Shariful Islam

The newly formed Anti-Terrorism Unit is expected to start operation within months with a countrywide mandate, using most of the

Outgoing Inspector General of Police AKM Shahidul Hoque has said police need to improve the quality of service in line with the expectations of the people.

The controversial sonic device procured recently by the police to disperse protesters has the potential to damage nerve system of ears for good, according to doctors and records.

The fight against militancy remains challenging as ever as dozens of militants are getting freed every year from prisons that have no de-radicalisation programmes.

The Victory Day morning of last year started like any other for the 85-year-old widow of a former Ispahani company director. She woke up, did her usual chores and had breakfast.

Top police officials have demanded that the police headquarters centrally recruit constables to prevent entry of inefficient people to the force through corruption and political influence.

Social media users may have to be more cautious about making “unlawful” public remarks and sharing contentious items as it would soon be only a matter of hours for police to trace their origins with the help of special software.

Taking lessons from the past, law enforcement agencies are redoing their strategies to keep law and order under control in this election year. As part of their plan, police and different intelligence agencies will prepare a fresh list of wanted criminals and probable political troublemakers ahead of the election and launch drives to arrest them. Special drives will also be made to recover illegal firearms, said a number of top police officials.

In the first nine months of this year, more than 60 percent of the accused got acquitted in drug-related cases, and narcotics control officials blame the poor conviction rate mainly on the faulty charge sheets and a lack of witnesses. The scenarios were almost similar in the previous two years.

Mohammad Alauddin, a manpower businessman, was waiting for a friend at a tea stall at Mollartek in Dakkhin Khan around 4:30pm on November 10.

KM Shamim Akhter was forced into a microbus near his Paltan home on the morning of September 29, 2011 by five to six armed men claiming to be members of a law enforcement agency. His wife Jhorna Khanam and other family members left no stone unturned to find him out. But he still remains traceless.

The High Court yesterday asked Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) to form a probe body to investigate why the intelligence unit of then BDR failed to detect the impending 2009 mutiny.

In recent years, the country's northwestern border in Chapainawabganj has emerged as a major route for smuggling in arms. It has of late become militants' most preferred point for collecting illegal firearms and explosives. This is the route through which terror outfit “Neo JMB” smuggled in the guns and bombs used in last year's Gulshan café attack. With such chilling information surfacing, Shariful Islam visits the zero line area of Indo-Bangla border in the district to investigate how the illicit trade goes on there so easily.

Two years have passed since the killing of publisher Faisal Arefin Dipan and the hacking of another publisher Ahmedur Rashid Tutul and two others, but investigators still cannot say for sure when they will be able to submit charge sheets in the cases.

Three brothers joined arms to conduct a gold smuggling business that spanned across Dhaka, Dubai, Masqat, Kuala Lumpur, Jeddah

Believe it or not, there are only six officials at the directorate of prisons, which oversees 68 prisons across the country containing around 70,000 inmates.

A Bangladeshi citizen who along with his family went to Malaysia last year has remained missing since July 19 after Malaysian immigration police deported him for his suspected links with militancy.

Young homeopath Moklesur Rahaman Johnny went out of his chamber to buy medicine for his father on August 4 night last year, but he never returned. He did not just disappear, according to his wife Jesmin Nahar as she had seen him in the lockup of the Satkhira Sadar Police Station the next morning when she had gone there to ask police to find her husband.

Militant group “Neo JMB” is still posing a security threat as its members are making efforts to carry out suicide attacks individually, said counterterrorism officials.

Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh militant Tariqul Islam Tareq was arrested in Chittagong in connection with a 2005 countrywide series bomb blast case.