Khaleda Zia with her son Tarique in London during a recent visit

The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of Bangladesh yesterday charged opposition leader and former prime minister Khaleda Zia’s eldest son Tarique Rahman and 29 others for the August 21, 2004 grenade attack on an Awami League rally, in which 24 people were killed and 300 injured.
Tarique, now in London, was charged in the case just on the day Bangladesh Nationalist Party, led by Khaleda Zia, announced a 48-hour countrywide shutdown for July 6-7 in protest against the 15th amendment to the
constitution.
“We have submitted a supplementary charge-sheet after an extended investigation into the case,” CID’s special superintendent Abdul Kahar Akhand told newsmen after filing the charge-sheet at the chief metropolitan magistrate court.
He said the investigations suggested that operatives of Harkat ul Jihad al Islami (HuJI) carried out the attack which was backed by several stalwarts of the then Bangladesh Nationalist Party-led four-party coalition government and security and police officials.
He said the investigations found former minister for home Lutfuzzaman Babar, former PM Khaleda Zia’s political secretary Haris Chowdhury, former minister and Jamaat-e-Islami leader Ali Ahsan Mujaheed, incumbent BNP lawmaker fugitive Mofazzal Hossain Kaikobad and former commissioner of Dhaka City Corporation
Ariful Islam.
The charge-sheet also named three former police chiefs and heads of two intelligence agencies who were former inspectors general of police - Shahudul Haque, Ashraful Huda and Khoda Bux Chowdhury and former directors general of National Security Intelligence (NSI) Brigadier Abdur Rahim and Major General Rezzakul Haidar Chowdhury, who subsequently became the chief of the agency.
The other intelligence officials who were made suspects in the case were former director of directorate general of forces intelligence (DGFI) Major General ATM Amin, former NSI director Lt Colonel Saiful Islam Joardar and Khaleda Zia’s nephew and private secretary-2 Lieutenant Commander Saiful Islam Duke.
The serving policemen, who were found to be linked to attack, apparently targeting Sheikh Hasina, were former deputy commissioners of Dhaka metropolitan police (DMP) Obaidul Rahman Khan and Khan Sayeed Hassan.
Both are now officers on special duty while Khan is a police superintendent and Hassan is a deputy inspector general of police.
The retired police officers to face the trial in the case are former CID’s special superintendent and supervising officer of the case Ruhul Amin and former investigation officers of the case assistant superintendents of police Munshi Atiqur Rahman and Abdur Rashid.
The HuJI leaders and operatives named in the charge-sheet included Maulana Sheikh Abdus Salam who later floated a new outfit called IDP, Maulana Abdul Malek, Maulana Shawkat Osman alias Sheikh Farid and Mufti Shafiqur Rahman, Ratul Babu and Indian national and Pakistan- based LET leader Abdul Majed Bhat.
The earlier charge-sheet named 22 people including former deputy minister Abdus Salam Pintu and his brother and suspected supplier of the ammunition Maulana Tajuddin and HuJI chief Mufti Abdul Hannan while the rest were his accomplices in the militant outfit.
Officials familiar with the investigation said of the 30 suspects, 12 including Babar, Mujahid, Salam Pintu and the two former army generals are now in custody to stand the trial in person.
But several of the suspects including Haris Chowdhury, Kaikobad, Amin and three ex-police chiefs were shown “fugitives” along with several others while the CID filed a petition seeking to confiscate the property of the fugitives.