Bangladesh kills Dhaka cafe terror attack mastermind
Tamim Chowdhury, a Canadian citizen of Bangla origin, was gunned down in an early morning encounter.
DHAKA: Bangladesh police on Saturday said they have killed the mastermind of last month’s terror attack on a Dhaka cafe and two other militants during a raid on a house outside the Bangladeshi capital. Tamim Chowdhury, a BangladeshiCanadian citizen with alleged Islamic State links, was killed in the morning raid on a three-storied house in Paikpara Baro Masjid area of Narayanganj, outside Dhaka.
Inspector General of police, A.K.M. Shahidul Hoque, and counter-terrorism unit chief Monirul Islam confirmed the death of Tamim Chowdhury after the raid, codenamed “Operation Hit Strong 27”.
A joint team of security forces, including counter-ter- rorism forces and the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), had cordoned off the building around 9.36 a.m. and the operation lasted an hour.
According to police officials, a team of counter terrorism and transnational unit conducted the drive in plainclothes.
There was heavy exchange of gunfire and the militants also lobbed some grenades at the security forces. After the operation, police entered the house and found three bodies inside the house, the police said. The raid was carried out on information extracted from one of those arrested following the 1 July attack on the Holey Artisan Bakery in Gulshan area, police sources said.
The IGP said law enforcers had given the militants scope to surrender but they did not take it, and instead opened fire and hurled grenades.
Police confirmed the identity of one of the three dead as Tamim after matching photos, the IGP said.
The other two militants killed in Saturday’s raid were identified as Manik, 35, and Iqbal 25.
Tamim, who was believed to be the local coordinator for Islamic State (IS) in Bangladesh was a high-ranking member of the local militant group called the “New Jama’atul Mujahideen Bangladesh ( JMB)”.
According to investigators, he had accompanied the five Holey Artisan Bakery attackers from their Bashundhara flat to Gulshan, Dhaka, and left the area after bidding them farewell just before the café siege began on 1 July, the Daily Star reported.
The five militants, carrying weapons including semiautomatic rifles, grenades and machetes, held diners hostage at the upscale eatery in the diplomatic zone.