Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina had earlier threatened to use force to end the Bangladesh Rifles mutiny, which broke out on Wednesday over pay and conditions. The border guards surrendered after tanks were brought into the center of Dhaka.
On Wednesday, the prime minister met with the leaders of the mutiny. She promised both to meet their demands and to ensure that they would not face prosecution. Border guards in Dhaka subsequently began laying down their weapons. However, gunfire broke out again on Thursday morning at a barracks in the Pilkhana area of Dhaka.
The mutiny then began to spread throughout the country, and reports of gunfire were heard near the barracks of the Bangladesh Rifles in the regions of Chittagong, Rajshahi, Feni, Teknaf, Satkania, Sylhet, Dinajpur and Naogaon.
"Lay down your guns immediately and go back to barracks. Do not force me to take tough actions or push my patience beyond tolerable limits," Hasina said on national television.
The conflict between the paramilitary border force's top brass and lower-ranking troops has been building up over the last 20 years because all of the top posts have been filled by Bangladeshi army officers, meaning long-serving border guard officers have no hope of promotion and live on very low wages in comparison to their superiors.
A number of media sources say that the number of dead could total over 100. Reports also said that the border guards had freed a number of hostages.
