{UAH} Bangladesh Hindu priest murdered by suspected Islamists

Bangladesh Hindu priest murdered by suspected Islamists
7 June 2016

There have been nationwide protests against the attacks
A Hindu priest has been killed in Bangladesh, in the latest attack by
suspected Islamist militants.

The body of Ananda Gopal Ganguly, 70, was found in a field near his
temple in western Jhenaidah district. His head had been nearly severed
from his neck.

Separately, police have killed three suspected Islamists in a
crackdown on extremists blamed for the murders.

Critics say the government is in denial about the killings, most of
which have been blamed on or claimed by Islamists.

Two alleged members of the banned Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh
(JMB) were shot dead in Dhaka when police raided a home in the city -
police said unidentified gunmen opened fire on them.

A third - said to have been linked to a recent bombing of an Ahmadiya
mosque - was killed in western Rashahi district.

Who is behind the Bangladesh killings?

Is extremism on the rise in Bangladesh?

Lurching from secularism to sectarian terror?

Ananda Gopal Ganguly is the third person to be killed in such an
attack in the past two days.

"He left home this morning saying that he was going to a Hindu house
to offer prayers," deputy police chief Gopinath Kanjilal told AFP news
agency. "Later, farmers found his near-decapitated body in a rice
field."

No group has said it carried out the attack and police do not think
there were any witnesses.

On Sunday the wife of a senior police officer investigating the
attacks and a Christian businessman were killed.

Media captionBangladeshi liberals are afraid of who might be next

Police say more than 40 people have been killed since January last
year in the wave of attacks on those seen by extremists as offensive
to Islam.

The government insists that Islamic State does not have a presence in
Bangladesh and has tended to blame the opposition and local militant
groups.

Critics have accused the government of failing to properly address the
violence in Bangladesh.


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Who is being targeted?
The grim list of those who have fallen victim to attacks by Islamist
militants in Bangladesh is growing ever more diverse.

Secular bloggers, academics, gay rights activists, and members of
religious minorities including Shia, Sufi and Ahmadi Muslims,
Christians and Hindus have all been killed, many of them hacked to
death.

A university professor whose family said he was not an atheist was
murdered in April, suggesting the list of those at risk had widened
further.

Who exactly is behind the attacks remains murky. Bangladesh has myriad
extremist groups and there have been few convictions over the attacks.

Bangladesh has disputed claims by so-called Islamic State (IS) or
al-Qaeda-linked groups for the attacks, instead often blaming
opposition parties or local Islamist groups.

But until the killings stop the government itself will face
accusations of not doing enough to protect minorities in the
Sunni-dominated nation.


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