Staff Reporter :A suicide bomber blew himself up injuring eight devotees in an Ahmadiya community mosque in Mochmoil area of Bagmara upazila of Rajshahi during Juma prayers on Friday.The autopsy report confirmed that the dead youth has been identified as the attacker. The attack took place during the simultaneous celebration of Eid-e-Miladunnabi and Christmas on December 25. “The bomb went off when the terrorist tried to free it from his waist in order to explode it during the Juma prayers in the mosque leaving him dead on the spot and injuring at least eight devotees,” Abdullah Al Mahmud, Additional Deputy Inspector General of Rajshahi Range told journalists. Of them, critically injured Moyez Uddin, 40, son of Bolai Talukdar, Sayeb Ali, 36, son of late Talukdar, and Nayan ,12, son of Mukul Hossain of Syedpur area of the upazilas are now under treatment at Rajshahi Medical College Hospital (RMCH).The attack on the Ahmadiya Muslim community followed a series of blasts in Hindu temples and attack on a Christian pastor in the northern district of Dinajpur. Earlier on November 26, a group of 4-5 unidentified gunmen stormed the Ahmadiya community mosque at Haripur village in Shibganj upazilas of Bogra and opened fire on the devotees while they were offering Maghrib prayers, leaving four of them injured, including Muezzin. Later, the Muezzin succumbed to his injuriesPolice could not ascertain the identity of any of the two attackers (including the dead), but suspected the link to banned Islamist outfit Jama’atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) in the attack. Earlier in the year of 2005, judges, lawyers, police constable and common people were killed and many others injured in separate suicide bomb attacks by Jama’atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) across the country.Police sued two unknown assailants over the Bagmara Ahmadiya mosque blast in Rajshahi. “On Saturday Md Masud Ali, a Sub-Inspector of Bagmara Police Station, filed case against two unknown assailants,” Motiar Rahman, Officer-in-Charge of the Bagmara Police Station, told The New Nation on Saturday.Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal on Saturday said after investigation it will be known whether the Bagmara Ahmadiya mosque bomb blast was a suicide attack or not.”We have not obtained clear information yet whether it’s a suicide bomb blast or not,” he told journalists at the annual general meeting of Crime Reporters Association of Bangladesh (CRAB) at Dhaka Reporters’ Unity in city.He said one of them killed on the spot during the blast while another managed to flee the scene. “I think the man who was killed in the bomb blast might have been carrying the bomb. It might have exploded accidentally while offering prayers,” he said.Enamul Haque, a physician of Forensic Department of Rajshahi Medical College Hospital on Saturday said there was clear evidence that the dead youth was the one carrying the bomb. “There are definite wounds on the youth’s hand. We found splinters inside,” he said.Assistant Inspector General Nazrul Islam (Media) of the Police Headquarters said a belt-like object was recovered from the body of the attacker. “One of his hands was also blown off in the bomb explosion. None of the devotees attending the Juma prayers could recognise the attacker,” he said.An explosive belt seized from the dead youth (in his twenties) on Friday after the blast suggests that it was a detailed and planned case of suicide bombing. Meanwhile, Serajul Islam Choudhury, littérateur and professor emeritus of Dhaka University said as democracy and good governance still remain a far cry in the country, subversive activities like suicide bomb attack in mosques and other important places will continue. “It’s a new dimension. It is terrible and alarming. Imbued with spirit of religious fanatic outfit when a youth is committed to kill people by blowing himself up, it is not possible to face such suicide bomb attack by the law enforcers,” he said.
