Bangladesh arrests 4 militants

DHAKA — Bangladesh police on Sunday arrested four suspected militants, including two linked to the slaying of a Japanese man one year ago, in a raid on their hideout in an abandoned brick kiln. The Jama’atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) militants threw homemade bombs, wounding three police, before they were overpowered, according to police. Guns, explosives and other weapons were found at the scene. The arrests were made some 300 km north of Dhaka in Rangpur district, where Kunio Hoshi, a 65-year-old agriculturalist, was killed while working on a farming project in the impoverished country. Mizanur Rahman, a police superintendent in Rangpur, told reporters that two of the men arrested, Belal Hossain and Ershad Alam, had helped train the militants who had killed Hoshi. The other men arrested, Ashraful Islam and Al Amin, were JMB activists, he said. In July, police lodged a charge sheet against eight JMB members, including ringleaders Saddam Hossain and Masud Rana, who were said to be involved in Hoshi’s killing. A JMB splinter group, that has aligned with Daesh (the so-called IS), claimed responsibility for the attack in July on a restaurant in an upscale neighborhood of Dhaka that killed 22 people, mostly foreigners. Two police and five gunmen were also killed during the gun battle at the restaurant. Meanwhile, police in Bangladesh have also arrested dozens of people following fresh violence against Hindus, the country’s biggest minority community, a senior officer said on Sunday. The Hindu community in the Brahmanbairs district has been under attack after a local youth allegedly shared an insulting Facebook post. Muslim hard-liners protested and demanded action against the Hindu youth, who denies sharing the post. Police arrested the youth for hurting religious sentiments, but the arrest failed to defuse the tension. The Bangladesh Hindu Buddhist Christian Unity Council (BHBCUC) estimates more than one hundred Hindu houses and 17 temples have been vandalized and looted since the violence broke out on Oct. 30. “The purpose of the attacks is to free this soil from minority community and also to occupy their properties and assets,” Rana Dasgupta, a general secretary at the BHBCUC said. — Reuters