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Bangladeshis condemn attacks on religious minorities

Sunday, 19 June 2016 5:50 PM [ Last Update: Sunday, 19 June 2016 5:51 PM ]

Bangladeshi men form a human chain in protest against the killing of 62-year-old Hindu monastery worker, who was hacked to death in Pabna District, north of Dhaka, on June 10, 2016. (Photo by AFP)

Protesters in Bangladesh have taken to the streets in the capital to express their anger at recent deadly attacks on members of religious minority groups in the South Asian country.

On Sunday, thousands of Bangladeshi protesters in the country’s capital city of Dhaka formed a 10-kilometer human chain to protest against secret killings and attacks perpetrated over the past several months on members of minority religious groups across the country.

The demonstrators, including members of the 14-party alliance led by the ruling Awami League Party, held banners and chanted slogans in the wake of the deadly attacks, most of which were claimed by the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group and al-Qaeda’s operatives despite the government denying their presence in Bangladesh.

The protest came a day after a suspected member of the Deash Takfiri group was killed in a shootout in Bangladesh after he critically wounded a Hindu college teacher in the latest of a series of attacks on minority groups.

The attacks have been haunting the country for the past several months. They have claimed victims among liberal academics, prominent secular bloggers and activists as well as members of minority Muslim sects and other religious groups.

Later in May, Daesh claimed it hacked to death Sanaur Rahman, a 55-year-old doctor in the district of Kushtia, 245 kilometers (150 miles) from the capital Dhaka, and inflicted serious injuries upon a university teacher, who was accompanying the doctor on his way to a clinic.

In a similar attack again in May, four assailants allegedly from the Bangladeshi branch of al-Qaeda terrorist group killed a 75-year-old monk in a Buddhist temple about 338 kilometers (211 miles) southeast of Dhaka.

In February, Deash Takfiris decapitated a leading Hindu priest as he was organizing prayers at the Deviganj temple in the remote border district of Panchagar, which is located 494 kilometers (308 miles) north of Dhaka.

Hindus and Christians make up about 10 percent of Bangladesh's 160 million population.

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