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Govt to downsize CHT police

800 cops to be redeployed in crime pockets across country

NURUL ALAM, Chittagong
The government is likely to downsize police strength in the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) soon by withdrawing over 800 police personnel from the three hill districts for their redeployment in most vulnerable crime pockets in other parts of the country, highly placed sources said.
Downslide in law and order amid
bomb blasts and other incidents of violence and crimes prompted the home ministry to propose pullout of a large number of police personnel from the CHT districts -- Rangamati, Khagrachhari and Bandarban -- and their redeployment elsewhere to beef up security. The proposal was sent to the Armed Forces Division through the Prime Minister's Office about a month back.
The authorities in the CHT have
agreed to spare 800 policemen, the sources said.
Presently 3,600 policemen are posted in 27 police stations in the three hill districts in addition to army, Bangladesh Rifles, Armed Police Battalion and Village Defence Party (VDP) personnel.
Moreover, steps are on to set up two more police stations at Sajek and Parua under Rangamati district
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and Baichhari under Banderban, a police official said.
The home ministry is trying to relocate policemen from the CHT to other areas as a big security force is deployed to ensure peace in the hill districts.
A senior official in the CHT said, " Initially we got a proposal to send back most of the policemen but we agreed to spare only 800 because we need the rest to guard the villages of Bangalee settlers and maintain legal procedures relating to arrest of terrorists and other criminals or recovery of dead bodies after an incident."
He explained, "If army personnel nab terrorists or other troublemakers, law requires them to hand over the elements to police."
Meanwhile, State Minister for Home Lutfozzaman Babar yesterday visited Khagrachhari and also went to some police camps in the district.
The local authorities apprised him of the necessity of keeping a certain number of policemen in the district.
The CHT saw an end to two decades of insurgency with the signing of a peace accord between indigenous rebels known as Shantibahini and the then Awami League government in December 1997.