Tears, prayers as Bangladesh mourns dead in hostage crisis

Police now believe the chef was shot mistakenly.

Bangladeshi police were trying to confirm the names of Islamist militants who attacked a Dhaka restaurant, killing 20 people, checking whether the identification of some by friends on social media is correct, officials said on Monday.

“Extremely pained to share that the terrorists have killed Tarushi, an Indian girl who was taken hostage in the terror attack in Dhaka”, India’s External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj tweeted, adding that she had spoken with the girl’s father.

Islamic State, also known as ISIS, ISIL or Daesh, had claimed responsibility for the attack, but Bangladesh’s police say the Sunni group had no role in the attack.

Twenty hostages, mostly foreign nationals, were killed when seven gunmen stormed in with guns and swords in the Gulshan’s Holey Artisan Bakery on July 1.

It was one of the deadliest attacks in Bangladesh, where ISIL and al-Qaeda have claimed a series of killings of liberals and members of religious minorities in the past year.

The Daesh terrorist group, outlawed in Russian Federation, had initially claimed responsibility for the attack, however the Bangladeshi authorities later accused the homegrown group called Jamaatul Mujahideen Bangladesh of the attack.

“Six members of JMB have been shown as accused in the case. The sixth man was a restaurant employee”, Saiful Islam, a top police official investigating the attack, told Reuters news agency. “It is because of Pakistan that many terrorists are involved in subversive activities in many countries”, alleged Inu, adding that it is very sad but the reality is that Pakistan can not have a clean chit.

The US embassy also urged its citizens and staff to avoid travelling on foot or in open vehicles exposed to potential attackers.

NEW DELHI (AP) – Some of the hostages rescued from the weekend attack on an upscale restaurant in Bangladesh’s capital were being questioned Monday by investigators searching for clues about the possible masterminds behind the gruesome attack that left 28 dead, including many foreigners.

Attacks linked to ISIS have picked up in recent weeks, including suicide bombings at a Turkish airport last week that killed 45 people.

The bodies of two Bangladeshis and one Bangladeshi-born USA citizen were handed over to the relatives for subsequent rituals and burial after the ceremony that was held on the second day of the two-day nationwide mourning declared in the country.

Remains of the two policemen killed in the attack have already been buried, while the bodies of the other victims will be handed over to their families and repatriated to their home countries.

Police did not clear the issue.

A majority of the 160 million people in Bangladesh are Muslim and the country has seen increasing violence from various groups. It clearly ruled out any involvement of the Islamic State.

 Former classmates recognised one of the attackers as Nibras Islam, the son of a Dhaka businessman who was educated at an expensive Dhaka school teaching a Western curriculum and briefly studied at the Malaysia campus of Australia’s Monash University.

Another man in custody, who was trapped in the restaurant with his wife and kids, is a British citizen who returned to Bangladesh about a year and a half ago, having lived in the United Kingdom for about 20 years. “We have evidence that they were militants”, he said.