Bangladesh Deploys Elite Force Amid Poll Fears

Bangladesh deployed some 6,000 elite soldiers who fanned out across the country on Wednesday as intelligence reports warned that the main contenders in a Dec. 29 election may be targeted by Islamic militants.

Former prime ministers Begum Khaleda Zia and Sheikh Hasina have also said their lives are at risk.

Security fears increased after officials seized live grenades and a bomb with a timing device near a spot where Khaleda had addressed one of her several campaign rallies on Tuesday.

Outlawed Islamist groups including the Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen, blamed for countrywide bomb attacks in 2005, have threatened the politicians with strikes ahead of the election, police said.

The radical Islamists want to turn Muslim-majority secular Bangladesh into a sharia-based Islamic state.

"The RAB (Rapid Action Battalion) personnel will act as a strike force, along with army troops, during and before the election, helping the civil administration and election commission conduct the vote peacefully," a senior government official said on Wednesday.

Many political analysts suspect Bangladesh could see a spate of violence in the run-up to the polls and after the elections, when the losing party is expected to reject the results and call for protests -- something that has been a tradition in Bangladesh politics.

Analysts and diplomats expect no immediate departure from this. The parties of Hasina and Khaleda, who rotated as prime ministers over 15 years to October 2006, are unlikely to break away from the acrimony of the past.

The U.S. State Department, fearing instability and violence, has warned its citizens in Bangladesh or those planning to travel there that the security situation during the election period could be fluid.

Separately, the Eurasia Group, a London-based watchdog, said on Tuesday: "Political instability will likely persist even after the 29 December general elections return the country to elected, civilian government.

"There are no guarantees that the two main political parties - the Awami League and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party - or the military will accept the election results. Neither party is also likely to adopt a more mature approach to politics."

Many hope a stable, democratically chosen government will help the impoverished Indian Ocean coastal nation of more than 140 million people to attract much-needed investment and aid.