Kazi Zahidul Hasan :The government has finally decided to form a separate unit within the Police Department to deal with militancy and terrorism, officials said.”Formation of a separate unit in police to handle cases of terrorism and militancy is under the government’s active consideration. The Ministry of Home Affairs has already started ground work for the formation of the unit,” Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal, told The New Nation on Monday.He said, “We have already received approval from the government high-ups in this regard and the unit will be created as soon as possible”.The Police Department proposed the formation of such a unit as capable of combating militants for active consideration.The Home Minister further said, the issue of militancy and terrorism has now become a global problem. It is not the problem of Bangladesh alone. So, recognizing the reality, the government has decided to form a separate unit within the police to deal with the issue.”We have already discussed the mechanisms of the new unit within the police department. It will be a sophisticated unit with modern technology and the personnel attached with it will be imparted necessary training,” he said without detailing.When asked, the minister said, the government is keenly working on how to counter extremism and it will not give any room to the militant groups here for running their activities. According to intelligent report, about 50 militant outfits are operating in the country with some of them having their roots outside the country.The government has already brought them under vigilance for their suspected activities in different forms.The present government on October 22, 2009 banned Hizb-ut-Tahrir. The same year, seven other organisations Hizb-ut-Tawhid, Islami Samaj, Ulema Anjuman al Baiyinaat, Islamic Democratic Party, Tawhid Trust, Tamir ud-Deen and Alla’r Dal were blacklisted for their suspected involvement in militant activities.According to the officials of the Home Ministry, the police and the RAB; the government is now set to ban all the seven blacklisted organisations and three others Shahadat-e-Nobuwat, Ansarullah Bangla Team and Al Markajul al Islami. Of the three, the existence of Ansarullah Bangla Team has been uncovered very recently.Previously the BNP-Jamaat government outlawed Shahadat-e-al Hikma on February 9, 2003; Jama’at-ul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) and Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh (JMJB) on February 23, 2005; and Harkat-ul Jihad al-Islami (Huji) on October 17, 2005.But all the banned and listed organisations have been running their activities even after the execution of six top leaders of the JMB on March 29, 2007, and the arrest of several thousand leaders and activists of the banned outfits, mainly Hizb-ut-Tahrir and JMB.
