DHAKA, Aug 17, 2023 (BSS) - At the behest of Tarique Rahman, a number of high profile ministers from BNP-Jamaat led government funded and shielded the infamous militant outfit JMB that later found responsible for series bombings in 63 districts countrywide in 2005.

The militant outfit also unleashed a killing spree against progressive writers in a bid to establish Islamic rule in Bangladesh.
 
On the 18th anniversary of 2005 series bombings, Sajeeb Wazed Joy, ICT affairs advisor to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina posted a video from his verified facebook account compiling media reports on the unholy alliance on BNP Jamaat and militants.

"Tarique Rahman, intervened and ensured release of top associate of Bangla Bhai from police custody", reveals WikiLeaks.

Some headlines of media reports cited in the videos are "Eight BNP-Jamaat leaders and ministers responsible for direct patronage behind rise of militancy", "Cadres of Bangla Bhai roaming Rajshahi city under police protection", "AL leaders strangled to death by Bangla Bhai cadres", "Top militants were released after arrest", are some headlines from mainstream media reports featured in the video.

A notorious criminal Siddiqur Rahman alias Bangla Bhai built up now banned militant outfit Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) that reared ugly head under direct patronage of state machinery during the regime of BNP-Jamaat alliance assumed between 2001 and 2006.

Following the blasts, photos of distributed leaflets "we seek to establish Islamic rule for Bangladesh" by the militant group were also featured in the video. It was incorporated in the video that progressive writers, thinkers and activists were targeted by the militants and came under attack with eminent writer like Humayun Azad was killed and later admitted by the militant group.

Employing militant groups to eliminate popular AL leaders and activists became a signature mark of the BNP-Jamaat regime, added the video with reports how AL leaders were attacked with some eliminated by militant groups.

In August 21, 2004 grenade attacks at AL's anti-terrorism rally, during that stint, that left at least 24 AL leaders and activists with then opposition leader Sheikh Hasina escaped the assassination attempt with ear injury, another post reads, "That blast was also executed and endorsed by BNP-Jamaat backed militant groups".

Portraying Tarique Rahman as a symbol of "kleptocratic government and violent politics" in Bangladesh, the US embassy in Dhaka even recommended blocking his entry into the United States.

From 2001-06, a number of international outlets also described the rise of specter of terror as leading analysts like Swedish journalist and writer Bertil Lintner described Bangladesh as the "Cocoon of Terror" and Pulitzer Prize-winning American journalist and poet Elisa Griswold predicted an Afghan style Islamist Revolution.

A cocoon of terror' by Bertil Lintner/Far Eastern Economic Review, April 4, 2002 and 'The Next Islamist Revolution?' by Elisa Griswold/ The New York Times, Jan 23, 2005 are some headlines speak about the explicit patronage by BNP-Jamaat government in its previous term.

Tarique and his associates including then intelligence officials in Bangladesh held ties with the separatist group United Liberation Front of Asom (Ulfa) Commander-in-Chief Paresh Barua, revealed Major General Gaganjit Singh, former deputy director general of India's Defence Intelligence Agency, recalling the 2004 10-truck arms and ammunition haul in Chattogram.