Police arrest another fugitive convict in 2002 attack on Hasina’s motorcade

Police have arrested another fugitive convict in the attack on Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s motorcade in Satkhira in 2002 when she was the leader of the opposition.

Dhaka Metropolitan Police’s Detective Branch arrested Tarikuzzaman alias Kanak in the 100 Feet Road area of Dhaka’s Mirpur on Sunday.

He was sentenced to four years in prison over the attack, said Rifat Rahman Shamim, a deputy commissioner of DMP’s Detective Branch.

Last month, police arrested Arifur Rahman Ranju, a former leader of the Kalaroa Government College unit of the BNP's student wing Chhatra Dal who was sentenced to 10 years in prison over his involvement in the attack.

Awami League chief Hasina’s motorcade was attacked on Aug 30, 2002 in front of the Kalaroa Upazila BNP office while she was on her way back to Dhaka from Satkhira after visiting the wife of a freedom fighter who had been raped.

Aside from the bomb attack and vandalism of cars, gunshots were also fired at Hasina.

Central leaders of the Awami League accompanying Hasina along with local activists and journalists were injured in the attack.

Moslem Uddin, the then general secretary of Kolaroa Awami League, later went to file a case over the incident at the Kolaroa police station but the law-enforcing agency refused to record it.

Moslem Uddin then filed a complaint with the Satkhira court on Sept 21, 2014, more than a decade after the attack. The court subsequently ordered the police to start a case on the basis of the complaint.

Police pressed formal charges against 50 people, including Habibul Islam Habib, a BNP MP at the time, following an investigation.

In February this year, a Satkhira court sentenced the accused to varying jail terms.