Nineteen days into the murder of prominent octogenarian photojournalist Aftab Ahmed, RAB personnel yesterday arrested his driver and four other suspects in connection with the killing on December 25.
The arrestees are driver Humayun Kabir alias Kabir Hossain, and his four associates Habib Hawlader, Sabuj Khan, Raju Munshi and Kislu.
The elite force claims that Humayun had planned the murder and hired the others. In 2010, they killed another man, a shopkeeper in Barisal, during a robbery.
They killed the journalist at his Rampura home, and took away Tk65,000 and his mobile phone.
Sources said a team of RAB 3 first arrested Humayun at the capital’s Sayedabad, and following information he gave them, the same team arrested the others at Agargaon and Gazipur over the period from Sunday night to early yesterday.
RAB made the arrests only a week after they had been assigned the case. Earlier it was investigated by the Rampura police and the Detective Branch (DB).
Col Ziaul Ahsan, additional director general (operations) of RAB, said: “During primary interrogation, all the five detainees admitted their involvement in the murder. They killed the journalist for the cash he kept in his house.”
He also said they were yet to recover the money.
Wing Commander ATM Habibur Rahman, director of legal and media wing of RAB, said the five accused had killed Aftab as he had resisted the robbery.
He added that RAB was trying to find other motives behind the killing.
The body of journalist Aftab was found at his bedroom in the morning on December 25, with his hands and legs tied with ropes and mouth wrapped with tape. He was strangulated to death in his bedroom.
Immediately after the murder, the family members said Aftab had kept Tk15 lakh at the house, which he got by selling a flat at Ramakrishna Mission Road. Driver Humayun had been on the run since then.
Monwar Ahmed, the only son of Aftab, filed a case accusing Humayun and several others of his father’s murder. The driver was appointed on December 1, only 24 days before the murder.