Dhaka - At least eight people have died of heat stroke this week during a nearly weeklong heat wave in Bangladesh, reports from the countryside said Tuesday. Five people died of heat stroke and heat-related ailments in the northern districts of Rangpur, Kurigram, Lalmonirhat and Bogra while three others died in the southern districts of Bhola, Jessore and Gopalganj, the bangladeshnews24. com news agency reported, quoting officials.

Many others across the country fell sick because of the heat.

Mumbai, Apr. 28 : India will get the lion’s share of the 2011 World Cup matches, given the unstable and precarious security and political situation in the three other host countries – Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

Addressing a press conference here, International Cricket Council (ICC) CEO Haroon Lorgat said that India will host 29 matches in eight venues, Sri Lanka would host 12 matches in three venues and Bnagladesh would host eight matches in two venues, adding that in all, 49 matches would be played at 13 venues in three countries.

Dhaka - Bangladesh on Monday opened a desk at the country's main airport to screen visitors coming from countries affected by swine flu as part of its effort to prevent spread of the influenza, officials said. "The incoming passengers have been asked to fill out a self-declaration form on arrival and advised to appear before the desk if they feel fever," Mahmudur Rahman, the director of the Institute of Epidemiology, Disease Control and Research, said after an emergency meeting, which reviewed the country's preparations against the influenza threat.

Dhaka  - Bangladesh's Awami League-led alliance government is proposing to restrict privatisation of state-owned enterprises, after bitter experience with past divestments, a news report said Sunday.

"We have no plan to privatise any more state-owned enterprises for the time being," the Daily Star newspapers quoted Industries Minister Dilip Barua as saying at a conference on industrial policy.

The minister criticised the handling of 76 state-run entrepreneurs privatised since 1994.

Dhaka - Saudi Arabia promised to recruit more Bangladeshi workers, while reassuring Dhaka that complications over work permits faced by over 2 million Bangladeshi workers already in the kingdom would be resolved, Bangladeshi Foreign Minister Dipu Moni said Saturday. Moni made the comments while briefing reporters on the recent five-day visit by Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wazed to the kingdom.

Dhaka - Bangladesh launched Saturday an improved livelihood programme worth about 80 million dollars for the coastal farmers devastated by the Super-cyclone Sidr in late 2007, officials said. Initially, the Improved Livelihood for Sidr-Affected Rice Farmers Project, funded by the United States, will benefit some 280,000 farm families through restoring high-yielding rice production in eight cyclone-battered southern districts.