Law enforcers could not yet identify who were behind the supply of sophisticated suicide vest, grenades and weapons and also funds to operate their so-called jihadist activists in the country.
Law enforcers collected the remains of burnt notes worth Tk 12 lakh, two laptops, several mobile phones and documents as evidences from the militants' den in the capital's Ashkona area of Dakkhin Khan on Saturday.
Afif Kaderi is the 14-year old son of militant Tanvir Kaderi who earlier committed suicide during police action. Abedatul Arfin alias Khadiza is wife of Tanvir Kaderi and mother of Afif, herself a militant now languishing in jail.
Meanwhile, police failed to find out who supplied sophisticated suicide vest, grenades and weapons to Afif.
Monirul Islam, chief of Counter Terrorism unit of Dhaka Metropolitan Police, said, "The total expenditure was not more than US$10,000 to carry out the July 1 Gulshan café attack that left 22 people including two police officials dead. The outfit received a portion of the money from abroad.
Police have documentary proof that the militant group received Tk 10 lakh and another Tk 18 lakh from abroad before the attack at the Holey Artisan Bakery in Gulshan, he said.
Police also failed to find out the real source of the fund for militancy in the country.
Women turn towards militancy under pressure of their militant husbands, Chief of DMP's counterterrorism unit Monirul Islam said on Tuesday.
Police came to this conclusion based on information given by the women arrested in recent times over the incidents of militancy, Monirul, also an Additional Police Commissioner, said while talking to journalists at DMP media centre in Dhaka.
Monirul said police are yet to find any evidence that shows women joined "Neo JMB" on their
own will.
Terming the incident of a suspected female militant blowing herself up "exceptional," the CTTC chief said she might have done it "out of frustration."
The female militant suspect Shakira tried to detonate her suicide vest in the midst of law enforcers during a police raid at a hideout of militant outfit "Neo JMB" in Ashkona of Dhaka's Dakkhin Khan on December 24. But she ended up blowing herself up seriously injuring her daughter.
Shakira first married Iqbal, father of her four-year-old daughter Sabina. After Iqbal died of cancer, she married Suman, a suspected militant, who according to their family sources was arrested in the past, the counterterrorism chief said. The law enforcers are yet to know the real identity of Suman, he added.
RAB Director General Benazir Ahmed has earlier said that they have found out who are funding and backing militants behind the scene in Bangladesh. But he declines to name names and has sounded a warning, "We know who the players are. This small group is playing with monsters in their own interest. And they will be obliterated by these monsters."
Most of the militant organisations continue to access funding from wealthy benefactors, legitimate business and criminal activities. But in the face of law enforcers' strong surveillance they are failing to fund themselves. Most of the organisations are currently under significant financial pressure.
