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JMB targets to kill high-ups

'Acting chief along with 6 other operatives held; militants communicated with IS, says DB

M Abul Kalam Azad and M Rahman
Seven members of Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh, including its acting chief, have been arrested at Ashulia.
They were allegedly plotting to attack WIPs to get local and international attention.
Following up intelligence, Detective Branch of Police raided the Landing Port Station area by theTurag and made the arrests around 1:00pm onThursday.
The seven are acting JMB chief Abdullah Al-Tasnim Nahid, 29, Md Naim Ali, 28, Md Sikander Ali Noki, 25, Mahmud-ibn-Basher,
23, Md Masud Billah, 26, Fuad Hasan, 18, and Ali Ahmed, 24.
The arrestees were paraded before the media at Dhaka Metropolitan Police's public relations office yesterday.
At the briefing, police officials said some JMB operatives had communicated with the Islamic State (IS) in leaders and were planning to go to Iraq and Syria to fight there alongside IS men.
Off the record, some police officials talked about the re-emergence of the banned Islamist outfit JMB.
During the raid, the detectives also recovered 10 kilogrammes of gel-mixed chemicals, fourbronze idols and some books and leaflets on militancy.
In preliminary interrogation, the arrestees told investigators they were preparing to attack the motorcades of WIPs and some other important
people with firearms and explosives.
"Following online contacts, the JMB has been recruiting jihadists [fighters] to join the IS," a senior official of the DBtoldThe Daily Star.
JMB acting chiefNahid, who got out earlier this year from prison, was appointed acting chief of the outfit by JMB’s ameer Saidur Rahman, now in Kashimpur Jail, the DB official said.
Nahid with the help of other fellow fugitives started reviving the outfit by recruiting members, including women, gathering firearms and ammunition, and training new recruits at a camp inThanchi of Bandarban.
They were aiming to recruit private university students as part of their plan to regroup the outfit and take it to the global stage.
"Like Ansarullah Bangladesh Team, a radical Islamist outfit that nurtures al-Qaeda's ideology, the JMB also formed an assassination team," Joint Commissioner of DMP Monirul Islam told The Daily Star.
"By carrying out attacks, they wanted to let everyone know about their presence in the country and inspire their leaders, operatives and followers and revive the outfit," Monirul said at the briefing.
Some top JMB leaders, including condemned convicts Salahuddin Salehin, in-charge of JMB's Sylhet-Mymensingh region, and Jahidul Islam alias "Boma Mizan", an explosives expert, are reportedly staying in Bashirhat of West Bengal in India. They frequently enter Bangladesh and meet JMB men to plot operations, said investigators.
On February 23, JMB men ambushed a prison van carrying Salehin, Mizan and its Khulna divisional commander Mohammad Rakib Hasan Russell alias Hafez Mahmud at Trishal of Mymensingh. Rakib was later arrested and killed in Rab shootout while the other two managed to cross the border.
"They had plotted to carry out a Trishal-style attack to snatch JMB boss Saidur Rahman," Monirul claimed.
A senior police official, involved in counter-militancy, said some behind-bars JMB top bosses met each other in prison and at courts to plan revival of the outfit.
The official said Ansarullah Bangla Team's "spiritual leader" Jasimuddin Rahmania and JMB ameer Saidur met at Kashimpur Jail. "During the last Eid, they held a congregation inside the
jail. Some 200 inmates attended the event."
Rahmania had given the sermon while Saidur conducted the prayers.
Like the acting JMB chief, many jailed militants are getting out and joining their outfits and the law enforcement agencies know little about it.
Monirul admitted that they did not know about the release of Nahid, elder brother Abdullah Al-Sohail who was sentenced to death for carrying out a bomb attack at Gazipur court on November 29,2005.
The government is committed to combatting militancy but there is no mechanism for a concerted effort to fight the criminals, a number of police officials said requesting anonymity.
There should be a unit dedicated to fighting militancy, Monirul said, adding that the JMB had spread its network to the upazila level.
Most family members of Nahid are involved in militancy, said the senior police official, adding Noki was a student of electrical engineering at North South University and a suspect in Shahbagh activist Rajib murder case.
"He was not arrested at that time as his involvement in the killing could not be established," explained Monirul, adding that Noki was bright and an expert on internet and information technology.
He said information regarding other JMB operatives and their connection with the IS would be known during further interrogation of the arrestees.
Investigators said top JMB leaders like Salehin, Mizan, Anwar Hossain Faruq, who had led the Trishal ambush, may replace Nahid to run the outfit.
Arrestee Mahmud-ibn-Bashar is a student of Tourism and Hospitality Management of Dhaka University.
Information about the other arrestees were not given.
Some JMB men, who escaped to Pakistan during the anti-militant drive in 2007-08, may also take charge of JMB. One of them is Saidur's son-in-law Javed Akhter, who lives in Karachi, sources said.
The JMB came to the fore through its brutal activities and killing of people during the BNP-Jamaat regime in 2004-05. It lost strength when most of its top leaders, including Shaikh Abdur Rahman and Bangla Bhai, were executed in 2007.