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IS releases new video featuring Dhaka cafe attackers

Last Updated 24 September 2016, 15:40 IST
The Islamic State has released a new video featuring the five terrorists involved in Bangladesh's worst terror attack in which 22 people, including an Indian girl, were killed.

The five terrorists in the video came down heavily on Islamic scholars for resisting Muslims from joining the armed jihad of the dreaded Islamic State (IS) terror group. "In the 15-minute video message released last night, both in Bangla and Arabic, the terrorist group calls on jihadis to launch armed attacks on atheists, apostates and crusaders as revenge for the persecution of IS fighters in Iraq and Syria and elsewhere," the 'Dhaka Tribune' reported.

The video was first released by the Arabic Nashir channel on Telegram. Nashir is the official IS media channel, it said. The five terrorists in the video, believed to be recorded sometime before the Gulshan attack, made statements to justify their stance, criticising the democratic system and political leaders.

Earlier in the day, IS' Bangla media At-Tamkin made an announcement on its website that they would release a video produced by the "Bilad al-Bengal media office". Bilad, in this context, means province or region, the report said.

The video, believed to have been recorded sometime before the Gulshan attack, was released less than a month after the law enforcers killed the attack's mastermind Tamim Ahmed Chowdhury or Sheikh Abu Ibrahim al-Hanif on August 27.

The attackers – Nibras Islam, Rohan Imtiaz, Khairul Islam Payel, Shafiqul Islam Uzzal and Meer Saameh Mubasser – were killed in a commando operation on July 2. Twenty hostages, mostly foreigners, were hacked to death on July 1 by seven militants inside at a popular upscale eatery in Dhaka's Gulshan neighbourhood before commandos launched an assault, killing six attackers and capturing one alive.

Indian girl Tarushi, 19, who was among the hostages was killed in the attack. Two police officers were also killed in the attack on July 1. Police launched a crackdown on militants after the two terror attacks- Holey Artisan Bakery and O' Kitchen (July 1) and Sholakia Eid congregation (July 7)- and have so far killed at least 31 members of the Jamaatul Mujahideen Bangladesh, which has links to the IS.

The government maintains there is no organisational base of IS in Bangladesh, and that the attacks were carried out by a faction of banned militant group Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB).
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(Published 24 September 2016, 15:40 IST)

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