President quits amid state of emergency

? The president Thursday declared a state of emergency, stepped down as leader of Bangladesh’s caretaker government and postponed this month’s elections following violent protests by a key political alliance that has said it would boycott the vote.

The government also indefinitely imposed an overnight curfew on Dhaka, the capital, and 60 other towns and cities. Soldiers already had been deployed across the country for election duties and were in place to enforce the curfew.

The dramatic announcements by President Iajuddin Ahmed were the latest twists in a tumultuous few months marked by increasing strife between rival political camps that has left at least 34 people dead since October and repeatedly paralyzed the South Asian country.

Ahmed did not say when the elections, originally scheduled for Jan. 22, would be held, and fears remained of further turmoil in a country with a history of military rule and violently bitter democratic politics.

“I’ve decided to step down as the chief adviser of the caretaker government and I will, in a couple of days, appoint a new interim leader to hold an election in which all parties will be able to participate,” Ahmed said in a televised speech.

In the meantime, one of his advisers, Fazlul Haque, would serve as the head of the caretaker government, he said.

Politics in this densely populated and grindingly poor country of 144 million people are so bitter that the constitution stipulates a caretaker government take over 90 days before elections to oversee the voting.