Two suspected terrorists on Sunday blew themselves up in “suicide blasts” when security forces raided their hideout in Bangladesh, the latest such incident amid an intensified nationwide crackdown on Islamist militants, officials said.
“It is a Neo-JMB den where two terrorists were killed in the encounter...It (operation) is still underway,” a senior police officer told reporters.
One of the terrorists detonated his suicide vest when police entered the single-story building at Bazrapur around Jhinaidah district, officer-in-charge of Moheshpur Police Station Ahmed Kabir was quoted as saying by the Daly Star.
The second terrorist died in another suicide blast inside the building, he added.
The first militant was identified as Tuhun.
The security forces now await arrival of a special bomb disposal unit at the scene to launch the “final assault” to flush out the rest of the ultras, the official said.
Media reports earlier said the elite anti-crime rapid Action Battalion (RAB), police’s counter-terrorism team and transnational crime unit (CTTC) and district police laid a siege along the hideout since midnight after receiving information that the ultra were inside the house.
Bangladesh witnessed an intensified anti-militancy clampdown across the country as the police headquarters recently circulated a list of nearly 5,000 suspected ultra to all district police chiefs.
In March, Bangladeshi police conducted series of large-scale operations against terrorists, in which at least 17 suspected terrorists were killed.
On March 31, eight terrorists blew themselves up with a grenade after the security forces raided their hideout north of the Bangladeshi capital.
Bangladesh has been witnessing a spate of attacks on secular activists, foreigners and religious minorities since 2013.