Violence lashes Shiite Muslim self-flagellation rituals

Over the weekend, explosive violence interrupted two Shiite Muslim processions in Bangladesh and Pakistan, raising both suspicion and denial of the Islamic State’s influence in the area.

Saturday, as dawn broke in Dhaka, an unidentified attacker tossed five homemade bombs near a Shiite center where thousands of Bangladeshi Muslims had gathered to commemorate the Day of Ashura. Three of the bombs detonated, killing one teenage boy and wounding more than 100 other participants. Amid jettisoned flip-flops, flags, and trails of spattered blood, the remaining Shiite pilgrims continued the Ashura march.

Islamic State (ISIS) militants swiftly claimed responsibility for the attack in an online statement picked up by jihadist-monitor SITE Intelligence Group. But the Bangladeshi government dismissed the claim as unsubstantiated: “This is not a militant attack, rather it is a planned and destructive attack aiming only to destabilize the situation of the country,” Interior Minister Asaduzzaman Khan told Reuters.

According to a recent New York Times report, Bangladeshi officials deny ISIS has a presence in the country: “In Pakistan, in Afghanistan, in other countries, but in Bangladesh, we do not have this clash,” said Qamrul Islam, national food minister. “In Bangladesh, there is no clash.”

Saturday’s blast marks the third time Bangladeshi officials have rejected an ISIS claim to violence. In recent weeks, ISIS claimed responsibility for the slaughter of two foreigners, an Italian aid worker and a Japanese agriculturist, but the government dismissed both claims. The killings have spooked the country’s expatriate community, prompting some Western embassies in Bangladesh to advise citizens to stay under the radar and avoid large crowds.

Bangladesh, a moderate Sunni majority nation of 160 million, has seen a sharp rise in religious violence in recent months. According to a report from The Guardian, banned Islamic militant groups have become increasingly violent toward Sufi Muslims, Hindus, and Christians. This year, Sunni hardliners claimed responsibility for the murder of four atheist bloggers openly critical of Islamic extremism.

In Pakistan, militants also attacked an Ashura procession in Jacobabad, just hours before the Dhaka attack. The suicide bomber killed at least 22 people and injured dozens more. No group has yet claimed responsibility for that attack. A day earlier, in southwest Baluchistan province, a radical Sunni supremacist group sent a suicide bomber into a Shiite mosque. Local media reported 40 wounded and 24 dead from the blast, six of them children.

The two attacks sparked Shiite anger against the government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif for failing to protect them. Almost immediately after the bombing in Jacobabad, angry Shiite protestors filled the streets, flinging rocks at policemen, setting vehicles ablaze, and ransacking government offices. Pakistani authorities quickly tightened security for the remaining Ashura events, sealing off procession routes, assigning paramilitary escort troops, and suspending cell phone service in some areas.

The Islamic Day of Ashura mourns the seventh-century martyrdom of Muhammad’s grandson, and is marked by weeping, fasting, and self-injury—devotees slice their skin and whip their own backs with chains and blades. This grisly self-punishment ritual, often involving adolescent participants, is forbidden in some countries but remains widely practiced in Bangladesh and India. Some say Ashura is designed after the Jewish Yom Kippur, or Day of Atonement, and many Muslims believe the bloody self-flagellation will cleanse them of sin. But Sunnis and Shiites disagree about how the day should be celebrated.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.