Citing testimonies of Joj Mia, who was framed during the BNP-Jamaat led government to cover up their role in the gruesome August 21, 2004 grenade attack, Sajeeb Wazed, ICT affairs advisor to the PM, reminded all of the “state patronage provided to militants” and the “cabal of BNP leaders led by Tarique Rahman” behind the blast.
Sajeeb Wazed posted a video on Twitter with the title: “How Tarique Rahman, BNP Hired & Unleashed Militants for 21st August Grenade Attack & Later Framed a Youth, named Joj Mia.”
Known as a “Hawa Bhaban plot,” the carnage descended on an AL rally in 2004, when militants hurled grenades leaving at least 24 dead with then opposition leader Sheikh Hasina narrowly escaping death with ear injuries.
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Hawa Bhaban was featured heavily in media reports as an “alternative powerhouse operated by Tarique” with access limited to his group of confidants including politicians, government officials, militants and businessmen, between 2001 and 2006.
It was a well-orchestrated plan, executed through abuse of state power, a special court had ruled, delivering verdicts in the two cases filed over the grenade attack.
According to the verdict, in the run up to the grenade attack, Tarique met militants, now serving sentences, and endorsed the plot that mainly targeted Sheikh Hasina “to make the Awami League leaderless.”
But after the attack, a cover-up drama was concocted by then BNP-Jamaat led government that saw a youth presented before the press by law enforcement only to be unraveled by media investigations, the video posted by Sajeeb Wazed says.
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The video also contains confession of the dreaded militant leader Abdul Hannan who led the Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islam Bangladesh (Huji) that was found responsible for the attack, in which the convicted militant admitted to conspiring with BNP’s top brass in regards to the mission to “eliminate Sheikh Hasina.”
The video provides flashbacks of the ordeals of Joj Mia and BNP-Jamaat’s “blatant patronage to militants to decimate Awami League and progressive groups.”
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The video also contains interviews of senior journalists who unraveled the sham.
BNP-Jamaat coalition’s last tenure had been described by Bertil Lintner as a “cocoon of terror" [Far Eastern Economic Review, Apr 4, 2002] and Eliza Griswold predicted an “Afghan style Islamist revolution” [The New York Times Magazine, Jan 23, 2005].