AFP/IANS/Dhaka
Bangladeshi police said yesterday they had arrested three suspected militants in the southeastern city of Chittagong who were planning to attack US targets in the country’s capital.
Deputy Police Commissioner Monirul Islam said Bangladeshi authorities were given intelligence reports concerning the men’s whereabouts following the arrest of two other suspected militants in the United States last month.
“We raided a madrassa in Chittagong and arrested three Bangladeshi men late on Thursday evening,” he told AFP.
“We believe they have links to the banned (Islamist) group Harkat-ul Jihad al Islami (HuJI) and were planning to attack American interests in Dhaka.”
They were identified as Mufti Harun Izahar, 33, son of Mufti Izaharul Islam who is the amir (chief) of a faction of Islami Oikya Jote; Shahidul Islam, 26; and Al Amin alias Saiful said.
Islami Oikya Jote is an ally of opposition leader and former prime minister Khaleda Zia.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina alleged in parliament on Thursday that the opposition was supporting religious extremists to foment trouble and bring political instability.
One of the militants claimed that he hailed from the southern Bhola district while another was from the northern Mymensingh area. But they could not show any documents, police officials said.
A spokesman for the US embassy in Dhaka said he could not comment on security matters.
Islam said information about the Bangladeshi suspects had come from the United States following the arrests last month in Chicago of David Coleman Headley, 49, a US citizen, and Tahawwur Hussain Rana, 48, a Canadian citizen born in Pakistan.
US authorities have charged the men with plotting terror attacks abroad, including on the Danish newspaper which published cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad in 2005.
Headley, 49, a US citizen who changed his name from Daood Gilani in 2006, was arrested by the FBI on October 3 at Chicago’s O’Hare airport before boarding a flight to Philadelphia en route to Pakistan.
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