Two ‘militants’ held over bomb attacks on police in Dhaka

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Bangla Tribune Report
Published : 13:30, Oct 14, 2019 | Updated : 14:07, Oct 14, 2019

A bomb exploded near LGRD Minister Tazul Islam`s car at the Science Laboratory intersection in Dhaka on Aug 31 injuring two policemen, including a security detail for the cabinet member.Police have arrested two people for their alleged involvement in bomb attacks on the law enforcers at the capital's Gulistan and Science Laboratory intersection.
Suspects Mehedi Hasan Tamim and Abdullah Azmir were detained from Dhaka’s Mohammadpur late on Sunday (Oct 13) by the Dhaka metro police’s (DMP) Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime unit.
The two are operatives of Neo-JMB, an offshoot of the banned militant outfit Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh, counter-terror unit chief Monirul Islam told a media call on Monday (Oct 14).
“Tamim and Azmir are among the four people named by brothers, Farid Uddin Rumi and Jamal Uddin Rafik, who were held from Narayanganj on Sept 23. Both of them graduated from KUET [Khulna University of Engineering and Technology], just like Rafik,” he said.
Tamim was directly involved with the attacks on police — from carrying the bombs at the scene to hurling them and Azmir dealt with the explosives to make the crude bombs, added the senior police officer.

“Azmir is one of the four people seen in a so called viral IS [Islamic State] video. He works as an assistant engineer at corporate house, which had issued a walkie-talkie to him for official purposes. Azmir is seen in the video with that very walkie-talkie,” said Islam, the additional commissioner of DMP.

Suspects Mehedi Hasan Tamim and Abdullah Azmir were detained from Dhaka’s Mohammadpur late on Sunday (Oct 13) by the Dhaka metro police’s (DMP) Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime unit.Tamim and Azmir used to write for different blogs of Ansar-al-Islam, before taking up the ideology of IS, according to him.

They later formed a group to conduct attacks on police officials at different places in order to be noticed by IS, Monirul added.

Two traffic policemen and an Ansar member were injured on Apr 29, when a crude bomb exploded in front of a shopping complex near the Gulistan underpass.
On Aug 31, a bomb exploded near LGRD Minister Tazul Islam's car at the Science Laboratory intersection, injuring two policemen, including a security detail for the cabinet member.
Middle-East-based militant outfit Islamic State (IS) claimed responsibility for the attack, terror-watch organisation SITE Intelligence Group reported after the attack.
Investigators, however, dismissed it and blamed local terror outfits for the attacks.

/arr/zmi/
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