DHAKA, 20 October 2004 — The Bangladesh government has stripped a second former armed services chief of his rank, a Defense Ministry spokesman said yesterday. Former air force chief Jamal Uddin Ahmed, who was promoted to the rank of air marshal on retirement in May 2001, would now be required to use the designation air vice marshal.
The decision to strip Ahmed of his status was made because the rank of air marshal does not exist in the Bangladesh Air Force, the spokesman said. Ahmed was not immediately available for comment.
“The government says this rank is not proper. It does not exist so from now on he will use the rank air vice marshal (retired),” the spokesman said.
Last week the government announced it was stripping a retired four-star general of his status for the same reason.
Former army chief Lt. Gen. Mustafizur Rahman was promoted to four-star general by the previous Awami League government on Dec. 18, 2000, on his retirement day. The party lost power in October 2001.
Mustafizur Rahman, a member of the Awami League which is now in opposition, said the decision was meant to tarnish his image.
The government criticized the former army chief for comments he made after grenade attacks on an Awami League rally in Dhaka on Aug. 21 in which 22 people died.
Rahman raised questions about the source of the grenades and criticized the detonation by the army of four grenades found at the scene. The Awami League claims the government had a hand in the attack, which it says was an attempt to assassinate its leader Hasina Wajed.
Meanwhile, Britain’s Scotland Yard, probing bomb blasts across Bangladesh, has finally found that the grenade hurled on British High Commissioner Anwar Choudhury at Hazrat Shahjalal shrine in northeastern Sylhet city on May 21 was of the same model as those found on Bangabandhu Avenue in Dhaka on Aug. 21 and at Dhaka Central Jail the following day.
Scotland Yard which assisted Bangladeshi investigators in the probe into the grenade attack said in its report that the grenade hurled on the Bangladesh-born British high commissioner was one of ARGES model.
Three grenades retrieved from Bangabandhu Avenue area after the grisly attack on the Awami League rally that injured about 200 and another one recovered from Dhaka Central Jail the following day were of the same model, the report, published in Dhaka yesterday said.
The Criminal Investigation Department (CID), which is currently probing the May 21 incident, received the Scotland Yard’s report on Monday. The CID, however, is yet to dig out clues to the grenade attack.
The British detective agency gathered evidence from the spot two days after the attack that killed three including a policeman.
Assistant Superintendent of Police (CID) Munshi Atiqur Rahman, also investigation officer (IO) of the Sylhet shrine case, told newsmen that he received a three-page Scotland Yard report.
