Charges framed against 21 HuJI militants in Bangladesh

The Bangladesh police have pressed charges against 21 militants of the outlawed Harkat-ul Jihad-e-Islami and a former Bangladesh Nationalist Party minister for the grenade attack on former prime minister  Sheikh Hasina's rally in 2004 that left her injured and killed 24 others, officials said on Thursday.

The chargesheet against the 21 members of HuJI -- blamed for terror attacks in India as well, including its detained top leader Mufty Hannan, and Abdus Salam Pintu, a deputy minister in the erstwhile Khaleda Zia-led government -- was filed in a Dhaka court on Wednesday.

The chief metropolitan magistrate's court issued an arrest warrant against the eight fugitives while the other accused including Pintu are already in custody. The development coincided with the release of former prime minister Sheikh Hasina from an 11-month detention to allow her to go abroad for treatment for the ear injury she suffered in the attack.

As many as 24 people, including top Awami League leader Ivy Rehman, were killed and about 400 others injured in the attack which took place as Hasina was addressing the rally in front of the Bangabandhu Avenue office of her party.

Additional inspector general of the criminal investigation department Javed Patwari said legal action was being taken against police investigators who had tried to mislead the case after receiving directives from the Zia government.

"Former deputy minister Abdus Salam Pintu personally got involved in the attack as his absconding brother HuJI leader Maulana Tazuddin Ahmed supplied the grenades for the killing mission," Patwari told media-persons on Wednesday.

The police had arrested Pintu in January. The United States had, earlier this year, designated HuJI as a terrorist organisation.