Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) chairman and election candidate Tarique Rahman (center) casts his ballot at a polling station during Bangladesh's general election in Dhaka on February 12, 2026. MONZUR MORSED RICKY / AFP
The Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) on Friday claimed a thumping win in the first elections held since a deadly 2024 uprising, with leader Tarique Rahman poised to become prime minister.
Final results are still to come, but the United States was swift to offer its congratulations to Rahman and the BNP for an "historic victory", its embassy in Dhaka said.
Rahman had told AFP two days before polling he was "confident" that his party – crushed during the 15 years of ousted premier Sheikh Hasina's autocratic rule – would regain power in the South Asian nation of 170 million people.
"This victory was expected. It is not surprising that the people of Bangladesh have placed their trust in a party... capable of realizing the dreams that our youth envisioned during the uprising," Salahuddin Ahmed, a leading BNP committee member, told AFP Friday.
