Hawzah News Agency-Azbahar Ali Sheikh, a senior police officer, confirmed that a Jamaat leader from the western district of Jhenaidah and a leader of its student wing were killed during a raid early Tuesday, October 24.

"They fired from pistols and threw three (Molotov) cocktails at policemen when they challenged them at 3:45 am. We fired back and two people were hit. Later we learnt their identities," media outlets quoted Ali Sheikh as saying.

A senior Jamaat official has vehemently denied that the two party figures were killed in gun battles, saying both had been picked up by plainclothesmen early last month.

"It is cooked up (by police)," the official told AFP on condition of anonymity, adding that another Jamaat member had also been killed in "fake gunfights."

Nur Khan Liton, a top human rights activist, called for a judicial probe into the latest killings, saying, "We've serious questions about these deaths. We think these are extrajudicial killings."

He added that local newspapers had earlier reported the two figures missing.

Bangladesh security forces have launched a major crackdown on suspected militants since a raid on a café in the capital Dhaka in early July, where more than 20 people, mainly foreign hostages, were killed.

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