Dhaka: Eight Islamist extremists from a banned group were charged by Bangladesh police on Sunday, for the 2016 murders of two prominent gay rights activists.
Dhaka police’s counter terrorism unit filed the charge-sheet against the eight men, saying they were members of Ansar al Islam, deputy commissioner of police Mohibul Islam Khan told AFP. “Among them four have been arrested and the rest are still at large,” he said, adding the group was led by Syed Ziaul Haque, a sacked Bangladesh army major who was leading the extremist group.
Xulhaz Mannan, publisher of Bangladesh’s first magazine for the gay and lesbian community, and fellow activist Mahbub Tonoy were hacked to death in a Dhaka apartment in April 2016 by unidentified men carrying machetes and guns.
Al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) said it was behind the killings of the men, both aged 35, who it said had worked to “promote homosexuality” in Bangladesh.
But Bangladesh police chiefs have said their murders bear the hallmarks of local Islamists, denying that international jihadist networks have a presence in the world’s third largest Muslim-majority country.
Ansar al Islam has been blamed for a series of murders since 2013, including of atheist writers, publishers, members of religious minorities, social activists and foreign aid workers. (AFP)
