Bangladesh police finds bomb materials from mosque compound in northeastern city

Police recovered bomb-making materials Wednesday from a room at a mosque complex in a northeastern Bangladeshi city, a day after a suspected Islamic activist threw a bomb at a judge, slightly wounding him, a police officer said. Police found bomb components, including detonators, metal shards, wires and batteries from his rented room at Buromia Jame Masjid in Sylhet town, 190 kilometers (120 miles) northeast of the national capital, Dhaka, officer Ansaruddin Khan Pathan said.

In a statement given Wednesday before a magistrate, the suspect, identified as Akhtar Ahmed, 25, claimed he was a member of a banned Islamic group, Jumatul Mujahedin Bangladesh, Pathan said.

The radical Islamic group and a sister organization, Jagrata Muslim Janata, are suspected of carrying out a recent spate of bombings targeting courts and government offices. The groups want to establish strict Quranic laws in the Muslim-majority nation, which is governed by secular laws, the AP reports.

Police charged Ahmed under an explosives act, which carries a maximum penalty of life in prison. He was later sent to Sylhet jail. Police were also looking for two of Ahmed's alleged accomplices, and were questioning the mosque's Imam.

In his statement, Ahmed, a graduate from an Islamic seminary, said the militant group had recruited him in neighboring Jamalpur district. A.M.