Former Bangladesh Prime Minister Khaleda Zia passes away at 80

Khaleda Zia, Bangladesh's first female prime minister, has passed away after a prolonged illness. The Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) confirmed the news on Tuesday. According to a Reuters report, 80-year-old Khaleda Zia was suffering from liver complications. Her doctors said she was also suffering from arthritis and diabetes, and had a history of heart disease.

Khaleda Zia served as the prime minister of Bangladesh twice, from 1991 to 1996 and from 2001 to 2006. She was the wife of former President and BNP founder Ziaur Rahman. Her elder son, Tarique Rahman, who is the acting chairman of the BNP, had been living in London since 2008 and returned to Bangladesh this month. Her younger son, Arafat Rahman, died of a heart attack in 2015.

Amid a political crisis, Khaleda Zia was released from jail on August 6, 2024, after which she traveled to London for better treatment, and returned to Bangladesh four months later, on May 6. For decades, Bangladesh's politics has revolved around two leaders, Awami League chief Sheikh Hasina and BNP chief Khaleda Zia. The media has dubbed the political rivalry between the two as the "Battle of the Begums." Since the 1990s, almost every election has seen power alternating between Sheikh Hasina and Khaleda Zia.

The two leaders had jointly campaigned against military rule in the 1980s, but their political feud deepened after the restoration of democracy in 1991 and Khaleda Zia's appointment as prime minister. Khaleda Zia was born in 1945 and had no family background in politics. In 1960, she married army officer Ziaur Rahman. During Bangladesh's war of independence in 1971, Ziaur Rahman declared the independence of Bangladesh on radio. After the assassination of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in 1975, the country plunged into political instability, and Ziaur Rahman became president in 1977, founding the BNP. He was killed during a military coup in Chittagong on May 30, 1981.

After her husband's death, the BNP began to splinter, and at the urging of party leaders, Khaleda Zia took the reins of the party in 1984. With her victory in the first democratic elections in 1991, she became Bangladesh's first female prime minister. Khaleda Zia's death is being seen as the end of an era in Bangladeshi politics.