A witness to the BDR massacre, Nazrul Islam, and three others were taken to the Baleshwar river, blindfolded, shot, and had their bodies cut open, tied to cement sacks and thrown into the water, Major Sabbir testified before the tribunal. Eyewitness Major Sabbir gave this testimony in an enforced-disappearance case at International Crimes Tribunal-1 around 11am on Thursday.
Major Sabbir told the tribunal that this killing was carried out in May 2010 by members of RAB-8’s intelligence wing, in the presence of and on the orders of Ziaul Ahsan, then head of RAB’s Intelligence Wing. The four were taken on a fishing trawler on the Baleshwar river at Chardowani in Patharghata, their faces and entire bodies covered. They were then brutally killed.
Earlier, on September 2, trawler boatman Abbas Mollik testified before International Crimes Tribunal-1 over enforced-disappearance and murder charges against former senior RAB official Ziaul Ahsan. At the time, he alleged that Ziaul Ahsan would personally shoot people brought in from Dhaka and other locations. Some detainees were shot once, others twice. A cement sack would then be tied to the victim’s neck or legs, and the body thrown into the river.
Abbas Mollik said that because detainees’ stomachs were cut open and they were shot in the head, their intestines and brain matter would come out, along with blood. This, he said, was why the boat needed to be washed afterward. They would then wash the boat and return to the ice mill at Chardowani.