Two suspected human-traffickers held, 18 victims rescued

Plainclothes policemen in a special drive Sunday busted an organised gang of human- traffickers who assembled people from various parts of the country for smuggling them to Palau Island via Thailand and Indonesia, officials said.
During the raid on a residential hotel at Ashkona on the outskirts of the capital, the Detective Branch (DB) of police arrested two key members of an alleged human-trafficking group and rescued at least 18 victims.
The arrested were identified as Golam Rabbani and Shahadat Hossain alias Masud. Passports and various documents were also seized from their possession during the drive.   
When contacted, Deputy Commissioner of the DB Sheikh Nazmul Alam said the duo were sending jobseekers to Thailand with tourist visas. Then they planned to smuggle them to Palau via Indonesia.
"The traffickers also took Tk 700,000 from each of them with a verbal promise of better jobs," he said, adding that the drive was launched at the hotel after they got information from one Kabir who was kept at the hotel for trafficking.
Citing preliminary interrogation, DB Assistant Commissioner Mahamud Naser said the victims came to know about the Island of Palau from Shahadat and Rabbani who later arranged a meeting with Managing Director of Malibagh-based GLC Private Ltd Mahmudur Rahman.
"The MD allured them of arranging good jobs for the aspirants in exchange of Tk 700,000 and the victims impressed by the offer paid them accordingly," he said.
But the gang members failed to send jobseekers to their destination even after setting several deadlines, causing concern among them, he said.
After seeing no hope and getting no response from the organisers as well as the hotel authority, a victim named Kabir Ahmed contacted the plainclothes policemen and informed them about the trap, the police officer said.
"But we failed to arrest GLC chief Mahmudur Rahman, its manager Babul Hossain, cashier Mahfuzur Rahman and two other staff Mahabub and Obaidur as they managed to flee the place just before the drive sensing danger," he added.
The officials said they stepped up their drives to net other members of the gang.
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