Investigators yesterday said that they had almost completed collecting information about the digital heist of $101 million from the Bangladesh Bank account with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
They would make the next move after analysing the information and the report to be provided by an IT expert team led by Rakesh Astana soon. Bangladesh Bank had appointed the team for investigation.
CID Special Superintendent Mirza Abdullahel Baqui told the Dhaka Tribune that they had questioned all the suspected persons – from office staff to deputy governor of the central bank who could be involved in the heist.
Meanwhile, a CID source said that they wanted to sit with Tanvir Hasan Zoha, an IT expert working with the government’s Cyber Security Programme who was allegedly picked by unidentified people early Thursday from the capital’s Kachukhet area. His family members alleged that they had been harassed by officers at several police stations when they attempted to filed a GD.
Asked if they would quiz Zoha, Baqui said that they would interrogate anyone who could possibly know anything about the heist.
Soon after the heist came to light, Zoha had told media on several occasions that he had some information about the heist and that he wanted to solve the case in all possible ways.
Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan on Thursday said that the law enforcers might have arrested Zoha for the sake of investigation. “But I am not sure about it,” he added.
Baqui said that they were yet to confirm whether the money had been laundered by outsiders or with the help of Bangladesh Bank officials. “We are waiting for the report by Rakesh Astana on the central bank’s security measures,” he added.
Another source said that Rakesh had already submitted a preliminary report on the matter.
Additional Deputy Inspector General Md Shah Alam, also the commandant of CID’s Forensic Training Institute (FTI), told the Dhaka Tribune that the heist might have been committed by people of four countries – Bangladesh, Philippines, Sri Lanka and the USA.
He said that they had already sent an e-mail to Interpol seeking some information but they were yet to receive answered from the organisation.
“We are now analysing the information. Soon we will be able to determine the persons need to be arrested, interrogated or kept under surveillance,” Shah Alam added.
On behalf of the central bank, its Joint Director (accounts and budgeting department) Jubair Bin Huda filed the case against unidentified people with Motijheel police on Tuesday. Later the case was transferred to the CID. A Dhaka court has set April 19 for submission of the investigation report before it.
Meanwhile, the meeting between officials of the CID and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) which was set to take place yesterday has been deferred till tomorrow.
Baqui yesterday told the Dhaka Tribune that he was not aware of the meeting and learned it through media. He said that the meeting would be held tomorrow.
DIG Saiful Alam, who is co-ordinating the investigation, earlier told the media that an FBI team of the US Embassy in Dhaka would sit with the CID officials on Friday.