Terrorists kill RAB officer in Chattogram’s Jungle Salimpur

A RAB officer was killed and three other personnel seriously injured when conducting a drive to arrest a criminal in Jungle Salimpur area in Chattogram on Monday evening.

RAB-7 Deputy Assistant Director Abdul Motaleb was killed after terrorists attacked his team with firearms and other weapons, confirmed Md Ahsan Habib Palash, deputy inspector general of police at Chattogram Range.

The 3,100-acre Jungle Salimpur area, located in Salimpur union of Sitakunda upazila, is designated as a government land, but has been almost entirely controlled by groups of terrorists, hill cutters and land grabbers for more than three decades.

Law enforcers are often attacked when they enter the area, where outsider entry is virtually impossible.

According to police, two vehicles of the RAB Patenga battalion entered the terror-infested area in the evening to detain a criminal. At one point, a group of terrorists attacked the convoy. Afterwards, the criminals took Motaleb and his compatriots as hostages.

Later, a team from the Sitakunda Police Station rescued the hostages and sent them to the Combined Military Hospital (CMH) in Chattogram Cantonment, where the doctors declared Motaleb dead.

RAB and police presence has been beefed up in the area.