Bangladeshi police arrest 12 linked to al-Qaeda in Asia

Last week, Bangladeshi officials arrested 12 men in Dhaka suspected of ties to the recently launched Asia branch of al-Qaeda. In a series of raids, local police “seized explosives, bomb-making materials, knives, and books on jihad” from suspects, said Commander Mufti Mahmud Khan, a spokesman for the elite anti-crime force Rapid Action Battalion.

On Friday, a Bangladesh court allowed police three days to interrogate the suspects. Not one of the detained men had a lawyer present to seek bail, said Mohammed Jalaluddin, an investigator on the case.

Khan told reporters the suspects were orchestrating a jail break to free the group’s leader, currently behind bars for a separate incident. According to a recent New York Times report, local military believe the group was plotting an attack after the Muslim celebration of Eid al-Fitr.

In September, al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri announced the birth of a new unit in South Asia and said he would “raise the flag of jihad” in India, Myanmar, and Bangladesh, according to an Al Jazeera report.

“This entity was not established today but is the fruit of a blessed effort of more than two years to gather the mujahedeen [holy warriors] in the Indian sub-continent into a single entity,” the article quotes Zawahiri as saying.

In May, the al-Qaeda India branch claimed responsibility for the grisly murders of two politically outspoken bloggers, including one American citizen of Bangladeshi origin. Both writers were openly critical of Islamic fundamentalism.

Technically, free speech is legal in Bangladesh, but writers brazen enough to criticize Islamic extremism may end up dead. The recent murders highlight the burgeoning tension between Bangladeshi secularists and Islamic traditionalists. Secularists have urged authorities to ban religiously inspired politics, while Islamists press for the adoption of blasphemy laws.

While Islamic violence is rare in Bangladesh, al-Qaeda’s freshly forged Asia wing might seek to take advantage of the region’s growing religious tension and the recent surge in radical attacks.

Islam is the majority religion in Bangladesh, with 9 out of 10 citizens identifying as Muslim. The nation is home to the fourth-largest Muslim population in the world, following Indonesia, Pakistan, and India. Christians make up 0.4 percent of the nation’s160 million inhabitants.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.