Last witness starts deposition

The investigation officer, last witness in the Holey Artisan café attack case, started giving his statements before a Dhaka tribunal yesterday.

Humayun Kabir, an inspector of Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) unit, told the tribunal that he took charge of the investigation on July 5, 2016. On that day, he also visited the café in Gulshan.

He said he gathered some evidence from the spot. “I handed over all seized evidence [alamat] to the court along with the charge sheet,” he said.

The blood and hair samples of five militants and another person -- killed on the spot -- were sent to Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in America for tests, he said.

As FBI did not send any report due to “technical problem” in this regard, they [police] took Criminal Investigation Department’s (CID) reports instead, he said.

On July 1, 2016, militants held around 100 people hostage, he also said. A total of 29 people, including five militants, died during the café attack incident, the IO added.

Judge Majibur Rahman of the Anti-Terrorism Special Tribunal of Dhaka recorded his statements.

Other than him, the tribunal has so far recorded statements of 113 out of 211 prosecution witnesses in the case. The tribunal set October 21 for the next hearing. Eight accused, now in jail, were produced before the tribunal during yesterday’s hearing.

On July 1, 2016, armed militants stormed the bakery and killed 20 hostages, mostly foreign nationals. Two police officials were also killed during the 12-hour standoff.

On July 23 last year, the IO submitted the charge sheet to the chief metropolitan magistrate court of Dhaka, accusing eight people over the attack and naming 211 as prosecution witnesses. On November 26, the tribunal framed charges against the eight accused.