Prime Minister Keir Starmer of Britain suffered a new blow on Tuesday when his anticorruption minister, Tulip Siddiq, quit her post weeks after being named in an embezzlement investigation in Bangladesh. Ms. Siddiq, 42, is the niece of Sheikh Hasina, the former prime minister of Bangladesh, who resigned last year after 15 years in power and fled the country amid a broad student-led protest movement against her repressive rule. A junior minister in Mr. Starmer’s government, Ms. Siddiq had previously referred herself to the prime minister’s ethics adviser for investigation after questions arose over whether she had benefited financially from her ties to Ms. Hasina. Ms. Siddiq has dismissed the allegations against her as politically motivated and insisted that she did nothing wrong. But in an official letter of resignation to Mr. Starmer on Tuesday, she wrote that the media focus on her risked diverting attention from the government’s political agenda.

Source: The Times January 14, 2025 16:38 UTC