Missing government critic found in Bangladesh

A prominent government critic, who was believed to have been blindfolded and abducted from his home, was today found safe in southwestern Bangladesh, police said.
Farhad Mazhar, 69, was found sitting in a bus with a travel bag in western Jessore, indicating he could be travelling on his own.
"Mazhar said unidentified people abducted him yesterday as he went out of his house (in the capital). We will review his statement," Dhaka police's Joint Commissioner Abdul Baten said.
A senior police official earlier told newsmen in Jessore "it does not look like a case of abduction" as Mazhar was found to be carrying his travel bag as a joint team of police and elite Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) rescued him while family members said the writer habitually carry the bag which contains different things, including books".

The CCTV footage of the writer's neighbourhood in Dhaka showed him walking away with a man yesterday.
Mazhar was brought to Dhaka under security cover while family members met him at detective police headquarters in the capital where officials quizzed him initially ahead of producing him before a magistrate for delivering his statement as part of a legal procedure.

"He would be handed over to his family after he makes his statement before the magistrate later today," Baten said.
Previously known to be an ultra-left writer, Mazhar, also a poet, visibly took a U-turn by throwing his weight behind ultra-right or fundamentalist Jamaat-e-Islami as its top leaders were being tried for committing warcrimes during the country's Liberation War of 1971.

In opposing the warcrimes trial, Mazhar also appeared as a harsh critic of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's government.
Mazhar's wife earlier said she had received a call from her husband who said he was being taken away and feared for his life while another by unidentified people demanding a ransom demand of 3.5 million taka (USD 43,300) for her husband.