'Un-Islamic' Statue Of Lady Justice Taken Down In Bangladesh
NEW DELHI (CBSNewYork/AP) - A statue of Lady Justice erected outside the supreme court in Bangladesh last December has been taken down.
The statue depicted a woman holding a scale in one hand and sword in the other. The figure is wrapped in a sari.
Islamists oppose "idol worship" and considered the statue un-Islamic.
Students from Islamic schools around Bangladesh threatened to launch a mass movement if the government didn't remove the statue.
Sculptor Mrinal Haque said he feels terrible.
"This is injustice, this is not fair," Haque told the Associated Press. "My mother has died and I can easily compare my present feeling with that loss."
About a dozen students from a leftist group marched at Dhaka University to protest the statue's removal.
Bangladesh has 160 million people and a secular government, though the influence of radical Islam has been increasing.
In 2008, protests led to the removal of a statue of a Bangladeshi poet near the airport.
Dozens of atheists, liberal writers, bloggers, foreigners and more have been targeted and killed in Bangladesh in recent years, the Associated Press reported.
(© Copyright 2017 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
