DHAKA, 12 March 2006 — A top police official has claimed that the militant group blamed for serial blasts in Bangladesh has no links with any foreign terror network, sources said.
National police chief Abdul Kaiyum made the statement a day after security officials said the arrested leader of the militant group Jamatul Mujahedeen Bangladesh (JMB), Sheikh Abdur Rahman, had confessed to masterminding the blasts.
“We’ve found no link between the JMB and international terror groups,” Kaiyum said. “We think this is a homegrown group. Their targets and methods are different than those of the international terror groups.”
However, media reports said Rahman has confessed to interrogators that his terror network is funded by donations from abroad.
The funds to run the militant outfit came from abroad as money to finance the spread of the Islamic faith according to a confessional statement by Rahman, national daily Ittefaq reported quoting Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) investigators. Rahman, head of the JMB which he founded in 1998 to wage a bloody campaign to have Islamic law imposed in the country, surrendered to police after a 33-hour siege March 2.
The Afghan war veteran was wanted in connection with a nationwide wave of blasts on Aug. 17 when over 400 small devices exploded almost simultaneously, and for subsequent attacks. At least 28 people, including two judges, died in the attacks that also included four suicide bombers.
