Bangladesh arrests ex-soldier after attack plot threat

Bangladesh anti-terrorism police are questioning an ex-soldier, arrested after a manhunt that began last month following warnings of attacks targeting airports, parliament and places of worship, police said on Saturday (May 16, 2026).

The suspect, named as 23-year-old Mohammad Rahed Hossain Mahed, “had taken refuge in a hideout near the Indian border”, said Md Moniruzzaman, head of the police station at Moulvibazar, a northeastern district.

Counterterrorism officers were questioning Mahed, who police said was linked to a radical Islamist group.

“The arrested individual is a dismissed army personnel member and was inspired by the ideology of the banned outfit Dawlatul Islam Neo-JMB,” a police statement late on Friday (May 15) said.

In late April, police tightened airport security after they warned of a possible attack, and a manhunt had been ongoing since then.

Police said the suspects could launch attacks on key installations, including airports, parliament and places of worship, using “sharp weapons, firearms or explosive devices”.

Bangladesh has periodically been targeted by homegrown militant groups inspired by Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group.

An attack on a bakery in Dhaka in 2016 killed 22 people, most of them foreigners.

Around the same time, Al-Qaeda-linked militants killed several secular writers and activists, including Avijit Roy, a US citizen of Bangladeshi origin.

Five men were sentenced to death in 2021 for killing the secular blogger.