A youth leader of ruling Awami League was killed in a mysterious shootout between elite Rapid Action Battalion and a group of criminals here, hours after he murdered his fellow partyman.
Zahid Siddiki Tarek, a leader of the party’s youth front Jubo League, was killed hours after he murdered fellow partyman Riazul Haque Khan Milky, firing bullets from a close range in front of a shopping mall at Gulshan area on Tuesday.
Milky’s murder sparked wide sensation as the TV channels carried the footages grabbed by the close circuit cameras of the shipping complex, visibly beyond the knowledge of Tarek, who was also wounded as an accomplice shot him on the foot.
“The people saw in the television that Tarek fled the scene in a motorbike immediately after the murder, but we tracked him down at the private Fortune Hospital at the Uttara area within hours as he was being treated there for his own injury,” a RAB spokesman said.
He said Tarek was killed in a “crossfire” shortly after RAB obtained his release from the hospital as his condition improved and was taking him to a police station in a microbus.
“A group of 10 to 12 criminals attacked the microbus firing gunshots, forcing our boys to retaliate… After the brief encounter, Tarek was found dead inside the bus while one of the attackers was also killed in the shootout,” he said.
Lt Col Kismat Hayat of RAB said two members of the elite force also suffered injuries during the shootout but their wounds were not serious.
The elite force also arrested six others in connection with the murder, and handed them over to police, who are investigating the case.
According to media reports, 43-year-old Milky was once political mentor of Tarek but they subtly developed hostility over the election for councillorship of the city corporation last year.