The anti-terrorism agents surrounded the building for two days. The radicals chose suicide rather than surrender. In these hours other military operations are underway. The extremists belong to the outlawed group Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh.
Dhaka (AsiaNews / Agencies) - A police siege of a hideout of Islamic militants in the village of Moulvibazar, near Sylhet in northeastern Bangladesh has ended with a bloodbath. The building where seven Islamic radicals were hiding had been surrounded for two days. After repeated calls to surrender, last night they decided to detonate explosives, killing a child with them. After the explosion the agents entered the hiding place and they found a gruesome scene. Some of them said they had found the remains of bodies - both male and female - torn and scattered everywhere.
While the police investigate how it was possible that a child was present on the scene of the explosion, the military in these hours are conducting another assault on a second hideout for militants. The den is in Barahat and has been surrounded since last March 29. According to police reports, there is also a woman among those under siege.
In press conference Monirul Islam, head of the anti-terrorism unit, said the dead last night belong to the banned radical Islamist group Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh. This is the same cell as the perpetrators of the Dhaka massacre last July 1, 2016. According to the authorities, the group’s affiliates and not the militants of the Islamic state (which still claims continuous attacks in Bangladesh) that recently are spreading a new wave of terror. On March 25, while investigators were still concentrating on the Dhaka international airport suicide bombing the day before, other militants detonated two bombs in Sylhet, while being searched. The toll was of three dead agents (the last died a few hours ago), and four civilians.