Mufti Hannan arrested

Mufti Mohammad Abdul Hannan, the mastermind of the assassination attempt on Sheikh Hasina and a key leader of Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HuJI), a banned Islamist outfit, was arrested from the capital's Badda area early Saturday.

During the drive, the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) also picked up his wife and four children but released them later.

RAB also arrested Muhibullah Mofiz, younger brother of Hannan from Tongi early Saturday.

The arrest took place against the backdrop of August 17 countrywide bomb blasts.

Police are also on hunt for his second-in-command Shakil, who used to identify himself as nephew of former Home Minister Air Vice Marshal (retd) Altaf Hossain Chowdhury, now the Commerce Minister.

A team from RAB headquarters, comprising Major Atiq and Major Ershad, raided a house at Maddhya Badda at around 4:30am and arrested Hannan and his pregnant wife, said sources in RAB legal and media wing.

The HuJI leader Hannan, who fought in Afghanistan against the Soviet invasion in late 80s, is accused in a case of plotting twice to assassinate the then Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in July 2000.

The police on July 21, 2000 had recovered a powerful timing device in a metallic container that weighed more than 76 kilograms at Sheikh Lutfor Rahman Ideal College in Kotalipara of Gopalganj where Hasina was to address a rally.

The container was planted only 50 feet away from the rostrum from where the then Prime Minister Hasina was scheduled to address the rally.

The key suspect in the plot was Mufti Abdul Hannan, a central committee member of the HuJI. He had allegedly been instrumental in the manufacture of the explosives at a soap factory – Sonar Bangla Chemical Industries Limited –– near Gopalganj.

On December 30, 2003 a special trial tribunal sentenced Mufti Hannan to life-term rigorous imprisonment in an arms and explosives case.

Judge Jahangir Alam Mollah of the Dhaka Speedy Trial Tribunal pronounced Mufti Abdul Hannan alias Abul Kalam guilty of the assassination attempt and handed down the verdict.

Mufti Hannan was absconding since the murder bid.

Four days after the unearthing the 76-kg explosives, police had recovered a huge quantity of bomb-making materials and a foreign-made revolver from a house that Mufti Hannan had rented at Hemangan in Gopalganj district town.

The HuJI intensified its subversive activities after the Awami League formed the government in June 1996. It was involved in a number of incidents, including the killing of journalist Shamsur Rahman, on July 16, 2000, in Jessore.

Later, police arrested 10 activists of the Harkat and sealed off its office at Khilgaon, Dhaka. Interrogations revealed that HuJI cadres had planned to kill 28 prominent intellectuals, including National Professor Kabir Choudhury, writer Taslima Nasreen and the Director General of the Islamic Foundation, late Maulana Abdul Awal.

It is believed that the HuJI members conducted at least 11 planned assassination attempts against Hasina during the tenure of ruling BNP-Jamaat coalition government in the last four years.

On September 21 this year, Gopalganj police arrested Harkatul Jihad leader Munshi Anisuzzaman, brother of Mufti Hannan, from his native village Kotalipara.

Earlier, he was arrested in July 2000 on charge of planting bomb at the meeting venue of Hasina. Later, he was released on bail. He went into hiding after August 17 bomb blasts.