For the third time in a couple of months, Bangladesh’s elite Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) on Tuesday recovered a huge cache of firearms and ammunition near Tripura’s border at the Satchhari forest in north-eastern Habiganj.
The arms and ammunition include light machine guns, sub-machine gun, self-loading rifles, automatic rifles, sniper telescope-5 rifle and 2,400 bullets of bore 7.62mm revolvers.
RAB’s director (Legal and Media), Wing Commander Mufti Mahmud Khan, said the arms and ammunition were recovered from the forest in Chunarughat. They were found in two containers hidden in two pits in the deep forest. The RAB official said they were yet to confirm who stashed the arms. The force recently recovered huge arms and ammunition from the same forest, which has been identified as a smuggling route used by Indian separatist groups.
Only in June, the RAB recovered 184 rocket shells and 153 chargers in a bunker in the forest. On another occasion in the same month, it recovered 633 rounds of 7.62 mm bullets, 54 rounds of 12.54 mm bullets and machine guns.