Security of politicians, int’l citizens enhanced

The government has enhanced security measures for the top political leaders, high government officials and judges as well as foreign nationals living in the country against the backdrop of Friday’s attack on a restaurant by ‘homegrown’ militants, police said.
Additional police forces were deployed and makeshift check posts were erected along the residential areas of ministers, top government officials and the neighbourhoods inhabited by international citizens, they said.
While visiting different airports, railway stations, bus and launch terminals, shopping malls and hotels across the country, New Age correspondents found security was beefed up.
‘Security measures have been tightened in Dhaka and elsewhere in the country,’ the Inspector General of Police AKM Shahidul Huq told reporters at Dhaka Medical College Hospital, after visiting two injured policemen there, on Sunday.
‘We have taken sufficient security measures for the foreign nationals and other important persons and public places,’ Dhaka Metropolitan Police deputy commissioner Masudur Rahman told New Age.

Twenty hostages, most of them international, were killed in the Gulshan café attack. Two police officers also died and 30 others were injured.
Bangladeshi commandos rescued 13 people after a 12-hour siege, killing six gunmen and arresting the lone attacker.
Police in the capital as well as the outlying cities and districts said all the foreign nationals in their respective jurisdictions were ‘safe.’
Over two lakh of international citizens are in service in Bangladesh, according to sources at the Bangladesh Bank.
Following the Gulshan attack, a number of countries including the US, the United Kingdom, Germany, Spain and France, in separate alerts urged their citizens to stay vigilant in Bangladesh.
While visiting the city’s Gulshan, Uttara and Baridhara neighbourhoods, where most of the foreign nationals live, New Age found on Sunday that those areas were under intensive vigilance.
Similar scenario was seen at Mintoo road, Baily Road, Ramna, Mohammadpur and other residential areas.
The cars and motorcycles were being checked while the bodies of the riders were searched.
‘The foreign nationals mainly live in Khulshi area and we have tightened security there,’ said Chittagong Metropolitan Police additional commissioner, Debdas Bhattacharjee.
He said they increased the number of check posts and raised vigilance in Chittagong EPZ, where a good number of foreign nationals work.
Sources in police said about 3,000 foreign nationals live in Chittagong.
Gazipur has over 800 foreign nationals, almost half working in apparel industry, for whom security have been strengthened, said Tasmidul Islam, an assistant superintendent of police in the district.
‘All the 202 foreign nationals in Bogra are safe and that their residences were under intensive vigilance,’ Bogra additional SP Saifuzzaman Faruqui said.
‘We have taken maximum security measures for different city hotels and guest houses as well as areas where the foreign nationals live,’ said Sylhet Metropolitan Police additional deputy commissioner Rahmatullah.
Khulna Metropolitan Police DC (headquarters) SM Fazlur Rahman, Rajshahi Metropolitan Police spokesperson Ifte Khayer Alam and Barisal Metropolitan Police spokesperson Farhad Sardar told New Age that the foreign nationals mainly come to these districts for short visits and stay at hotels where they had already tightened security measures.

News Courtesy: www.newagebd.net