Intelligence officials helped Ulfa in Aug 21 grenade attack

Trackback URL

Download PDF

A commander of the United Liberation Front of Asom (Ulfa) confessed his group was behind the August 21, 2004 grenade attack in Dhaka, aimed at Awami League chief Sheikh Hasina, in which 20 people were killed.

Pallav Saikia, the Ulfa commander, reportedly told Assam police that his group had lobbed grenades and fired rifles at an Awami League rally in the Bangladesh capital on that day, private news agency BDNews24.com said.

Assam police special branch chief Khagen Sarmah told BDNews24 that Pallav confessed they attacked the rally at the “explicit instruction” of Ulfa military-wing chief Paresh Barua.

Saikia, who was arrested by Assam special branch police on December 14, reportedly said that a group of 11 fighters led by him carried out the attack, BDNews24 said.

“Some Bangladesh intelligence officials helped us plan the assault and even gave us the vehicles for the assault that morning, but I don’t know these Bangladeshis,” he was quoted as saying.

“They started interacting with us after Paresh Barua briefed me on the mission on July 26 in a safe house in Gulshan in Dhaka,” Saikia was quoted as saying during questioning.

The Awami League said its leader Sheikh Hasina, who was the prime minister of Bangladesh between 1996 and 2001, was the target of the grenade attack, the deadliest Bangladesh had witnessed since its independence in 1971.

Indian authorities have blamed the outlawed Ulfa for a four-day wave of attacks in Assam this month in which 73 people were killed — 61 of them Hindi-speaking migrant workers.

Ulfa in the past targeted migrants to the state, including from neighbouring Bangladesh, who it claims take jobs from locals.

The Bangladesh National Party (BNP) led the government at the time of the August 2004 incident. It started a judicial probe into the carnage, but failed to solve the case, and rejected an opposition charge that it had been involved in the attack.

ULFA REJECTS CONFESSION
The Ulfa has rejected Saikia’s confession as “nonsense.”

“Pallav Saikia is either saying all this nonsense under pressure or he has been bought over and forced to say all this,” said Ulfa spokesperson Rubi Bhuiyan.

“We don’t meddle in the politics of any other country, we are just fighting to liberate Assam from Indian colonial control,” he said.

India has accused Bangladesh of providing sanctuary to Ulfa rebels who have waged a separatist campaign since 1979 that has claimed more than 20,000 lives.

Dhaka denies the charge.

Leave a Reply