'JMB militant Sohel Mahfuz used Rajshahi den for training'

Sohel Mahfuz, who has been a key leader of banned militant outfit Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) for over a decade and supplied grenades that were used in Gulshan Café attack last year, visited Rajshahi militant den several times to train up his associates on Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDS).

Sohel has been coordinating the terror outfit in Rajshahi region, M Khurshid Hossain, deputy inspector general of police of Rajshahi range, said at a press briefing today as the law enforcers ended the operation at the den in Tanore upazila of Rajshahi.

Police tracked Sohel Mahfuz several times before but failed to arrest him, the DIG said.

“The Neo JMB leaders might have stored the explosives at the house in order to carry out subversive activities,” he also said.

While discussing operation "Rebirth", the DIG said the operation has been so named as the group was trying to reemerge under the banner of Neo JMB.

Last night, law enforcers ended the operation with the recovery of three suicide vests, a pistol, six bullets and a magazine there.

The bomb disposal unit entered the house around 11:00pm yesterday and diffused the locally made suicide vests, said Nisharul Arif, additional deputy inspector general of Rajshahi range.

“The suicide vests contained triacetone triperoxide (TATP) which is highly explosive and very risky to handle. That’s why the bomb disposal unit diffused them in a room at the two-storey earthen house,” the police official told our Rajshahi staff correspondent.

The recovery also included around Tk 2 lakh cash, a cache of books and CDs and a laptop, he said.

The vests were inside a cooking pot inside the house located at Dangapara, some 40km off Rajshahi city.

The law enforcers cordoned off the house of Ramjan Ali of Dangapara village under Pachandar union Sunday night following information that Ramjan and his family members are involved in militancy.

Ramjan has been involved with JMB since the time of notorious chief of the terror group Siddikul Islam Bangla Bhai and his son Ibrahim got involved with militancy back in 2012, the police official said.

Four members of “Neo JMB” along with four children surrendered early Sunday after law enforcers cordoned off the house suspecting it a militant den. The operation was jointly conducted by Rajshahi police headquarters, the Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) unit of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP), Rajshahi and Bogra police.