Rab man makes 'confession'

Sepoy Nuruzzaman with another Rab man tailed Nazrul Islam on Narayanganj court premises on the day of the city panel mayor's abduction.

At one stage, Nazrul's aides caught Nuruzzaman's partner, who was in plainclothes, at the courtyard but freed him when he identified himself as a member of the elite force.

When Nazrul and his associates left the court on a car, the duo conveyed the message to Maj Arif Hossain and followed Nazrul's car on a microbus.

Nuruzzaman later joined the Rab team that abducted Nazrul and his four aides, and senior lawyer Chandan Sarkar and his driver on Dhaka-Narayanganj Link Road on April 27.

He did all these on orders from his senior officer Maj Arif, Nuruzzaman said in his deposition before Senior Judicial Magistrate Ishtiaq Ahmed Siddiqui's court in Narayanganj yesterday.

He gave deposition in two cases filed in connection with the sensational seven-murder incident, said Additional Public Prosecutor KM Fazlur Rahman.

Nuruzzaman, who was deputed from army, was arrested by detectives on Tuesday afternoon in his hometown Magura. He was running a business there since being forced into retirement from army following the murders, according to Magura police.

Nuruzzaman in his deposition said after kidnapping the seven, he along with some other Rab men got on the microbus, injected sedatives in the victims' body and strangled them with polythene bags.

Nuruzzaman also loaded bricks into the sacks that were later used to dump the corpses in the Shitalakkhya river.

The bodies were found floating in the river a few days later.

With Nuruzzaman, 11 out of 15 arrested Rab men have so far given confessional statements in connection with the gruesome killings, for which Commanding Officer of Rab-11 Lt Col Tareque Sayeed Mohammad, Maj Arif Hossain and Lt Commander SM Masud Rana were sacked from their forces and put behind bars.

Nur Hossain, who allegedly paid Tk 6 crore to the Rab men for killing Nazrul over political rivalry, is in an Indian jail for illegal entry into the country.