International
Munir Uz Zaman / AFP / Getty Images
Bangladesh police Tuesday filed criminal cases against two students and two other people for the machete murder of a blogger accused of mocking Islam, the second such attack in recent weeks.
Washiqur Rahman was hacked to death near his home in Dhaka on Monday morning, less than two months after the murder of an American atheist blogger triggered international outrage.
Police Inspector Mohammad Salahuddin said three knife- and cleaver-wielding attackers killed Rahman, 27, because they believed he had "defamed Islam" in the mainly Muslim country in posts on social media.
Police lodged preliminary murder charges against two students who were arrested at the scene, along with a third who fled and is still on the run, another officer said.
An alleged planner of the attack was also charged and is now under investigation after the students named him during police questioning, said deputy commissioner Biplob Kumar Sarker.
"A case was filed against the four people accusing them of the murder of the blogger," Sarker told Agence-France Presse.
Bloggers, other writers and secular activists held a rally and candlelight vigil late Monday at Dhaka University, a leading secular institution.
The European Union, Bangladesh’s main trading partner, condemned the "vile aggression" of the attack and called for freedom of expression.
Rahman wrote a 52-episode series for a satirical website, Dhormockery, according to the London-based International Humanist and Ethical Union. The pieces mock aspects of Islam, and fellow bloggers said Rahman did not believe in any organized religion.
The killing bears strong similarities to that of Avijit Roy, an American blogger of Bangladeshi origin who was hacked to death with machetes in Dhaka in February.
His death sparked an uproar, with hundreds of secular activists holding protests for days to demand justice.
One of the two arrested over Rahman’s murder had been studying at a top madrassa in the port city of Chittagong, headed by radical group Hefazat-e-Islam.
The group was behind massive protests against secular bloggers in 2013 that left nearly 50 people dead. Police cracked down on the thousands who poured into Dhaka to protest and demand the execution of bloggers, accusing them of defaming Islam.
Al Jazeera and Agence-France Presse
Avijit Roy, an outspoken defender of secularism, attacked by men wielding machete.
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