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Militant Islamists Are Suspected in Slaying of Hindu Priest in Bangladesh
Militant Islamists Are Suspected in Slaying of Hindu Priest in Bangladesh
Image: The Hindu priest Anando Gopal Ganguly and his wife, Shefali Ganguly, in an undated photograph taken at their house in Jhenidah, Bangladesh. Credit European Pressphoto Agency
DHAKA, Bangladesh — A Hindu priest was hacked to death on Tuesday morning in southwestern Bangladesh in what the police suspect is the latest in a series of killings by Islamist militants.
The priest, Anando Gopal Ganguly, 68, was riding a bicycle in an isolated rural area not far from his home when he was attacked by three men on a motorcycle who came up from behind him, said Gopinath Kanjilal, an assistant superintendent of the police for the Jhenaidah district. He said Mr. Ganguly had been on his way to conduct a prayer service.
The Islamic State claimed responsibility for the murder in a report by the group’s Amaq news agency, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors extremist activity online.
“It seems the attackers were following the priest from his home and killed him at a convenient place,” Mr. Kanjilal said. Mr. Ganguly’s throat was slit, and he was “almost beheaded,” said Mr. Kanjilal, who said he had suspected that Islamist militants were responsible.
In recent years, Bangladesh has had a series of similar killings. The initial targets were secular writers and intellectuals, but recently the victims have included foreigners, gay activists and members of religious minorities. Islamist militants are suspected in many of the attacks, which appear to have accelerated in recent weeks.
On Sunday, the wife of a police official known for pursuing Islamist militants was fatally stabbed and shot while taking her son to a school bus stop in Chittagong, in southern Bangladesh. Also on Sunday, in the country’s north, a Christian grocer was hacked to death.
The Islamic State has claimed responsibility for some of the attacks, while a branch of Al Qaeda has claimed others, according to the SITE Intelligence Group. Officials in Bangladesh deny that foreign Islamist militants have a presence in the country.
Also on Tuesday, the police said they had killed two members of the banned militant group Jamaat-ul-Mujahedeen Bangladesh in a gunfight in Dhaka, the capital. One was involved with the bombing of a Hindu temple in the country’s north in December and the murder of a professor in northwestern Bangladesh in April, and the other was involved with an attack on a Shiite mosque in November, said Masudur Rahman, a spokesman for the Dhaka Metropolitan Police.
Members of Jamaat-ul-Mujahedeen Bangladesh had been traveling to Dhaka, the police said. Officers intercepted them in the Mirpur area of the city, and the two men were killed in the subsequent gunfire, while the rest escaped, Mr. Rahman said.
Another Islamist militant whose affiliation is unknown confessed to his involvement in an attack in December on a mosque of the tiny Ahmadiyya Muslim community in the Rajshahi district in northwestern Bangladesh and was arrested on Tuesday morning, said Mohammad Nisharul Arif, superintendent of police in Rajshahi. When he brought officers to the home of some associates on Tuesday, he was killed in a gun battle there, Mr. Arif said.
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© 2016, The New York Times
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