'Missing' Bangladesh brothers resurface on Facebook with Islamic State flag in background

Ibrahim Hasan Khan and Junayed Hossain Khan, who figure on the list of youths suspected to have joined militancy after fleeing home, have reappeared through a photo on Facebook, with the Islamic State flag and guns.

The brothers appeared on the first list of 10 such youths released by police after the July 1 terror attack on a cafe in Dhaka's Gulshan.

Security forces had said the duo and the members of their family, residents of Bashundhara in Dhaka, had been missing for around a year.

The photo of the two brothers along with another person, who is yet to be identified, was posted on Ibrahim's Facebook wall on Wednesday night BdST. It was removed later.

A person who knew them has confirmed bdnews24.com of their identities.

Farhan Islam, who studies at Malaysia’s Sarawak campus of the Swinburne University of Technology, said he had been in the same school with Ibrahim in Saudi Arabia.

"I was shocked to see Ibrahim and his elder brother Junayed's photo on Facebook timeline. I saw another person in the photo. I haven't ever thought of seeing something like this," he said.

The DMP’s counterterrorism unit Deputy Commissioner Mohidul Islam said police were investigating the matter.

All three were seen wearing dark clothes, with glasses poured with dark drink in hands, in the photo. Firearms like rifles and pistols lay on a table and beside the chairs.

Farhan said the youth sporting sunglasses in the centre is Ibrahim and the person wearing red turban is Junayed.

Brothers Ibrahim Hasan Khan and Junayed Hossain Khan. Photo provided by security forces.

Shahadat Hossain Bachchu, the vice-president of the flat owners' association of the building in Bashundhara where the family had lived, said the family ‘have not been in the country' for around a year.

According to him, Ibrahim and Junayed's father Munir Hasan Khan lived in Saudi Arabia. He saw the brothers with their father for the last time more than a year ago.

"He (Munir) is tall and has beard. His sons are also tall and healthy. They did not usually stay in Dhaka for long."

Several photos on Ibrahim's Facebook wall capture a reunion of the former students of Bangladesh International School in Riyadh.

Farhan, who was a year’s junior to Ibrahim at the school, said he spoke with him in mid-2015, but could not possibly think that he had turned a militant.

"We had normal conversations like friends do, but talked nothing about religion."

Ibrahim posted this photo of him visiting Holey Artisan Bakery in Gulshan in June, 2015.

He also said he heard Ibrahim travelled to the US from Saudi Arabia in 2013.

"I've never thought he would join the IS," he added.

Abdur Rahman, the caretaker of the building where the brothers lived, told bdnews24.com in July that a person, identifying himself as Munir’s son-in-law, paid the service charge of the flat in April.

The pictures on Ibrahim's Facebook wall also included some of him visiting the Gulshan cafe that came under a terror attack on July 1.

At least 22 persons, including 17 foreigners, were killed in the siege.

Three of the six suspected attackers killed in raid by security forces emerged to be from renowned educational institutions for children of rich families.