Staff Correspondent, CHT News
Friday, 26 December 2025
The United People’s Democratic Front (UPDF) has called
on people to organize themselves and remain prepared for future struggles.
This call was made in a message issued by the Central
Committee of the UPDF, addressed to its members and the general public, on the
occasion of the party’s 27th anniversary on Friday, 26 December 2025.
The verbatim text of the UPDF Central Committee’s
message is given below:
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Message to Members and the People on the Occasion of
the 27th Anniversary of the UPDF
Dear brothers and friends,
Today, “26 December,” is an unforgettable day in the
history of our struggle. On this day in 1998, our beloved party, the United
People’s Democratic Front (UPDF), was formed.
On this memorable occasion, we extend to you our
spirited revolutionary greetings. We pay deep respect and homage to the
memories of the heroic martyrs who sacrificed themselves in the struggle to
establish rights. We express our heartfelt affection and warm love to those
comrades who were seriously injured and left permanently disabled due to
attacks by enemies and traitors at different stages of the movement. We express
our solidarity with those who are currently imprisoned.
On this auspicious day, we also convey our greetings
to all those – both in the Chittagong Hill Tracts and in different parts of the
world – who have, in various ways, supported and contributed to the struggle
for the rights of the people. Above all, we extend our sincere thanks and
revolutionary salutations to those who, following the directives of the party’s
top leadership, continue to carry out their duties steadfastly at their
respective posts by resisting the combined attacks and subversive activities of
enemy forces and national traitors.
Comrades and friends,
The 27th anniversary of the UPDF is being observed at
a time when, despite the announcement of the schedule for the 13th National
Parliamentary Election, the environment required for a free, fair, and neutral
election is absent in reality. The situation in the Chittagong Hill Tracts is
particularly dire.
The UPDF—one of the main stakeholders in the
election—along with its leaders, activists, and supporters, is passing its days
in extreme hardship, having been displaced from homes and localities and
burdened with cases and arrest warrants. Army operations are still continuing
in UPDF-controlled areas. At the same time, harassment by identified groups
backed by the army is ongoing.
Setting up camps in schools and kyangs (Buddhist
temples) in remote villages, the army—together with newly masked armed
terrorist groups—has been raiding homes, harassing, humiliating, and physically
assaulting UPDF leaders, activists, and supporters, and vandalizing household
items and cooking utensils. In some places, mobile phones and money have also
been looted.
In Kaukhali, Nareichari, and Panchari, extortion,
ransom, and threats against ordinary people by an armed criminal gang are
taking place with the direct assistance of a corrupt section of army officers.
Just as fascist Hasina played a staged electoral game
by keeping the UPDF and other major political parties outside the electoral
process, no meaningful departure from that practice is visible even under the
caretaker government led by Dr. Yunus. Naturally, serious doubts, suspicion,
and uncertainty have arisen among the people about whether a fair election will
be held on schedule, what direction the country will take, and how the ongoing
situation in the Chittagong Hill Tracts will unfold.
In particular, following the announcement of the
election schedule for the 13th parliament, the shooting of a candidate in Dhaka
with intent to kill and his subsequent death while undergoing treatment in
Singapore; the rampage of extremist communal fundamentalist groups centered on
that incident; vandalism and arson at newspaper offices in Dhaka; attacks on
cultural institutions and destruction of musical instruments; the
medieval-style killing of Dipu Das, a garment worker from the Sanatan (Hindu)
community, in Bhaluka, Mymensingh, on false allegations of religious
defamation, followed by his body being burned in a frenzy and the circulation
of that incident on social media—have all created fear and terror among ethnic
and religious minority communities. These incidents do not bode well for the
country’s future.
This wave of extremist mob violence has also raised
its poisonous hood in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. A Pakistan-aligned section of
army officers is openly backing these extremist communal groups. They are
summoning people to army camps and instructing them whom to vote for. A
blueprint has been devised to ensure the electoral victory of a convicted
criminal, notorious as the “Butcher of the Mahalchari Rampage.” Emerging from
the filth of this vile conspiracy are reactionaries and collaborators among the
hill people—social outcasts and enemies of the masses, akin to sewer waste. A
headless group of so-called social workers is also joining this destructive,
anti-national-interest game.
In this context, the people of the hills must remain
vigilant against conspiracies to install extremist communal forces through the
upcoming election.
Dear friends,
The caretaker government led by Dr. Yunus has not only
failed to govern the country but has clearly taken the side of extremist
communal forces. As a result, extremist communal fundamentalist groups are
growing stronger by the day. Progressive-minded individuals and organizations,
liberal thinkers, writers, intellectuals, journalists, and cultural activists
are all deeply concerned about the current situation. Most frightened and
existentially threatened are ethnic nationalities and religious minority communities.
Even if a government is formed through the 13th
National Parliamentary Election, there is no guarantee that the “Hill Tracts
Accord” will be implemented. Moreover, the BNP is a party that carried out
military repression in the Chittagong Hill Tracts and facilitated settler
infiltration, seeking to turn the hill peoples into minorities and weaken them
in their own homeland, thereby destroying their existence.
Over the past twenty-eight years, the “Hill Tracts
Accord” has not been implemented. Although the Awami League, the party that
signed the Accord, remained in power for one and a half decades in a row, it
failed to implement it. The likelihood of the Awami League returning to state
power in the next decade is slim. In short, the future of the “Hill Tracts
Accord” is uncertain, and the existence of the hill peoples is facing a grave
threat.
The ruling clique continues all conspiracies to weaken
the people’s capacity for resistance. Much damage has already been done due to
the deception and betrayal of the ruling class and the political
shortsightedness of the Jana Samhati Samiti. This must not be allowed to happen
again. Now is the time to rise up. There is no benefit in lying idle and
lamenting over a dead accord.
There is no alternative path before the people of the
hills other than struggle and resistance.
“Self-reliance is the real strength.”
Our Call on the 27th Anniversary:
• Organize yourselves; be prepared for future
struggles!
• Follow the path directed by the UPDF—victory is
inevitable!
No Full Autonomy, No Rest!
Long Live UPDF!
26 December 2025
United People’s Democratic Front (UPDF)
Central Committee
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