A Canadian man of Bangladeshi origin has been listed as a potential suicide bomber trained by the so-called Islamic State for targets in Europe.
The list of 173 fighters has been compiled amid concerns that the terror group will strike targets in the West as its caliphate shrinks due to allied efforts in Iraq and Syria.
Most people on the list are Iraqis, but it has several Westerners, including the Bangladeshi-Canadian, said Dr Amarnath Amarasingham, a researcher who found Hasib, aka Abu Bakr Bangladeshi, on the list.
A group of three Bangladeshis including Hasib and one Malik Abdul travelled to Lebanon to join the Syrian war in July, 2012.
But they were convinced to return home by their fathers who had followed them there, according to Global News.Then in Jul 14 of 2014, after the caliphate’s formation, Hasib, Malik Abdul and another person entered Syria through Tal Abyad, a year after the death of their alleged recruiter Andre Poulin, a Muslim convert from Ontario’s Timmins. He is known as ‘Abu Muslim’.
“As far as I know, two of these Bangladeshis have already been killed in Syria. Tabirul (Hasib) seems to be still alive, but I can’t be sure,” Amarasingham, a fellow at George Washington University’s Program on Extremism, told Global News.
“This likely means that he joined this so-called suicide brigade later on, possibly after his friends were killed,” Amarasingam told CBC News.
An entry form among leaked IS documents mentions Hasib as being single who had previously traveled to Bangladesh and Lebanon.
His “Shariah level” has been rated as “student.”
Tamim Chowdhury, termed as the mastermind of the 2016 terror attack on Dhaka’s Holey Artisan Bakery, was a resident of Ontario.
The Canadian-Bangladeshi, who headed a revived faction of the Jama’atul Mujahideen Bangladesh, was killed in an anti-terror raid following the deadly attack that left 22 people dead.
Source: bdnews24