Dhaka: Tax authorities in Bangladesh have decided to unfreeze the bank accounts of Bangladesh Nationalist Party President Khaleda Zia. Let us tell you that the bank accounts of Bangladesh Nationalist Party President Khaleda Zia will be opened after 17 years.

The National Board of Revenue (NBR) on Monday directed banks to unfreeze the accounts of BNP Chairperson Zia. This decision has been taken after former Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina left the country.

BNP demanded

In August 2007, the NBR's Central Intelligence Cell directed banks to freeze the accounts of the BNP chairperson, who has been elected Bangladesh's prime minister twice since 1990. The decision was based on the recommendation of a panel formed during the then army-backed caretaker government, a senior NBR official said. The BNP has on several occasions demanded that they be frozen.

The then caretaker government had also blocked Sheikh Hasina's bank accounts, but they were opened after she became prime minister.

Khaleda was the Prime Minister of Bangladesh from 2001 to October 2006

An interim government led by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus was sworn in on August 8. Zia, 79, was released from jail after 76-year-old Hasina fled to India on August 5. Zia was Bangladesh's prime minister from March 1991 to March 1996 and again from June 2001 to October 2006.

The NBR said it received an application from Khaleda's lawyer on Sunday seeking lifting of the freeze on the accounts.

"Since there is no tax-related investigation pending in respect of them, we have advised the banks to unlock all their accounts. We have asked them to take immediate action and provide a compliance report," the official was quoted as saying.