TANGAIL: The Daesh terrorist group claimed responsibility for the murder of a Hindu tailor in central Bangladesh on Saturday, according to a US-based monitoring group, amid a rise in attacks on religious minorities in the nation.
Police said the victim, named as Nikhil Chandra Joarder, 50, may have been murdered for allegedly making anti-Islam remarks several years ago.
“They came on a motorcycle and attacked him as he sat on a roadside. They hacked him on his head, neck and hand,” deputy chief of Tangail district police Aslam Khan told AFP.
Bangladesh is reeling from a series of brutal attacks on members of minority faiths, secularists, foreigners and intellectuals in recent months, including two gay activists and a professor in the past eight days alone. Many of the killings have been blamed on or claimed by militant groups, and in several cases attackers riding motorbikes hacked the victims to death with machetes or cleavers.
Police said local Muslims had filed a complaint against Joarder, who owned a tailoring shop, to police in 2012 for making anti-Islam comments. He was charged with hurting religious sentiments and spent three weeks in jail.
“But the trial did not proceed after the complainants withdrew the charges,” Abdul Jalil, the police chief of Gopalpur sub-district told AFP.
Another police official said that the dispute appeared to have ended peacefully, adding that the victim’s family said he was also being threatened by a relative. The murder came less than a week after suspected militants hacked to death two gay rights activists in the capital Dhaka, saying they tried to promote homosexuality in the country.
In February suspected militants decapitated a top Hindu priest inside a temple complex in a northern district, in an attack claimed by the Daesh group.
Separately, police said Saturday they had arrested two members of a banned militant outfit, Jamayetul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) in the case of a Christian convert brutally hacked to death in March.
Police said the victim, named as Nikhil Chandra Joarder, 50, may have been murdered for allegedly making anti-Islam remarks several years ago.
“They came on a motorcycle and attacked him as he sat on a roadside. They hacked him on his head, neck and hand,” deputy chief of Tangail district police Aslam Khan told AFP.
Bangladesh is reeling from a series of brutal attacks on members of minority faiths, secularists, foreigners and intellectuals in recent months, including two gay activists and a professor in the past eight days alone. Many of the killings have been blamed on or claimed by militant groups, and in several cases attackers riding motorbikes hacked the victims to death with machetes or cleavers.
Police said local Muslims had filed a complaint against Joarder, who owned a tailoring shop, to police in 2012 for making anti-Islam comments. He was charged with hurting religious sentiments and spent three weeks in jail.
“But the trial did not proceed after the complainants withdrew the charges,” Abdul Jalil, the police chief of Gopalpur sub-district told AFP.
Another police official said that the dispute appeared to have ended peacefully, adding that the victim’s family said he was also being threatened by a relative. The murder came less than a week after suspected militants hacked to death two gay rights activists in the capital Dhaka, saying they tried to promote homosexuality in the country.
In February suspected militants decapitated a top Hindu priest inside a temple complex in a northern district, in an attack claimed by the Daesh group.
Separately, police said Saturday they had arrested two members of a banned militant outfit, Jamayetul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) in the case of a Christian convert brutally hacked to death in March.
