The Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HuJI), a South Asian fundamentalist group linked to the 2010 German Bakery bombing in Pune, had a common subversive agenda for befriending northeast rebels. This also seems to the case with the similarly radicalised terror group Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB).
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) had on Thursday arrested Nurul Hoque alias Naeem, JMB’s chief trainer, from Howrah station near Kolkata. Naeem told interrogators that he had received advanced training in guerrilla warfare at a Myanmarese base of the National Socialist Council of Nagaland-Khaplang (NSCN-K), shared by the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA-Independent).
HT had reported that ULFA-I’s elusive chief Paresh Barua used two Bangladeshi mercenaries -- both ex-HuJI members -- as bodyguards.
NIA officials said JMB’s involvement pointed to a plan hatched before the Naga armed group had walked out of a 14-year-old truce in March, to destabilise the northeast as well as Bangladesh.
“There were reports of at least 200 ULFA activists having received training in Pakistan and Afghanistan by Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) and the Afghan Mujahideen,” Assam DGP Khagen Sarma said.