This is a cross post from The Spittoon
Murdered: Rajib Haider (26)
Rajib Haider who blogged under the name of ‘Thaba Baba’ was one of the blogger activists of the Shahbag youth uprising in Bangladesh. Yesterday came news that Rajib was slaughtered in Dhaka close to his home. His throat and wrists were slit, in signature Chaatra Shibir (Jamaat-e-Islam’s student wing) style, and he was left to die.
Ahmed Rajib Haider, 26, was an active participant of the ongoing nonstop demonstrations at Shahbagh demanding death sentences for all ‘war criminals’.
Officer-in-Charge of Pallabi Police Station Abdul Latif Sheikh told bdnews24.com that they recovered Shuvo’s body from Laalmatia’s Palashnagar around 9pm.
He said the face bore signs of slashes. A scarf was wrapped around the blogger’s throat, Sheikh added.
This was not a simple mugging case as police said the deceased’s laptop was found near the body of the architect.
His had, a few days before his murder, appeared on a “hit list” of names on the Jamaat-e-Islami run blog “SonarBangladesh’
Jamaat’s “hit list” of Shahbag activists
CNN reports:
Haider was an active supporter and participant of the ‘Shahbag Movement 2013‘ in Bangladesh that demands capital punishment of the War Criminals of 1971 War of Independence of the country. He was a renowned blogger in ‘somewhereinblog‘ with a nick ‘Thaba Baba‘. A major portion of his posts were targetted against the War Criminals of 1971 and the political party Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami and their student wing Bangladesh Islami Chhatra Shibir. TheInternational Crimes Tribunal of Bangladesh is currently administering trials of the party’s top leaders and sentenced death penalty to a former leader whereas life term to a current leader. The charges against the other leaders are in progress.
Earlier on February 11 (1:32 PM local time), on ‘Sonar Bangladesh‘ blog, a hitlist was published listing the names and facebook profile links of some activists of the Shahbag Movement and the victim Rajib was the first one in it. The blog is backed by Bangladesh Islami Chhatra Shibir and there are multiple posts that published such hitlists. The screenshot of this hitlist was saved by an activist of the movement although the original post was removed later on.
Following the news, the Shahbag movement announced that a Janaza (funeral rites) would be held for the murdered activist at the square. This was followed by a tweet by “Farabi Shafiur Rahman”, one of the alleged murderers who posted this:
Translated:
Any imam who reads the janaza prayer of Thaba Baba will also be killed. Janaza prayers are only for Muslims, not for unbelievers or apostates. Those who have spent their whole lives insulting the Prophet are not Muslims and cannot have Janaza Prayer read. Thaba Baba’s corpse should be fed to the animals in Dhaka Zoo. The soil of this motherland will not back into her womb the corpse of any unbeliever or apostate insulting Allah or his Prophet in unspeakable language.
In spite of the threats, Rajib’s janaza was held at Shahbag earlier today, with several tens of thousand in attendance:
