TAVELLA KILLING : Quayum one of suspects: HM [ Tritiyo Matra News ]

TAVELLA KILLING : Quayum one of suspects: HM

Local October 29, 2015

Home affairs minister Asaduzzaman Khan on Wednesday said that Bangladesh Nationalist Party leader MA Quayum was one of the suspects who masterminded the murder of Italian citizen Cesare Tavella in Dhaka.
‘I said the name [Quayum] that came in a newspaper report was one of the suspects in the murder of the Italian citizen…We are suspecting him too,’ Asaduzzaman told a briefing after a meeting of the cabinet committee on law and order at the ministry.
The minister made a shift in his statement a day after he had named Quayum, also former ward commissioner of undivided Dhaka City Corporation, as the mastermind of the murder of Cesare Tavella in Dhaka.
Three suspects in the murder were remanded in police custody for eight days for interrogation on Monday, while another suspect made a statement before a metropolitan magistrate.
The Dhaka Metropolitan Police claimed that Tavella was killed by the arrested at the order of a ‘big brother’ and they were now looking for him.
Prime minister Sheikh Hasina in a cabinet meeting on October 5 also hinted at involvement of local BNP leaders in the killing of Japanese national Hoshi Kunio in Rangpur on October 3.
Tavella was shot dead at diplomatic enclave Gulshan in Dhaka on his way home on September 28. Five days later, 65-old Japanese farmer Hoshi Kunio was shot dead near his farmhouse in Rangpur on October 3 in an apparently similar attack.
The minister for industries, Amir Hossain Amu, who chaired the cabinet committee meeting on Wednesday, questioned the security alerts issued by several diplomatic missions in Dhaka and thanked the law enforcement agencies for maintaining order ‘satisfactorily.’
At a briefing after the meeting, he said there was a conspiracy to destabilise the country, but the law enforcement agencies had effectively brought the situation under control.
Asked about the foreign diplomats’ security concern after the recent killing of two foreigners, Amu said, ‘If there is any security concern, how come they are staying here?’
US ambassador Marcia Bernicat recently said they were ‘enormously grateful’ to the government for steps taken by police and intelligence agencies as the ‘threats are credible and remain real.’
She also said that an advisory was meant to urge the US citizens to be vigilant and be aware of the threats here adding that the United States did not advise their people not to come to Bangladesh.
Amu, also head of the cabinet committee, said that the law enforcement agencies had dealt with some isolated incidents of killing and bomb attacks successfully in the recent time as they contained the countrywide violence before and after January 5 elections in 2014.
He linked the recent murders of foreigners and attack on Shia Muslims with the violence that took place during the countrywide blockade enforced by the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party-led alliance in early 2015 to press for fresh elections under a non-party interim administration.
‘We appreciate the way the law enforcement agencies have tackled the situation and thank them for their efforts to maintain order at any cost,’ Amu said.
Commerce minister Tofail Ahmed, information minister Hasanul Haq Inu, water resources minister Anisul Islam Mahmud, law minister Anisul Huq and home minister Asaduzzaman Khan, among others, attended the meeting that reviewed the country’s overall law and order situation.
The envoys of United States, United Kingdom, Australia and Canada in Dhaka on October 21 in a meeting with the home minister said that they were still ‘concerned’ because of threats of attacks on their citizens here.
In the security message updated on October 17 for US citizens, the US embassy in Dhaka said, ‘Reliable information suggests that a terrorist attack could occur against Westerners in Bangladesh, including attacks against large gatherings of Westerners at international hotels.’
‘ISIL claimed responsibility for the September 28 killing of an Italian national and the October 3 killing of a Japanese national. Future attacks against Westerners may occur, including against US citizens,’ the message read.
In another development, Humayun Kabir Hira, the guide of Hoshi Kunio, was sent to jail on Wednesday night after interrogation in police custody for 25 days in three phases in two cases.
A court official requesting anonymity said that police produced Humayun before a Senior Judicial Magistrate’s Court at about 7:30pm, when the magistrate recorded his statement, New Age correspondent in Rangpur reported.
Later, the senior judicial magistrate, Shafiul Alam, remanded Humayun to jail.
When contacted, Rangpur superintendent of police Abdur Razzak declined to say anything in this regard.