Japanese national shot dead in Bangladesh, days after ‘Islamic State’ murder of Italian
The Japanese man worked for a farming project in Rangpur in the north of the country
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Police said the victim, whom they named as Hoshi Kunio, aged 66, was riding in a rickshaw when he was shot dead in Kaunia town in Rangpur district at about 10.30 am.
“He was travelling to the town from Rangpur city, where he had been living for a while, on a cycle rickshaw when his vehicle was stopped by three men riding on a motorcycle,” deputy police chief of Rangpur, Saifur Rahman, said.
Read more: Embassies on terror alert and international schools shut after ‘Islamic State attack’
The Bangladesh government sought to allay concerns over the safety of foreign nationals in the country after the second killing in a week, saying it was taking both murders “very seriously”.
“Whoever is involved with the killings will be identified and brought to book,” Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal, the Home Minister, said.
Kunio was a frequent visitor to Bangladesh and worked on a farming project in Rangpur, about 300km north of the capital Dhaka, police said.
“Two of the assailants shot him twice in the chest with pistols while the other waited with the motorbike ready to flee,” local police chief Rezaul Karim said, adding four people had been interrogated over the murder but none had been arrested.
Kunio’s landlord Jakaria Bala told Bengali daily Prothom Alo that the victim had leased a piece of land in a village near the Kaunia town to grow grass for cattle.
A Japanese embassy spokesman in Dhaka said they were seeking more information regarding the deceased.
“According to the information we got from the law enforcement agencies, it appears to indicate that he was a Japanese who is in his 60s,” Takeshi Matsunaga said.
His body was taken to Rangpur Medical College morgue. Police have not yet identified any motive for the murder.
The attack came less than a week after an Italian aid worker was shot dead near the capital’s diplomatic zone.
The government has sought to calm escalating security fears in the country after the attack was claimed by the Islamic State group, describing it as an ”isolated incident”.
Bangladesh prides itself on being a mainly moderate Muslim country. But the gruesome killings of a series of atheist bloggers this year have rocked the nation and sparked a crackdown on local hardline Islamist groups.
