Dhaka: Detectives are investigating whether BNP senior vice-chairman Tarique Rahman had any link with the conspiracy to abduct and kill prime minister Sheikh Hasina’s son and her ICT adviser Sajeeb Wazed Joy in the USA.

‘Detectives are looking into whether anyone from Bangladesh, London and the USA had any link with the plotters,’ said chief of the Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime of Dhaka Metropolitan Police Monirul Islam while talking to reporters at the DMP Media Centre in Dhaka on Tuesday afternoon.

Asked whether Tarique Rahman was one of the BNP’s high-profile suspects as mentioned in the First Information Report (FIR) lodged with Paltan Police Station in August last year, he said it would be revealed after investigation.

According to the FIR, some high-ups of BNP were involved in the plot to abduct and kill Joy.

Responding to a query, Monirul Islam, also DMP Additional Commissioner, said arrested senior journalist Shafik Rehman admitted during interrogation that he had several meetings with former FBI special agent Robert Lustyik, his friend Johonnes Thaler and a BNP leader’s son Rizvi Ahmed Caesar, now detained in the USA, in connection with the plot.

Shafik Rehman went to the USA in 2012 where he had attended several meetings with the detained plotters, the CTTC unit chief said, adding that a special DB team comprising of Deputy Commissioner (South) Masrukur Rahman Khaled, Additional DC Rajib Al Masud and investigation officer of the case Assistant Commissioner Hasan Arafat will go to the USA to investigate the matter.

He claimed that the plotters sent Shafik Rehman several emails, and some documents containing personal information of Joy, including his residential address, his car’s colour and registration number, were sent to detained Amar Desh acting editor Mahmudur Rahman by Fedex courier service from the USA.

Based on information gained from Shafik Rehman, a DB team went to his Eskaton Garden residence in Dhaka on Tuesday afternoon and confiscated his passports and some documents, Monirul Islam said.

As detectives have found the involvement of Mahmudur Rahman in the conspiracy to abduct and kill Joy, the investigation officer of the case submitted a petition to the Dhaka’s CMM court on Monday for showing him arrested in the case.

In the petition, he also prayed for placing the Amar Desh acting editor on police custody for quizzing him about the plot, Monirul said, adding that the court fixed April 25 for hearing the petition.

Mahmudur Rahman has been in jail since his arrest from his newspaper’ s Karwanbazar office in Dhaka North city on April 11, 2013 in a case filed under the ICT Act.

Earlier on Saturday morning, DB police arrested journalist Shafik Rehman, former editor of the Bangla daily Jaijaidin, from his Eskaton Garden house. He was later put on a five-day custody in the case.