ISIS kills Hindu priest, Buddhist in Bangladesh

A Hindu priest and a Buddhist leader were brutally hacked to death by machete-wielding ISIS militants while another Hindu man survived a bid on his life in Bangladesh, the latest in a series of vicious attacks on minorities in the Muslim-majority nation.

Shymanondo Das, in his mid 50s, was hacked by three motorcycle-borne assailants when he was plucking flowers for morning prayers at a garden in the Radhamodon Gopal Moth premises in Jhenaidah, said Jbahar Ali Sheikh, additional superintendent of police in Jhenidah.

“Three motorbike-borne assailants attacked (priest) Shymanondo Das with machetes....Doctors declared him dead at Jhinaidah Sadar Hospital,” a police officer told PTI.

“To make sure he died, they rained multiple blows on his head and neck with sharp weapons,” a police official said.

Three weeks ago, Jhenidah saw a similar killing of another Hindu priest. Das is the third Hindu priest to be killed this year by Islamists. Officer-in-charge of the nearby police station, Hafizur Rahman said Das was the priest of Radhamodon Gopal Moth.

He said the killers quickly fled the scene, a pattern which was followed in previous several such Islamist attacks on secular or liberal activists and religious minorities.

The attack on Das came hours after the murder of Buddhist man Mong Shwe Lung Marma, 55, in Bandarban on Thursday night.

Marma, a farmer of the ethnic community and a former ward-level leader of the ruling Awami League, was killed by machete-wielding assailants at Samshankhola, said Abul Khair, officer-in-charge of Naikkhangchhari police station. “He died on the spot.”

In May, a Buddhist monk was brutally murdered in the area.

The murders of Hindu priest and Buddhist leader have been claimed by the ISIS. “ISIS fighters in Bangladesh killed a Hindu with blade weapons in Jhenaidah and murdered leader of a Buddhist party in Banderban,” the ISIS-affiliated Amaq news agency said, according to US-based SITE Intelligence Group.