The Telegraph - Calcutta : Opinion

Lee describes in his memoirs how Sheikh Mujibur Rahman “arrived in style…in his own aircraft” for the 1973 Commonwealth summit in Ottawa. “When I landed, I saw a parked Boeing 707 with ‘Bangladesh’ emblazoned on it. When I left, it was still standing on the same spot, idle for eight days, getting obsolescent without earning anything. As I left the hotel for the airport, two huge vans were being loaded with packages for the Bangladesh aircraft.” Compounding the irony, Mujib made a pitch for aid at the conference. Lee’s observation is that “the poorer the country, the bigger the Cadillacs they hired for their leaders” at the United Nations.