A court in Bangladesh on Thursday ordered authorities to request Interpol to issue a red notice for the arrest of Tulip Siddiq, a British MP and the niece of former Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
Siddiq, who represents London's Hampstead and Highgate constituency in the UK, is accused of corruption in Bangladesh. According to the South Asian country’s anti‑corruption commission, she used her relationship with Hasina to influence the allocation of land in the upscale Gulshan area of the capital, Dhaka, to a private company. Siddiq’s mother is Hasina’s younger sister, Sheikh Rehana.
A senior judge in Dhaka issued the red notice order based on a petition from the corruption watchdog. Siddiq has already been sentenced to six years in prison in three other corruption cases tied to her aunt. She has denied all allegations, calling the verdicts a “complete farce."
In January last year, she resigned as economic secretary to the Treasury in the cabinet of Keir Starmer amid pressure linked to the controversy, saying the issue had become a "distraction."
The developments follow a student‑led uprising in August 2024 that toppled Hasina after 15 years in power. Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus took over days later as the head of an interim government, and elections were held earlier this month, on February 12. The new government is led by Bangladesh Nationalist Party chief Tarique Rahman, son of former President Ziaur Rahman and ex-Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, Bangladesh's first female prime minister and the main rival of Hasina.
Khaleda Zia passed away in December last year, days after Rahman returned home following 17 years in the UK.
