Police arrest two more ‘Ansarullah members’ in Dhaka

Dhaka Metropolitan Police’s Detective Branch claimed Monday of arresting two more members of banned militant outfit Ansarullah Bangla Team (ABT) in Dhaka.

DB’s Deputy Commissioner Mashrukur Rahman Khaled said the two were arrested from Faridabad and Kamrangirchar early on Monday.
 
He identified them as ‘Nayeem’ alias ‘Saiful’ alias ‘Saad’ and ‘Sohail’ alias ‘Sovel’. Both are teachers of two local madrasas.
 
Last month, police released photos of six ABT operatives, who were suspects in the murders of writers, bloggers and publishers, with a promise of rewards for information about them.
 
Then, law enforcers identified a man shot dead in an ‘encounter’ with DB officials early on Jun 18 as ‘Shariful’, one of the six wanted men, and claimed he was an important member of the ABT’s ‘operations wing’.
 
They said he had directly taken part in the killing of writer-blogger Avijit Roy and joined similar attacks on other bloggers and publishers.
 

However, two men while trying to collect the body a day later at Dhaka Medical College Hospital had identified Shariful as Mukul Rana. They had identified themselves to reporters as Mukul’s brother-in-law and cousin.

They had also shown reporters the National Identity Card of Mukul, whose face in the photo looked similar to that of Shariful in images provided by police.

DC Mashrukur Rahman Khaled said that the two arrested on Monday were not involved in any of the recent murders, but were recruiting new members for the banned outfit.

He promised to brief the media later.

The government had banned ABT in May last year. Prior to that, Hizb-ut Tahrir was banned in 2009 and four others including the JMB in 2005.