Unknown assailants bombed to death Amir Azam Khan, 43, a local BNP leader and chairman of Amirpur union in Batiaghata upazila at Sarkarpara under Khulna Police Station and killed Abdus Salam Shikder, 52, an AL activist of Morrelganj upazila in Bagerhat, in a knife attack.

Manzur Morshed Khan Labu, 32, general secretary of Sonadanga unit of the AL, was severely injured when assailants hurled three potent bombs at him on Haji Ismail Road in Khulna city, the scene of a string of high-profile recent killings that sent shock waves across Bangladesh.

According to witnesses, Azam died on the scene fronting a direct bomb in the neck when assailants hurled three powerful explosive devices at about 11:45am on his way home.

"He received death threats from outlaws on several occasions last year for taking a bold stand against them in violence-torn Batiaghata," said Amir Ejaj Khan, president of the upazila BNP and the party's candidate for Khulna-1 constituency in the last parliamentary ballot.

Azam, who dropped his younger brother Ejaj near an autorickshaw stand a few minutes before his death, was the fourth union parishad chairman killed in Batiaghata upazila allegedly by outlaws in the last two years.

Khulna police said they arrested one of the bombers, Nuruzzaman Sumon, 25, and he admitted his involvement in the killing of Azam and New Age newsman Manik Chandra Saha in a judicial confessional statement.

Sumon was caught and beaten up by people when he was fleeing after hurling the bombs.

Saha was killed in a bomb attack in front of Khulna Press Club on January 15 in a high-profile killing after AL leader Manzurul Imam last year in the city, at the heart of violence-ravaged southwestern region where a series of recent deaths including of law-enforcers has shell-shocked the nation.

Eighty-five minutes before Azam's killing, Manzur, 32, suffered serious injuries when assailants threw three handmade bombs to him on his way to the district judge's court by motor-cycle.

Motaleb Hossain, former joint convener of Khulna district Jubo League, who was in the pillion seat, suffered splinter injuries in the attack that the AL instantly blamed on the BNP, triggering tension in the city.

Police and witnesses said one of the bombs exploded in the abdomen of Manzur, who was shifted to Dhaka by helicopter for better treatment by the afternoon and was operated upon at Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH) last night.

MM Abdus Shamim, a Khulna Medical College Hospital doctor who accompanied the AL leader to Dhaka, told The Daily Star that Manzur was in critical condition as he suffered massive injuries to his liver and right abdomen.

Salam was knifed to death in front of a graveyard when he was returning home from local AL office early yesterday in an apparent conflict with a local BNP leader.

Police retrieved his body and three pairs of shoes and a knife probably used by the killers from Nabbuirashi bus stand yesterday morning.

Officer-in-Charge of Morrelganj Police Station Abdur Razzak linked the killing to Salam's personal enmity with BNP activist Mashiur Rahman Howlader of Saralia village.

He claimed that the slain AL leader forced Mashiur to pay a fine of Tk 40,000 in a sex scandal.

Life lurched into a halt in Batiaghata in the wake of the killing of Azam, who joined the BNP from the Jatiya party in 1995 and was elected chairman of Amirpur for the third consecutive term last year.

Road communication on all routes between Khulna to Satkhira through the upazila and Dumuria was suspended when hundreds of agitators wrecked several vehicles from a protest procession.

Hundreds of people and top BNP leaders including Whip Ashraf Hossain and Khulna Mayor Shaikh Tayebur Rahman rushed to the KMCH to see the chairman.

Police reinforcements were rushed to Amirpur union and Batiaghata upazila headquarters to maintain peace and the KMCH was cordoned by the joint forces of police and Bangladesh Rifles.

Deputy Commissioner (South) of Khulna Metropolitan Police Ali Akbar said Sumon confessed to killing Azam and Saha in a statement to Metropolitan Magistrate Safina Begum recorded at 6:15pm.

Sumon, allegedly an outlaw, in his statement said seven of his outfit, divided into two gangs, killed Azam.

A band of four stood a few yards off Azam's Sarkarpara house while others in a separate gang guarded his house, the police officer quoted Sumon as telling the court.

He said the killers used similar explosive devices to kill Saha.

Additional Police Commissioner of Khulna Shaikh Sajjad Hossain also linked Sumon to an outlawed outfit.

Fear spread in Sonadanga area in the wake of the bomb attack on Manzur where panic-stricken pedestrians ran helter-skelter for cover, roads became deserted of vehicles and shops and other businesses closed down immediately.

Tension also ran high in Dhaka when a large number of AL leaders and activists rushed to the DMCH in the evening after Manzur was flown in from Khulna by the Medinova Hospital helicopter.

Addressing an impromptu rally at the DMCH, AL General Secretary Abdul Jalil blamed the attempt on the life of the opposition leader on the 'ruling party hit-men'.

He pegged the attack as a ploy to exterminate all popular AL leaders.

A case was filed in Salam killing in Morrelganj, but no one was arrested.