The mastermind behind the attack on the Holey Artisan Bakery in Dhaka's Gulshan Thana area in July 2016 has been killed in a raid early on Friday (January 6), police sources in Bangladesh said. At least 22 people, including an Indian, were killed in the attack in the posh location of the Bangladeshi capital on the night of July 1.
According to the Press Trust of India (PTI), New Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen's (JMB) wanted leader Nurul Islam alias Marjan, along with another unidentified extremist, was killed by the Counter-Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) personnel in Dhaka's Mohammadpur Beribadh area. Marjan had coordinated the cafe attack, said the police.
Twenty-two-year-old Marjan was made the New JMB's operations leader following the deaths of the group's military and operations commander Tamim Ahmed Chowdhury, Maj (retd) Murad alias Zahid and another top leader Faridul Islam alias Akash in raids, the Dhaka Tribune reported. Marjan was believed to be the youngest commander of the New JMB, a terror outfit affiliated with the the ISIS.
Marjan, whose photo was released by the police in August 2016, belonged to a conservative Muslim family from Afuria village under Hemayetpur union in Pabna district of Bangladesh. Over 30 mobile phones were retrieved from the bakery by the investigators following Operation Thunderbolt on July 2.
More than three dozen members of the New JMB have been killed in raids following the cafe attack. According to the daily, at least 14 leaders of the terrorist organisation are still at large.
The ISIS has claimed responsibility for 26 attacks in Bangladesh between September 2015 and August 2016, leaving at least 45 people dead and several hundreds injured. The Bangladesh government has, however, denied the involvement of the terror group in the attacks and said homegrown terror outfits were actually responsible.
Five terrorists entered the bakery late in the night of July 1 and took many people, including a number of foreign nationals, as hostages. A joint commando force was deployed and the attackers were neutralised in a 11-hour seige. All the attackers were citizens of Bangladesh.
The attack has been the worst terror act in the history of Bangladesh.
