DHAKA, 29 June 2006 — A Bangladesh court yesterday acquitted all 23 accused in a bomb attack that killed 10 people in the country’s southwest seven years ago and ordered the case be re-investigated, court officials said.
The bomb went off during an open-air music concert in the town of Jessore, 300 km from Dhaka, on March 6, 1999.
“The accused have been acquitted as police failed to produce any clear evidence against them,” a court official quoted judge M. Abul Hossen Bepari as saying.
Bepari questioned the charges filed against the accused, saying recently detained militants had claimed involvement in the attack. “Police should re-investigate the case and file charges afresh against the real culprits with enough evidence to substantiate the charges,” a defense lawyer quoted the judge as saying.
Among the exonerated persons are ex-commissioner of Jessore Municipality Mohiuddin Alamgir, Ahsan Kabir Hasan, Mizanur Rahman Mizan and ex-Union Parishad chairman and BNP leader Mokaddes Hossain Babu.
Security was beefed up at the court premises where hundreds of people had gathered to hear the verdict.
Security officials said detained militants including Shaikh Abdur Rahman, chief of the outlawed Jamat-ul-Mujahedeen group, and Siddikul Islam Bangla Bhai, leader of another outlawed group Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh, confessed during police interrogation to involvement in the concert bombing.
In May, a court sentenced Rahman and Bangla Bhai along with five others to death by hanging for their involvement in killing two judges late last year.
