Three ‘JMB activists’ held in Rajshahi’s Bagmara with bombs

Three activists of banned militant outfit Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) have been arrested with bombs in Rajshahi, says the Rapid Action Battalion.

The elite police unit claimed the men were planning a terror attack on Mar 7 (Monday), the day Bangladesh observes the 45th anniversary of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s historic Race Course address.

On this day in 1971, the Bangabandhu had appealed to all Bangalees to join the independence struggle against Pakistan.

The Rajshahi-based RAB unit said the men had been arrested early on Sunday morning from a village in the Bagmara Upazila.

They had been identified as Amunir Rahman Supan, 35, Abu Sayeed Manik and PM Shahin Shah Tanin, said Assistant Superintendent of Police Alok Biswas.

The elite force had swung into action after the people of Purbaparha village informed it about the presence of three unfamiliar men in the area, said the RAB official.

As many as 16 crude bombs, seven petrol bombs and jihadi literature were found on them, said Biswas.

“The initial interrogation has revealed that they are JMB activists, who were preparing a terror attack on programmes planned on the historic Mar 7.”

Rajshahi’s Bagmara Upazila has been in the news of late because of militant activities.

A suicide bomber blew himself up at an Ahmadiyaa mosque in December, leaving 10 people injured.

In August 2015, RAB arrested a man, identified as Lutfur Rahman, claiming he was an adviser to top JMB leaders Shaykh Abdur Rahman and Siddikur Rahman, alias ‘Bangla Bhai’, hanged in 2007 for the murder of two judges in Jhalakathi.

The law enforcers said Rahman was trying to reorganise the group in the Rajshahi region.

The JMB had emerged in Bangladesh in the late 1990s under the leadership of Shaykh Abdur Rahman, a veteran of the Afghan war of the 80s.

The JMB had come under the scanner in 2003 after security forces got wind of its existence following the interrogation of militants arrested in the northern districts of Dinajpur and Chapainawabganj.

Shayakh Abdur Rahman had egged another JMB top gun Siddikur Rahman alias ‘Bangla Bhai’ to form the ‘Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh’ (JMJB) in mid-2003.

On May 20, 2004, Bangla Bhai came under security glare following the brutal murder of two people— Idris Ali and Abdul Kaiyum Badsha - in Naogaon’s Raninagar.

In February 2005, the government banned the JMB but, on Aug 17 the same year, the group triggered serial blasts across 63 districts in Bangladesh.

Shaykh Abdur Rahman was arrested from Sylhet in March next year. Four days later, Bangla Bhai was arrested from Mymensingh.

The two and four other JMB leaders were hanged on Mar 30, 2007 over the murders of two Jhalakathi judges.