B'desh: Two female militants nabbed, one killed in raid at militant den

Dhaka [Bangladesh], Dec. 25 (ANI): A raid by the Counter-Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) unit at a house in Ashkona Purba Para area of Dhaka led to the capture of two female militants and rescue of three children. Two others were killed in the raid- a woman killing herself by detonating a suicide vest and a teenage boy whose cause of death remains unclear, reports the Dhaka Tribune. The operation, codenamed Ripple 24, was carried out early Saturday after a tip-off that wanted militant Musa was staying in the house. Also, two women - wife of Major (retd) Jahid, allegedly the trainer of Gulshan and Sholakia attackers, and wife of "Neo JMB" leader Maynul Musa - surrendered with two babies. Jebunnahar Shila, widow Jahid alias Murad, surrendered with her one-and-a-half-year-old daughter and Trsihna, wife of Musa, too was with her daughter, aged six to seven months, surrendered to the police. SWAT, Bomb Disposal Unit of the CTTC and different other units were involved in the 15-hour raid in the densely populated neighbourhood. The target was a flat on the ground floor of a three-storey building of Jamal Hossain, a Bangladeshi living in Kuwait. 14-year-old, Afif Kaderi, whose father Tanvir committed suicide during the September 10 raid on a militant hideout in Azimpur, refused to surrender and opened fire at the police. He was later found dead inside the flat. Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal, who visited the scene, said the boy got engaged in gunfight with the police and finally blasted a grenade that left him dead. A number of anti-militant operations have taken place since the July 1 Gulshan cafe attack that killed 22 people, mostly foreigners. Over the last few months, law enforcers conducted such drives in Kalyanpur, Rupnagar, Azimpur, Savar, Narayanganj, Gazipur and Tangail, killing 26 suspected militants, including "Neo JMB" coordinator Tamim Ahmed Chowdhury, thought to be one of the masterminds of the cafe attack. "Neo JMB", an offshoot of Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), is inspired by the ideologies of Islamic State. (ANI)