Avijit killing: Farabi on 10-day remand

Shafiur Rahman Farabi, the prime suspect in the sensational murder case of writer-blogger Avijit Roy, was placed on a 10-day remand today.

Metropolitan Magistrate Md Rezaul Islam of Dhaka passed the order after Fazlur Rahman, inspector of Detective Branch (DB) of police, produced him before the court with a 10-day remand prayer.

Farabi, who had issued repeated death threats to Avijit, was arrested by Rapid Action Battalion in Jatrabari Bus Terminal of Dhaka when he was about to leave for Chittagong yesterday.

Farabi was detained twice before -- in 2010 for vandalism on Chittagong University campus and in 2013 for issuing death threat to the imam who conducted namaz-e-janaza of Rajib Haider, a blogger chopped to death in Mirpur on February 15 of the same year.

He was indicted under the ICT act following his arrest on February 24, 2013. But he came out on bail after about six months and started to incite killing of free-thinking bloggers.

Farabi again came to the forefront after Avijit was hacked to death and his wife Rafida Ahmed Bonya seriously injured on Dhaka University campus on Thursday night.

SCF TO BUILD MEMORIAL AT KILLING SITE

Sector Commanders' Forum today announced that they will build a memorial at the killing site of Avijit, a Bangladesh-born US citizen, said Harun Habib, acting secretary general of the forum.

Addressing a human chain programme at Dhaka University premises where the gruesome killing took place, Harun also urged the government to build a dummy monument at the place where Avijit was killed.

The SCF organised the human chain protesting the murder of Avijit.