Thirty-eight people, who went abroad for jobs and studies in the last few years, were radicalised in several countries, including Turkey and Malaysia, according to a police investigation.
Many of them are believed to have entered Syria through Turkey to join global terror organisation Islamic State, say sources at the police headquarters.
“Our immigration police are on alert. If any of them tries to enter the country, he will be arrested,” said a police official on the condition of anonymity.
The records of the 38 Bangladeshis, who had gone missing in seven countries, have already been sent to the immigration police, the official added.
Of them, 13 went out of trace in Singapore, nine in Turkey, seven in Malaysia, four in the United Arab Emirates, two in Japan and one each in Qatar, Iran and Saudi Arabia, say the police headquarters.
They are among the 51 missing people suspected to have been radicalised. The remaining 13 went missing from different parts of Bangladesh over the last couple of years.
The police headquarters has finalised the list of 51 after scrutinising other lists prepared independently by different law enforcement and intelligence agencies.
“The Police headquarters talked to the family members of the missing people and got information that they might have been radicalised,” said the official.
Referring to some Bangladeshi students now studying at Monash University in Malaysia, the official said they might be radicalised if the Bangladesh High Commission there doesn’t keep a close watch on them.
Contacted, a senior official at the Bangladesh mission in Kuala Lumpur said, “It is not possible for us to monitor whether any Bangladeshi student or national is getting radicalised after coming to Malaysia.”
The official, however, said if they receive any information about any Bangladeshi national’s involvement in militancy there, they would take necessary steps.
Two of the five Gulshan café attackers — Nibras Islam and Rohan Imtiaz — were students of Monash University. Another student of the university, Tawsif Hossain, also a friend of Nibras, went missing after he returned to Bangladesh on February 3.
Tawsif is also on the list of the missing people.
Following the terror attacks in Holey Artisan Bakery in Gulshan and near Sholakia Eidgah in Kishoreganj early last month, police and other agencies took initiatives to prepare lists of missing people suspected to have been radicalised.
Source; The Daily Star
