Staff Reporter :
The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) on Sunday ruled out foreign media reports over a foiled plot to assassinate Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
“The media reports over a plot to attack the Prime Minister are totally baseless, misleading and motivated,” the PMO said in a statement signed by Mohammad Ashraful Alam, deputy press secretary to the Premier.
The statement criticized some Bangladeshi television channels, which had carried the news quoting a foreign TV channel and an international online outlet as well as discussed it in their talk shows.
“The media is being requested to refrain from propagating such baseless and misleading reports,” read the statement.
According to the report that quoted four intelligence sources from Bangladesh and India, six to seven personnel of the Special Security Force (SSF) were preparing to attack Hasina on August 24.
Meanwhile, Industries Minister Amir Hossain Amu on Sunday also dismissed the reports broadcast on Indian television.
“We don’t have any evidence of this plot,” he told journalists after a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on law and order at the Home Ministry in Dhaka.
On the other hand, ruling Awami League General Secretary Obaidul Quader alleged that there was a conspiracy to kill Sheikh Hasina.
It is to be noted that News18, an Indian based television channel, ran the story.
The News18 channel said an attempt on Bangladesh Premier Sheikh Hasina’s life, inspired by the way Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her own bodyguards, was foiled four weeks ago by her loyalists and top counter-terrorism officers in Dhaka,
Their plan was to attack her as soon as she would step out of her office for an evening stroll.
Four independent sources, including two in Dhaka and two in the external intelligence apparatus of India dealing with Bangladesh, confirmed the development.
Bangladesh intelligence sources told News18 that the attack was being coordinated with Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) militants. According to the plan, JMB jihadis were supposed to trigger a series of explosions around Hasina’s office to divert the attention of the other security guards, and to provide an escape route to the assassins.
“The plan was modelled on the assassination of Indira Gandhi. It was supposed to be an inside job performed by recalcitrant bodyguards with the outside support from jihadis,” another top intelligence official working closely with Bangladesh PMO told News 18.
JMB, an internationally recognized terror group, has taken responsibility for many bomb blasts in Bangladesh and aims to replace democratically-elected government with Islamic State.
The plan was foiled after a joint team of Indian and Bangladeshi intelligence officers intercepted the communication between JMB militants and the rogue SSF guards.
As soon as the conversation around the conspiracy was intercepted, PM Hasina was advised to stay put at a location outside her office in Dhaka, where she had gone for a personal meeting.
Following this, her loyal guards formed an inner ring around her. The rogue men were nabbed right after this, paving the way for Hasina to return safely to her office.
“The whole operation was discreet. We wanted to catch every last person involved in this,” a top official in Dhaka said.
According to sources, the suspects are still being interrogated by Bangladeshi authorities.
News18’s request for comment from Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Dhaka through the Bangladeshi High Commission in Delhi didn’t elicit any response.
A spokesperson of the Ministry of Home Affairs in New Delhi said the issue pertains to Bangladesh and declined to comment further.
This is said to be the 11th assassination attempt on Hasina since she took charge in January 2009.
Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was assassinated by two members of her security detail on October 31, 1984 as she walked from her residence to office in New Delhi.
In the attempt on Prime Miniter Hasina’s life, Pakistani spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) is suspected to be among the main conspirators of the attack.
“It all began when ISI’s Brigadier Ashfaq, in-charge of eastern operations, met a top opposition leader from Bangladesh in London two months ago,” said one of the intelligence officials in Dhaka.
The Bangladeshi intelligence is closely monitoring two major general-level officers of SSF, who also met the same opposition leader in London.
According to the sources, these SSF officials made a phone call to a top officer in the ISI’s Operations Directorate, which suggested finalisation of a plan to create large-scale disorder in Bangladesh.
