Dhaka:

Bangladeshi garment makers closed 150 factories “indefinitely” on Saturday, officials said, as police laid sweeping charges against 11,000 workers in connection with violent protests demanding a higher minimum wage.

Violent protests demanding better wages broke out last month, leaving at least three workers dead and more than 70 factories vandalized or damaged, according to police.

A government-appointed panel on Tuesday raised the sector’s wages by 56.25 percent to Tk 12,500, but garment workers have rejected the hike, instead demanding a Tk 23,000 minimum wage.

On Thursday, 15,000 workers clashed with police on a major highway and vandalized a top plant, Tusuka, as well as a dozen other factories.

“Police have registered a case against 11,000 unidentified people over the attack on the Tusuka garment factory,” police inspector Mosharraf Hussain told AFP.

Bangladesh police often issue preliminary charges against thousands of people after large protests and political violence – without specifying their names, a tactic critics say is a way to crush dissent.

Bangladesh’s 3,500 garment factories contribute about 85 percent of its $55 billion annual exports, supplying many of the world’s top brands including Levi’s, Zara and H&M.

But conditions are dire for many of the sector’s 4 million workers, most of whom are women whose monthly wages, until recently, started at 8,300 taka ($75).

Human rights groups have previously warned that such mega cases initiated against thousands of unidentified people give police license to target innocent protesters.

The pay protests are a major challenge for Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who has ruled the country with an iron fist since 2009.

A revived opposition has challenged his rule as he prepares for elections before the end of January.

Police told AFP that 150 factories had closed in the major industrial towns of Ashulia and Ghazipur, north of the capital Dhaka, as manufacturers feared more strikes when Bangladesh’s working week begins on Saturday.

“Manufacturers invoked Section 13/1 of labor laws and indefinitely closed 130 factories in Ashulia, citing an illegal strike,” manufacturing center police chief Sarwar Alam told AFP.

Ashulia is home to some of the largest Bangladeshi factories, some of which employ over 15,000 workers in a single multi-storey plant.

Police fired rubber bullets and tear gas at about 10,000 workers in Ashulia on Thursday when they attacked officials and factories with bricks and stones.

Police chief Mohammad Sarovar Alam said at least 20 factories were also closed in Ghazipur, the country’s largest industrial area.

Minimum wage protests over the past two weeks have been the worst in more than a decade.

The prime minister has ruled out any further pay rises for workers and warned that violent protests could lead to job losses. “If they take to the streets to protest instigated by someone, they will lose their jobs, they will miss work and they will have to return to their villages,” Hasina said on Thursday.

“If these factories close, if production is disrupted, exports are disrupted, where will their jobs be? They have to understand that.”

But the unions rejected Hasina’s warning and staged protests.

They had rejected the panel’s decision because the salary increase does not match the rising costs of food, rent, health care and school fees for their children.

The Clean Clothes Campaign, a Netherlands-based garment workers’ rights group, has rejected the new pay levels as “poverty wages”.

Washington has condemned violence against protesting activists.

The United States, one of the largest buyers of Bangladesh-made garments, has demanded wages that “address the growing economic pressures facing workers and their families”.