Sayed Kamaluddin
The recent high-profile murder of two foreigners in Dhaka and in Rangpur – an Italian and a Japanese nationals – and strong denials by Bangladesh authorities at the drop of a hat about the involvement of any Islamic State (IS) or al-Qaeda extremists are seemingly casting a lengthening shadow of doubts in the peoples’ mind. The question being asked widely is how could they assertively deny the alleged involvement of any extremist group even before going through a proper drill of investigations. This has obviously created some confusion.
This confusion has apparently been compounded by important government and ruling party functionaries by publicly naming names and in particular, accusing two mainstream opposition political parties, namely Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and pro-Islamic Jamaat-e-Islami party of their involvement in the murders.
Discretion is the word
Let’s be clear. In the cases of such high profile and diplomatically sensitive murders, nobody is above suspicion. The investigators of the case, in the process of their investigation might eliminate and clear most people suspected of having any role and zero in on those whose antecedents may be found suspicious. This process takes time and those connected with such cases are expected to maintain absolute discretion. Here we see none of it.
Interestingly, the jihadist extremist group ISIL had announced their claim to have murdered both the foreign nationals separately. This group is involved in mindless killings of innocents in Syria, Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East for the last few years. They are in the habit of always proudly announcing their misdeeds and none of their announcements ever proved to be false. So the government functionaries should have been more careful about the ISIL claims before hastily ruling them out of these dastardly killings.
Meanwhile, the government’s decision seems to have been corroborated by the Indian intelligence agencies. The largest circulated Indian English-language daily the Times of India with multiple editions reported last Monday: “Indian intelligence agencies are discounting the possibility of Islamic State’s (IS extremist Jihadists) involvement in the recent killings of an Italian and a Japanese national in Bangladesh.” The newspaper also quoting unnamed Indian intelligence sources further said:”They (Indian intelligence) suspect the involvement of Jamaat-e-Islami hardliners and see the murderous attacks as a ploy to draw attention of the Western nations to the targeting of its top leaders for 1971 war crimes without proper trial.”
Political polarization
Be that as it may, the Western sources however, tend to give due consideration to the ISIL claim. Senior Research Fellow of the Washington-based Heritage Foundation Ms Lisa Cartige gave an interview to the government-owned Voice of America radio. Discussing the twin murder of the foreigners, killing of bloggers before that, she suggested that because of the prolonged political rivalries between Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and past Prime Minister Khaleda Zia has given rise to a political polarization in Bangladesh. The extremist groups in the country are taking the advantage of the situation.
While she said it is difficult to say with certainty about IS’s involvement or whether some people being encourage by the group has started to work in Bangladesh. However, she thinks extremism in Bangladesh is rising and the government has to face it. To investigate these murders, the government should take help from the US which has already been offered.
She said, she thinks the grievances of the rightists forces, especially the Jamaat-e-Islami against Sheikh Hasina’s government may provide opportunities for IS or al-Qaeda to infiltrate into the South Asian Subcontinent. This may also generate a competition within the two outfits for availing the opportunity. She also believes that as in the past, Bangladesh will be able to come out of this crisis successfully.
Likewise, US Ambassador to Bangladesh Marcia Bernicat told a news conference: “The U.S. government has taken seriously the claims of responsibility by the IS, and we are working hard right now with your government to verify whether or not those claims are accurate.” She also informed the government that the US will provide all assistance for investigation and also to jointly resist the spread of extremist elements in the country.
Police’s contradictory statements
Meanwhile, the largely circulated English-language daily (Daily Star) in a front-page report on Thursday provided the details of press briefings, press releases of the police on the arrests of many IS and extremist suspects in the course of the last one year. This report quoting police’s own briefings suggests that their latest statement claiming that either IS or other extremist elements do not exist in Bangladesh appears self contradictory.
It said: according to police press releases and briefings at different times, since September last year, about 15 suspects have been arrested for “having or trying to establish contacts” with Islamic State (IS).
On 18 September last year, cops arrested seven members of banned militant outfit Jama’atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) for “establishing contacts” with IS. The arrested persons were Abdullah Al Tasnim; Nayeem Ali; Masum Billah; Fuad Hasan and Ali Ahmed, the press release said.
Just a week later, police arrested Asif Adnan, 26, and Fazle Elahi Tanzil, 24, two suspected members of militant organization Ansarullah Bangla Team (ABT). They were allegedly planning to go to Syria through Turkey with the help of a UK citizen of Bangladesh origin. According to police, the UK citizen, Samiun Rahman alias Ibn Hamdan, was in Dhaka to recruit fighters for IS, a global militant organization based in Syria and Iraq. He was shown arrested two days later.
“From his passport we came to know that he (Samiun) went to Syria in September last year,” Joint Commissioner Monirul Islam of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) then told journalists. He also said Samiun took part in a demonstration against Bashar al-Assad.
Facts speak
On January 18 this year, detectives arrested four others – Sakhawatul Kabir, Anwar Hossain alias Baten, Rabiul Islam and Nazrul Islam – in the capital’s Jatrabari for their suspected links with IS (also known as ISIS or ISIL).
Following their interrogation, police said, Sakhawatul was working as IS coordinator in Bangladesh.
On May 24, cops arrested a regional coordinator of JMB named Aminul Islam Beg and his associate Sakib bin Kamal. They had allegedly been trying to send operatives to Iraq and Syria from Bangladesh. Police told the press that Aminul had so far selected 20 people from among the JMB operatives across the country to join IS.
Later on May 30, Abdullah Al Ghalib, a suspected IS recruiter and militant trainer, was detained. During interrogation, Ghalib said was an “assistant coordinator of Ansarullah Bangla Team and member of banned radical Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir. Police had informed the media about all those arrests through press statements and briefings.
Source: Weekly Holiday
