PM Sheikh Hasina likely to attend Queen’s state funeral

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is likely to attend the state funeral of Queen Elizabeth II on September 19, owing to which her stay in London may be extended by a day, said a reliable source today (September 11, 2022).

On September 19, the Queen's coffin will be taken in a procession to Westminster Abbey for the state funeral, which will be a Bank Holiday in the UK.

The coffin will proceed through central London on Wednesday, and then will be laid in state at Westminster Hall. It will remain there for the next four days.

PM Hasina is scheduled to leave Dhaka for London on September 15. She is likely to leave for New York from London on September 19 after attending the funeral, the source told UNB.

World leaders and dignitaries have been paying tributes to the Queen, who died on Thursday at the age of 96.

Hasina will return home on October 4 after attending the 77th UN General Assembly in New York followed by a visit to Washington DC.

Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen and State Minister for Foreign Affairs Md Shahriar Alam will be accompanying the PM during her upcoming visits to London, New York and Washington, an official at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs told UNB.

Momen was not part of the PM's entourage during her just-concluded state visit to India (September 5-8), due to "health reasons".

The seventy-seventh session of the UN General Assembly opens on September 13 with the theme, "A watershed moment: transformative solutions to interlocking challenges."