A Dhaka court has ordered the authorities to confiscate the moveable and immoveable properties of five people, including sacked army major Syed Ziaul Haque alias Zia, the Ansar al-Islam military wing chief, in the murder case of blogger Nazimuddin Samad.
Dhaka Anti-Terrorism Special Tribunal Judge Md Mujibur Rahman gave the order on Wednesday after a compliance report on the arrest of the five accused, who are currently on the run.
The court also ordered the authorities to submit a compliance report on the seizure on March 30.
The other accused in the case are Md Waliullah alias Oli, Sabbirul Haque Chowdhury alias Konik, Mawlana Junayed Ahmed alias Junayed and Akram Hossain.
Earlier on January 20, the same court accepted the charge sheet in the presence of four of the nine accused in the case.
It also issued arrest warrants against five, including the former army officer.
On August 20, 2020, the Counter-Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) unit of police submitted the charge sheet before the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Court, accusing nine people in the case.
All the accused were involved in different aspects of the murder from planning to assassination, according to the CTTC.
Nazimuddin, a Jagannath University master’s student, was hacked to death at Ekrampur intersection in Old Dhaka’s Sutrapur area on April 6, 2016.
He had come to Dhaka in January and got himself admitted to the university in February and started living in Gandaria.
Earlier in October 2016, one of the accused, Rashidun Nabi, had expressed his regret over the killing when he was produced in court after his arrest.
At the time, at a press briefing, Deputy Inspector General (DIG) and CTTC Chief Monirul Islam said that militants linked to Ansarullah (now Ansar Al Islam) had planned to kill Nazimuddin three months prior to the assassination.
“A few days before the attack, the militants had rented a house near Jagannath University. They followed Nazimuddin’s movements and finally attacked him on April 6,” he had said.
The senior police official also claimed that Nabi had also confessed to his involvement in the killing of LGBT rights activists Xulhaz Mannan and Mahbub Tonoy and the attempted murder of publisher Ahmed Rashid Tutul.