Brutality beyond belief!

If armed rescue officers failed to reach the spot, 19 police officers were bound to get burnt to death. This story unfolded in Amirabad, south Chittagong in the afternoon of last Thursday. Earlier that day, one member of the same police department got hacked to death by activists of Jamaat-Shibir. In order to protect themselves from the attackers, 19 police officers took shelter in a 3 storey community centre in the town of Lohagora of sub-district Amirabad. Jamaat-Shibir activists then poured petrol all over the building and set it on fire after locking the collapsible gate at the exit of the building. Local police reported, the goal of the activists were to burn the police officers alive. Witnesses mentioned, since the verdict of Delwar Hossain Sayeedi, a notorious war criminal who got sentenced to death after 42 years, local Jamaat-Shibir activists started getting desperate. From 3pm that day, hundreds of Jamaat-Shibir activists gathered at the town of Lohagora and started protesting the verdict.

Witnesses also mentioned that around 3:30pm an armed mob of Jamaat-Shibir was crossing a 3 storey community centre called "Jamir Complex" in Lohagora. At this point 20 police officers, including 4 sub-inspectors, entered Jamir Complex. The angry mob locked the collapsible gate at the exit of the community centre after dragging one of the constables, Tarekul Islam, out of the building. The rest of the police officers took shelter in the first floor of the building.

Additional police super (south) Md. Iltut Mish described the situation as follows, "the protesters locked the exit of Jamir complex, poured petrol and set the building on fire around 5pm. As the fire spread, the confined police officers asked for backup via radio. Me and another 18 officers started shooting our chinese rifles as we approached the spot. After removing the mob, we were able to rescue the 19 police officers from the building"

Iltut Mish added, "The attackers took our constable Tarekul Islam and started hacking him brutally with machete and eventually drove a pick in his head to ensure death."

Police super of Chittagong district Md. Hafij Aktar said, "The attackers tried to burn 19 of our officers to death. If another team hadn't reached the spot shooting, we wouldn't have been able to save them. Another constable of the same team got brutally hacked to death. The murderers were local Jamaat-e-Islami and Shibir party leaders and their associates, a lot of whom have been identified by us already."

Translated news coverage by Prothom Alo, available here.