Narayanganj tragedy: Ex-Rab man Arif reveals brutalities

Former Rab officer Major Arif Hossain, who was arrested for his alleged involvement in the abductions and killings of seven people, has described the brutalities before a local court.
Arif made a confessional statement before the court of Senior Judicial Magistrate AKM Mahiuddin Wednesday, according to court sources, according to a news agency.
In his statement, Arif told the court that a total of 18 Rab men, including him and two other arrested former Rab officers — Lt Col Tareque Sayeed Mohammad and Lt Commander MM Rana, had been involved in the incident.
He also claimed that Col Ziaul Ahsan, additional director general (Operation) of the elite force, had been aware of the incident.
The former Rab officer said the plan to kidnap Narayanganj city panel mayor Nazrul Islam had been fixed earlier.
He said plain-clothes members of Rab who took position in the court area on April 27 informed him when Nazrul left the court around 12:30pm after securing bail in an extortion case.
A team of Rab, led by Arif, intercepted the vehicles of Nazrul and lawyer Chandan Kumar Sarker near Fatullah Stadium on Dhaka-Narayanganj Link Road.
Later, occupants of the two vehicles — Nazrul Islam, his three associates and driver, Chandan and his driver –- were taken to two Rab vehicles at gunpoint. Soon, they were made unconscious with injections into their bodies. The victims were in the vehicles for several hours.
Later, they were taken to Narsingdi and brought back beneath the Kanchpur Bridge around 10:30pm on the day as per the plan.
The heads and faces of the victims were wrapped in polythene bags inside the vehicles, and they were strangled to death one after another.
Later, a Rab boat was taken to Kanchpur from terminal-5 in the city to carry the dead bodies. Materials to dump the bodies were picked up from a certain place on the way through the Shitalakkhya River.
Bricks were tied up with the bodies on the boat and a hole was pierced under the navel of each victim so that the bodies did not float after dumping. Later, the bodies were finally dumped into the river.
A total of 20 people, including the former three Rab officers, took part in the mission.
Lt Col Tareque Sayeed met a police team at Hajiganj check post while returning to the office when he told the in-charge police officer that they were conducting operation to rescue the seven people. Similarly, Major Arif met a police officer of Fatullah Model Police Station on Dhaka-Narayanganj Link Road on the way.