Bangla gay activists killed for Indian NGO links

Claiming responsibility for the brutal killings of leading Bangladeshi LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) rights activists Xulhaz Mannan and Khandaker Samir Mahbub Tonoy, the Bangladesh chapter of Al Qaida in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) has claimed the duo were killed because of trying to spread homosexuality and actively participating in a 2015 workshop organised by a New Delhi-based NGO.

A statement by AQIS spokesperson Mufti Abdullah Ashraf stated that a 2015 Youth Leadership Programme workshop organised by the Indian NGO where Mannan and Tonoy participated with the aim to “make homosexuality popular among the youth of Bangladesh. In this workshop they laid out different schemes and methodologies to attract the unsuspecting youth to homosexuality”.

The Indian NGO works to advance the rights of women and girls, and sexual and reproductive freedoms of all people across geographies. On being contacted, the NGO refused to comment because of the sensitivity of the situation.

On April 25, Mannan (42) and Tonoy (25) were hacked to death by five machete-wielding youth inside Mannan’s apartment in Dhaka.

Besides being a leading political analyst at USAID, Mannan brought out magazine Roopbaan that spoke for promoting LGBT rights in Bangladesh.

The AQIS statement also alleged that Roopbaan was created as a tool to spread and popularise homosexuality in Bangladesh. “In this regard, they took India as their role model! Because in India, the spread of the perverted movement of homosexuality was initiated by several magazines,” the statement said.

Interestingly, while underscoring the fact that AQIS does not recognise the ISIS or the caliphate of Al-Baghdadi, it said that not all of its (ISIS) actions as illegitimate. “To the members and supporters of the group called ‘Islamic State’, all say: Attack only those targets which are justified by the shariah,” the statement added.