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Suspected terrorists arrested ahead of anticipated Bengali New Year attack

FORUM Staff

Anti-terrorism officials in Bangladesh say a tip led to the arrest of five suspects accused of plotting a terrorist attack during upcoming Bengali New Year celebrations.

Authorities raided an apartment outside Dhaka where they discovered large quantities of gel explosives and other bomb-making materials, Reuters reported in March 2016. Mizanur Rahman Bhuiya, spokesman for the country’s Rapid Action Battalion, said the suspects planned to use the weapons in April during Bengali New Year celebrations — the largest annual event in Bangladesh.

Bhuiya described the suspects as members of Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh, an Islamist militant group banned in Bangladesh. The Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen is blamed for exploding nearly 500 bombs almost simultaneously on a single day — including in Dhaka — in 2005.

Instances of violent extremism continue to erupt across Bangladesh even as officials reaffirm their commitment and place into action plans to crack down on terrorism.

A day after authorities announced the Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen suspect arrests, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) claimed responsibility for killing a Shiite preacher who was hacked to death a week earlier, according to Agence France-Presse (AFP). Bangladesh authorities, however, reject ISIL’s claims, according to AFP.

“We’re investigating the motive, but it was not carried out by IS [the Islamic State],” Anwar Hossain, a local police chief, told AFP.

ISIL also claimed responsibility for the January 2016 killing of another preacher from the same district as this victim, an 85-year-old man who had converted to Christianity from Islam.

Bangladesh officials maintain that any terrorism problems within the country are homegrown and that attempts — if any — by ISIL to infiltrate the country have been unsuccessful.

“We have made arrests on each and every so-called ISIS- [Islamic State of Iraq and Syria] claimed attack,” a Bangladesh police official told the Breitbart News Network. “The attackers have confessed their crimes in court. They have also confessed being a Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh member and denied any linkage with ISIS.”

Amid this wave of militant violence, the Bangladesh High Court has agreed to hear discussion on dropping Islam as the country’s state religion, decreed so in 1988 by military ruler Hussein Muhammad Ershad. When the Bangladesh constitution was established in 1971, it declared all religions as “equal in the eyes of the state,” Reuters reported in March 2016.

Recent discussions on Islam have polarized Bangladesh as ISIL credits itself with attacks against religious minorities there. The High Court was scheduled to begin hearing discussion on the issue in late March 2016, but a decision could take months.

“It will take long time to get any decision,” Rana Dasgupta, a government prosecutor, told Reuters. “The nature of the case is time consuming. The High Court will continue to hear from both parties and then will deliver its verdict.”

According to The Wall Street Journal newspaper, the composition of Bangladesh citizens is 90 percent Muslims, 8 percent Hindus, and 2 percent Christians and other religions.

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