Court Correspondent

A court here today withdrew the arrest warrant issued against veteran journalist Shafik Rehman in a case lodged for plotting to abduct and murder ousted prime minister Sheikh Hasina’s son Sajeeb Wazed Joy in the USA in 2015.

Dhaka Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Mahbubul Haque passed the order as Rehman surrendered before the court and pleaded to withdraw the warrant against him for filing an appeal against his conviction in the case.

“Earlier on September 22, the home ministry suspended Rehman’s sentence for a year on the condition of surrendering before the lower court and filing an appeal against his conviction,” defence counsel Syed Joynul Abedin Mejbah told BSS.

The court of the then Dhaka Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Asaduzzaman Nur on August 17, 2023, convicted and sentenced five people including veteran journalist Shafik Rehman and former acting editor of daily Amar Desh Mahmudur Rahman to seven-year imprisonment in the case.

The other convicts in the case are Jatiyatabadi Samajik Sangskritik Sangstha (Jasas) vice-president Mohammad Ullah Mamun, his son Rizvi Ahmed Caesar and Mizanur Rahman Bhuiyan, an expat businessman living in the USA.

Police on August 3, 2015, filed the case with Paltan Police Station and on February 19, 2018, filed the charge sheet against the five. A total of 12 witnesses including Joy testified in the case on different hearing dates.