New JMB takes nearly two years to take root

Canadian Citizen Tamim Chowdhury, 30, who came to Bangladesh on October 5, 2013 through Dubai formed the militant outfit. Once the outfit was ready it began to launch attacks in 2015. Its first victim was Japanese citizen Hoshi Kunio who was killed on October 3, 2015 in Kawnia upazila of Rangpur. AKM Shahidul Hoque, the inspector general of police (IGP), said they had found involvement of the New JMB members in a good number of murder incidents since last year, especially in the North Bengal region. As police were very busy in dealing with political programmes and violence in 2013 this outfit made the best use of that opportunity and spread its tentacles across the country. “But we are now well aware of their style of work,” said the IGP, adding that they used to collect members or communicate through social media site Facebook and other online networks. He, however, assured that such things would never happen in the country as they had already ended the episode of Tamim. A source in the police said after entering Bangladesh Tamim started analysing militant root. Tamim later met Mawlana Abul Kashem, who is working as an acting chief of the JMB in the absence of its chief Saidur Rahman. Known as a great religious preacher working at the Okharabari Madrasa of Dinajpur. Kashem mainly helped Tamim to reunite its members and Tamim provided all kinds of financial and technical supports to them. A law enforcement official investigating militancy said Tamim met Kashem in July last year. During the meeting, Kashem named Tamim as Abu Bakar Ali Hanif. Another source said Tamim is the one who used to upload pictures and information of their attacks on different online sites including the Site Intelligence. The New JMB members used to send information to him after any attack and he then uploaded them. Monirul Islam, the chief of the counter-terrorism and transnational crime unit, said: “We have come to know about the identities of eight to nine more people who were behind the Gulshan attack and the drive is on to arrest them.”