Two arrested over Bangladeshi Secular Blogger Murder

Dhaka, Aug 14: Two people have been arrested for the murder of Bangladeshi secular blogger Niladri Chatterjee Niloy, police said on Friday.

Dhaka Metropolitan Police Deputy Commissioner Muntasirl Islam said Jatiya Party leader Chunnu’s nephew Sad Al Nahin was detained from Uttara and Masud Rana from Kalshi area on Thursday, bdnews24 reported.

He said they were both members of Ansarullah Bangla Team, an Islamist militant group accused of links to the murders of three other bloggers.

Studying BBA at the Dhaka University, Nahin was arrested earlier over the murder attempt on blogger Asif Mohiuddin two years ago.

He was freed on bail around a year back.

Police have claimed that Ansarullah Bangla Team is responsible for the murders.

Niloy was hacked to death on August 7 by a five-member gang armed with machetes at his home in the capital Dhaka. It was the fourth such killing of a secular blogger this year.

The other three bloggers — Avijit Roy, Oyasiqur Rahman Babu and Ananta Bijoy Das — were also killed in a similar manner.

All four were involved with the ‘Ganajagaran Mancha’, a movement demanding maximum penalty for those who committed war crimes during the 1971 Bangladesh freedom struggle and a ban on religion-based politics.  (IANS)