DHAKA, Dec. 30 -- The Detective Branch of Bangladesh Police Monday night arrested a top leader of the country's main opposition party. Vice-Chairman of Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) Shamsher Mobin Chowdhury, also a former foreign secretary, was arrested shortly after he came out of the residence of ex-Prime Minister Khaleda Zia who virtually remained confined to her house since the opposition alliance launched "March for Democracy" program on Dec. 24.

Chowdhury and Khaleda's two advisers -- Reaz Rahman and Sabihuddin Ahmed -- entered the opposition chief's residence around 5:00 p.m. to help her with a meeting with British High Commissioner in Dhaka Robert Gibson.

Soon after Gibson's departure, Chowdhury came out and was arrested by the detectives at about 7:30 p.m. local time. "Reaz Rahman managed to leave the house safely but Chowdhury was arrested," Sabihuddin Ahmed told Xinhua over phone.

"I'm staying inside the opposition chief's house to avoid arrest," he said but refrained from giving any details about the agenda of the meeting.

Deputy Commissioner of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) Masudur Rahman told Xinhua that Chowdhury was detained for "instigating political violence."

A BNP spokesman who did not want to be named termed the charge against Chowdhury as "totally false and fake."

He said Chowdhury, who served as Bangladesh's foreign secretary from October 2001 to March 2005, can never be involved in any such activity as instigates violence.

The arrest aimed at weakening opposition's ongoing movement demanding parliament polls under a non-party caretaker government, he added.

Khaleda's 18-party alliance boycotted the general elections slated for Jan. 5 and has been trying to put pressure on Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's government to scrap the polls.