Bangladesh's former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will defy a ban by the military-backed interim government and return to the country on Monday, a close aide of the Awami League chief has said.
"She remained firm to her decision to return home on April 23," Abdus Sobhan Golap told the Channel-I-TV from London, where Hasina is currently staying on her way back home from the US.
Golap said Hasina met several members of the British House of Commons on Friday.
The development came a day after a senior adviser of the interim cabinet Abdul Matin said 'steps' will be taken against Hasina if she returned home.
The Home Ministry on Tuesday issued a press note saying the government took a 'temporary step' to restrict the Aawami League chief's return home for her recent 'provocative and inflammatory' remarks against the government and law enforcement agencies.
While she was away on a vacation to the US to meet her ailing daughter-in-law, Hasina was also charged with abetting the killing of five persons in political violence last year.
Meanwhile, Hasina's arch rival Khaleda Zia has reportedly asked the caretaker government trying to force her into exile to allow her son Tareque to accompany her while seeking one last meeting with her party colleagues
The New Age newspaper quoting unidentified 'family source' said the former premier 'has been trying to delay the departure as the government is yet to settle some issues, including her demand that her son Tareque (Rahman) be allowed to go with her.'
'The government is yet to fulfil another of her demands to allow her to meet some senior leaders of her Bangladesh Nationalist Party to settle how the party would be run in her absence,' the source told the newspaper.
Earlier reports said Zia was 'packed up and ready to fly out' under a 'negotiated deal' with the government, prompting newsmen to keep a constant vigil on Dhaka's main Zia International Airport.
Security forces on early Monday detained Zia's younger son Arafat Rahman Koko for nearly 24 hours, heightening speculation that she could be under pressure to go into exile.
In a related development, the High Court on Thursday asked the government to explain its stand on Zia following a writ petition by a BNP activist alleging that she could be exiled against her will, an allegation denied by the Attorney General's office.
The court will hear the petition on Sunday.
Bangladesh came under the military-backed emergency rule on January 11 amid heightened political tensions between Sheikh Hasina's Awami League and Zia's BNP, which spilled into the streets and resulted in clashes between the two sides.
