International media sparks for Bangladeshi blogger murder

International actors and media around the world widely covered and deplored Friday’s murder in Dhaka of yet another blogger, Niladri Chattopaddhyay, the fourth of such incident this year.

Reports outside of the country also described the killing as a sign of the rise of Islamist militancy in Bangladesh, terming Niladri a secular freethinker.
Global organisations and different countries called on the Bangladesh authorities to urgently investigate the death and bring the perpetrators to justice.

The United Nations denounced the murder and asked the government of Bangladesh to bring the killers to justice and also to protect vulnerable writers. The United States and the United Kingdom condemned the murder.

Slating the killing, the US state department said, “This heinous act once again underscores the need to work together to counter violent extremism.”
The British foreign and commonwealth office minister Hugo Swire said, “The UK stands together with the people and government of Bangladesh in the face of extremism.”

According to the BBC, a Bangladeshi blogger known for his atheist views has been hacked to death by a gang armed with machetes in the capital Dhaka. “All four men killed were on a list of 84 "atheist bloggers" drawn up by Islamic groups in 2013 and widely circulated, added the BBC report.

Reporting on the murder, CNN mentioned that Niladri “routinely posted on women's and minority rights, communal violence and the oppression of Hindus in Bangladesh.”

Al-Jazeera quoted the United Nations special rapporteurs on freedom of expression, David Kaye, and on extrajudicial executions, Christof Heyns, as condemning the blogger's murder.

"The violent killing of another critical voice in Bangladesh shows that serious threats to freedom of expression persist in the country," they were quoted to have said in a statement on Friday, calling for a prompt and thorough investigation.
In its reaction to the murder, East Asia Forum observed that Islamist militant groups in Bangladesh are “showing signs of revival”. The forum writer Iftekharul Bashar attributing to the Bangladeshi authorities mentioned that militants from at least two banned outfits - Jama’atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) and Ansarullah Bangla Team (ABT) - are preparing for attacks on the country, including targeted assassinations involving individuals whom they consider apostates or obstacles to establishing an Islamic State in Bangladesh.

“Bangladesh has witnessed the emergence of pro-ISIS outfits, pledges of allegiances to ISIS and ISIS recruitment drives both online and on the ground. Many members of the existing local militant groups support ISIS and are recruiting fighters into the Syrian theatres,” the forum wrote.

Mail Online India ran a report titled “Speaking the truth gets more difficult each time a freethinker is murdered by Islamists”.

“The Bangladesh government knew about the threat. Yet, he became the fourth secular activist in Bangladesh to die this year. The Islamists kept their word, for the fourth time,” it pointed out.