Woman among 3 found dead

Three suspected militants were found dead inside a “hideout” in Moulvibazar's Borohat as police wrapped up their 82-hour raid there yesterday.

With this, three houses, where law enforcers said militants were hiding , have been raided in the last nine days.

In all, 21 people, including 14 suspected militants, were killed. Police claim most of the militants blew themselves up to avoid arrests.

SWAT members entered the Borohat “hideout” around 11:00am yesterday and saw body parts of three “militants”, including a woman, lying scattered, said counterterrorism officials. They suspect the “militants” killed themselves by exploding bombs.

Police did not disclose their identities.

One of the three had directly taken part in carrying out the two powerful explosions near the Shibbari hideout in Sylhet, Monirul Islam, chief of the police's Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) unit, claimed at a media briefing after the operation ended.

The March 25 blasts claimed the lives of four civilians, two police officials and a top Rab official.

Talking to The Daily Star, Mohibul Islam Khan, deputy commissioner of the CTTC unit, said, “We believe two of the three militants were a couple. Their bodies were found in a toilet of the building. The other body was lying just outside the toilet.”

The male “militants” were between 25 and 30 while the woman looked around 25, he said.

CTTC Additional Deputy Commissioner Saiful Islam said they recovered some burnt documents and money from the bedroom of the duplex building.

Some powerful explosives, including improvised explosive devices (IEDs), were also recovered and then defused inside the building.

Police originally cordoned off the building around 1:30am on Wednesday and a SWAT team launched an assault codenamed “Operation Maximus” the next morning. Maximus is a Latin term for “greatest”. 

However, whenever the special force tried to close in on the hideout on Friday, the “militants” pushed them back by exploding bombs, forcing police to eventually suspend their operation as soon as dark fell.

The offensive led by the Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) resumed at the building on Abu Shah Madrasha Road in Kusumbag around 8:43am yesterday.

A number of gunshots were heard between 9:30am and 10:00am. There was also a huge explosion. Around 11:00am, SWAT members entered the building and found the three bodies lying scattered.  

Later, the bodies were taken to Moulvibazar Sadar Hospital for autopsy.

On Thursday, police ended their operation at Moulvibazar's Nasirpur, some 20km from Borohat. They found body parts of seven to eight people, including those of four children. Police claimed they included “Neo JMB” militants who blew themselves up to avoid arrest.

One of the children was just two to three months old. The other three were below 12, said doctors who performed autopsies on the bodies.

Earlier, four militants were killed in an army-led operation, codenamed “Operation Twilight”, on the hideout in Shibbari's Atia Mahal. The two powerful bombs exploded at two separate places within 400 metres of the den while the operation was still underway.

Hours after the operation ended on March 27, police cordoned off the two suspected dens in Nasirpur and Borohat of Moulvibazar.

Both the houses are owned by a Bangladeshi expatriate in England.

CTTC CHIEF BRIEFING

While briefing reporters in Moulvibazar's Kusumbag after yesterday's operation, CTTC unit chief Monirul Islam said, “With the use of technology, we came to know that one of them [who exploded the bombs in Shibbari area] might have been hiding in the Borohat den.”

The militant returned to the building after carrying out the attack, he said, adding they had assessed that one bomb-making expert and another militant might be inside the building with some powerful explosives.

“Later, we learnt that three militants -- two men and one woman -- were holing up there,” he said.

On the first day of the operation, a woman, sensing police presence, went to the rooftop of the building and hurled two grenades at the law enforcers. One of them exploded but the other laid in a nearby crop field unexploded, Monirul said.

However, police on Thursday had said after they cordoned off the building, a woman opened a window and threw a grenade at the law enforcers. The grenade did not explode.

“We had a plan to capture them alive. We had repeatedly asked them to surrender but they refused,” Monirul said, adding the “militants” carried out a huge explosion after the SWAT tried to approach them.

SITUATION BECOMING NORMAL IN BOROHAT

Locals in Borohat area were relieved to see the operation end. They had been living in panic since the operation began.

“We were wondering when it would end,” said Mir Sabbir, a local, adding that the bangs of bombs and sounds of gunshots were traumatising the children.

Most of the shops and the educational institutions in the area were kept closed, said several locals.