BNP suspects conspiracy behind Aug 21 grenade attack case

The Bangladesh Nationalist Party thinks the government is hatching conspiracy against the party and desperately tries to convince the people that BNP chairperson Khaleda Zia and its acting chairman Tarique Rahman were involved in August 21 grenade attack.
The government should not create new ‘crisis’ over the case by blaming the BNP chairperson and the acting chairman for the attack, said BNP secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir at a news briefing at the party’s central office in Dhaka.
Fakhrul said in last few days the head of the government, the ruling party general secretary, law minister and other ministers while addressing public programmes and before media were seen claiming that BNP chairperson and former prime minister Khaleda Zia and the party’s acting chairman Tarique Rahman were involved in August 21 grenade attack case. 
Referring to law minister Anisul Huq, who said the verdict of the grenade attack case would be delivered within September, and road transport minister Obaidul Quader, who claimed that BNP would fall in ‘leadership crisis’ after the verdict, Fakhrul said, ‘Now not the judges but the law minister fixes which case’s verdict will be delivered on which day.’
The road transport minister’s statement meant that he knew about the verdict which was going to be delivered, the BNP leader said.
Fakhrul said the ‘present government’ was trying to use the issue as a ‘weapon’ to ‘suppress’ and ‘weaken’ its main political opponent (BNP) and for this reason the government had appointed a partisan investigation officer who had ‘forcibly’ extracted confessional statement from one of the accused of the case (Mufti Hannan).
But Mufti Hannan divulged the government’s ‘conspiracy’ by withdrawing his confessional statement, the BNP leader said.
‘Now they (government) are trying to fulfil their political desire using the judiciary,’ Fakhrul said.
He condemned it and asked the government to reconsider its consequences in national politics.
He claimed that Khaleda and Tarique in no way were involved with the grenade attack incident.
All the existing political differences and disputes could be resolved through discussion, said Fakhrul adding that the government should take positive initiative to resolve existing problems instead of creating ‘new crisis’.
BNP leaders including Khandaker Mosharraf Hossain, Moudud Ahmed, Goyeshwar Chandra Roy, Abdul Moyeen Khan, Nazrul Islam Khan, Khandker Mahbub Hossain, Zainul Abedin and Ruhul Kabir Rizvi were present.
The secretary general also raised some questions over August 21 grenade attack.
He questioned why the Awami League within a short time shifted its rally venue from Muktangan to the front of its central office on Bangabandhu Avenue in Dhaka on August 21, 2004 without informing police, why the then opposition leader Sheikh Hasina turned down the Interpol, FBI and other investigation authorities’ request to examine her bullet-hit vehicle as an evidence, why any court or investigator did not ask Sheikh Hasina why she had told Indian senior journalist Kuldip Nayar that ‘Bangladesh army’ was involved in the grenade attack incident.
Fakhrul also questioned why the incident of firing bullets on her vehicle was not mention in any investigation report or confessional statement of the suspects, and why Sheikh Hasina being number two witness of the case did not appear before the court.
Hasina while giving statement during her detention in 2007 under section 161 to fifth investigation officer of the case did not make any allegation against Tarique Rahman and Khaleda Zia and if there was any cooperation between Mufti Hannan and Tarique Rahman then why Mufti Hannan was arrested during the period of BNP’s government in September 2005, the BNP leader said.
Fakhrul also said that the fifth investigation officer of the case, Fazlul Kabir, submitted charge sheet in August 2007 accusing 22 people but Tarique was not among them. 
The entire incident took an ‘abnormal turn’ after Sheikh Hasina assumed in power in 2009, Fakhrul said.
He said controversial retired police officer Abdul Kahar Akand was appointed as the investigation officer for further investigation into the case in August 2009 and submitted supplementary charge sheet in 2011 accusing 30 more people, including Tarique Rahman, in the case.

News Courtesy: www.newagebd.net