B'desh president meets party chiefs in deadlock

DHAKA, Dec 2 (Reuters) President Iajuddin Ahmed set up meetings with the leaders of Bangladesh's two main political parties today to discuss a deepening political crisis ahead of parliamentary elections in January.

Bangladesh Nationalist Party chief Begum Khaleda Zia met the president first while the head of the Awami League was expected later, a spokesman for the presidential palace said.

''Khaleda Zia has discussed political issues with the president and we are now expecting Awami League chief Sheikh Hasina to arrive and put forward her points for a solution to the persistent political impasse,'' the spokesman said.

Khaleda and Hasina were invited by the state president, who heads an interim government in charge of conducting the polls.

The two women, who have ruled the country by turn for the last 15 years, have not spoken to each other for about 10 years.

Iajuddin's invitation came a day before a transport blockade that is likely to paralyse much of the country -- the third in three weeks.

Previous blockades have often been violent and at least 40 people have been killed in fighting between rival groups since Khaleda ended a five-year term as prime minister in October.

The warring party leaders are crossing swords over Bangladesh's Election Commission, which has set a voting date for January 21.

The constitution says a new election must be held within three months of the end of the previous government's tenure.

Khaleda ended her five-year tenure as prime minister late in October, handing power to the caretaker administration.

Hasina, chief of Awami League, rejected the poll date and related schedules, saying they were announced in haste. She also has said voter lists were riddled with false names.

A US based election monitor said today the voter list in the country of some 137 million people contains 12.2 million false names.

''Bangladesh's voters' list has approximately 12.2 million names which are either in error or are duplicates,'' a report by the Washington-based National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI) said.

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