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Hasina, 76, had been in power since 2009 but was accused of rigging elections in January and then watched millions of people take to the streets over the past month demanding she quit.<\/p>\n
Hundreds of people died as security forces sought to quell the unrest, but the protests grew and Hasina finally fled Bangladesh aboard a helicopter on Monday as the military turned against her.<\/p>\n
Army chief General Waker-Uz-Zaman announced Monday afternoon on state television that Hasina had resigned and the military would form an interim government.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe country has suffered a lot, the economy has been hit, many people have been killed \u2014 it is time to stop\u00a0the\u00a0violence,\u201d said Waker, shortly after jubilant crowds stormed and looted Hasina\u2019s official residence.<\/p>\n
Waker was expected to meet student leaders on Tuesday, to hear their demand for the 84-year-old microfinance pioneer Yunus to lead the government.<\/p>\n
\u2018In Dr. Yunus we trust\u2019<\/h2>\n
The students also want the dissolution of parliament, a call echoed by the key opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), who have demanded elections within three months.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn Dr. Yunus, we trust,\u201d Asif Mahmud, a key leader of the Students Against Discrimination (SAD) group, wrote on Facebook.<\/p>\n
Yunus has not commented on the call, but in an interview with India\u2019s The Print, he said Bangladesh had been \u201can occupied country\u201d under Hasina.<\/p>\n
\u201cToday all the people of Bangladesh feel liberated,\u201d it quoted Yunus as saying.<\/p>\n
Streets in Dhaka were largely peaceful on Tuesday \u2014 with traffic resuming and shops opening, but government offices mainly closed \u2014 after a day of chaotic violence saw at least 113 people killed.<\/p>\n
Millions of Bangladeshis flooded the streets of Dhaka to celebrate after Waker\u2019s announcement on Monday.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel so happy,\u201d said Sazid Ahnaf, 21, comparing the events to the independence war that split the nation from Pakistan more than five decades ago.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have been freed from a dictatorship.\u201d<\/p>\n
Deadliest day<\/h2>\n
But there were also scenes of chaos and anger, with police reporting mobs launching revenge attacks on Hasina\u2019s allies.<\/p>\n
It was the deadliest day since protests began in early July, with at least 413 people killed overall, according to an AFP tally based on police, government officials and doctors at hospitals.<\/p>\n
Protesters stormed parliament and torched TV stations, while some smashed statues of Hasina\u2019s father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the country\u2019s independence hero.<\/p>\n
Others set a museum dedicated to the former leader on fire, flames licking at portraits in destruction barely thinkable just hours before when Hasina still had the loyalty of the security forces in her autocratic grip.<\/p>\n
Offices of Hasina\u2019s Awami League across the country were torched\u00a0and\u00a0looted, eyewitnesses told AFP.<\/p>\n
Some businesses and homes owned by Hindus \u2014 a group seen by some in the Muslim-majority nation as having been close to Hasina \u2014 were also attacked, witnesses said.<\/p>\n
Political prisoners freed<\/h2>\n
The unrest began last month in the form of protests against civil service job quotas and then escalated into wider calls for Hasina to stand down.<\/p>\n
Her government was accused by rights groups of misusing state institutions to entrench its hold on power and stamp out dissent, including through the extrajudicial killing of opposition activists.<\/p>\n
The army chief met President Mohammed Shahabuddin late Monday, alongside key opposition leaders, with the president\u2019s press team saying it had been \u201cdecided to form an interim government\u00a0immediately\u201d.<\/p>\n
Shahabuddin also ordered the release of prisoners from the protests, as well as former prime minister and key opposition leader Khaleda Zia, 78.<\/p>\n
Zia, who is in poor health, was jailed by her arch-rival Hasina for graft in 2018.<\/p>\n
Mothers of some of the hundreds of political prisoners secretly jailed under Hasina\u2019s rule waited outside a military intelligence force building in Dhaka on Tuesday, hoping for news.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need answers,\u201d\u00a0said Sanjida Islam Tulee, a coordinator of Mayer Daak, meaning \u201cThe Call of the Mothers\u201d, a group campaigning for the release of people detained by Hasina\u2019s security forces.<\/p>\n
Hasina\u2019s fate is also uncertain. She fled the country by helicopter, a source close to the ousted leader told AFP.<\/p>\n
Media in neighbouring India reported Hasina had landed at a military airbase near New Delhi.<\/p>\n
A top-level source said she wanted to \u201ctransit\u201d on to London, but calls by the British government for a UN-led investigation into \u201cunprecedented levels of violence\u201d put that into doubt.<\/p>\n
Bangladesh has a long history of coups.<\/p>\n
The military declared an emergency in January 2007 after widespread political unrest and installed a military-backed caretaker government\u00a0for\u00a0two\u00a0years.<\/p>\n
Michael Kugelman, director of the South Asia Institute at the Washington-based Wilson Center, warned that Hasina\u2019s departure \u201cwould leave a major vacuum\u201d and that the country was in \u201cuncharted territory\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe coming days are critical,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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