Awami League General Secretary and Road Transport and Bridges Minister Obaidul Quader has said the perpetrators of August 21, 2004 grenade attack, including Tarique Rahman, would be brought back home to implement the court verdicts.
“After the completion of trial procedures, the killers of August 21 who are staying abroad, especially Tarique Rahman, will be brought back home like the August 15 (1975) killers,” he told a virtual discussion marking the 16th anniversary of August 21 grenade attacks at the AL’s Bangabandhu Avenue central office in Dhaka on Friday, reports BSS.
Prime Minister and Awami League President Sheikh Hasina presided over the discussion through a videoconference from her official Ganabhaban residence.
Describing history as ‘very cruel’, Quader said the trial of those, who carried out the grenade attacks with the target to assassinate Bangabandhu’s daughter and the then Opposition Leader Sheikh Hasina, has begun under the initiative of the premier.
The court has given historic verdicts in the cases filed over the gruesome grenade attacks and an appeal awaits disposal at the High Court, he added.
The AL general secretary said the soil, which was drenched with the blood of thousands of martyrs in 1971 Liberation War and blood of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in August 15, 1975 carnage, again saw grisly grenade attacks with the shedding of bloods of Awami League leaders-workers and innocent people as well on August 21, 2004.
Bangabandhu’s daughter Sheikh Hasina was the prime target of August 21 grenade attacks as the bullets of 1975 carnage returned as grenades in 2004, he added.
“By the grace of Almighty, our loving leader Sheikh Hasina narrowly escaped death in August 21 grenade attacks as the party leaders and workers had built a human shield to save her,” he said.
Quader said the then BNP-Jamaat led four-party alliance government did everything to halt the trial of August 21 grenade attack cases and they staged ‘Joj Mia drama’ to divert the incident to a different direction.
A one-member judicial inquiry commission with Justice Joynul Abedin was formed at that time and the commission ended its responsibility ridiculously by hinting links of a neighboring country (without naming) and in that way, they carried out their evil attempts to turn the county’s judiciary into a farce, he said.
He said the politics of killings had begun in the country with the brutal assassination of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the architect of independent Bangladesh and the superhero of the country’s history, along with most of his family.
The minister said with the grief of losing dear and near ones, Bangabandhu’s daughter Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is making her all-out strides to bring smile on the faces of the Bangalees to materialize her father’s dream as her life of struggle is a rare one in the contemporary world in spite of being the daughter of Father of the Nation.
Quader said plotters of August 15 carnage and August 21 grenade attacks still remain active as they are now out to spread falsehood and rumors at home and abroad.
He said hurdles on the country’s way to progress and prosperity are being overcome one after another as Bangladesh is witnessing a magical transformation of changing fortunes of its people.
AL Presidium Members Begum Matia Chowdhury, Dr Abdur Razzaque, Abdul Matin Khasru, Advocate Jahangir Kabir Nanak and Abdur Rahman, Information Minister and AL Joint General Secretary Dr Hasan Mahmud, Joint General Secretaries Mahbubul Alam Hanif and AFM Bahauddin Nasim, Central Working Committee Member Mofazzal Hossain Chowdhury Maya Bir Bikram, Organizing Secretaries Ahmed Hossain and Advocate Afjal Hossain were present, among others.
Publicity and Publications Secretary Dr Abdus Sobhan Golap moderated it.