Bangladesh's Reign of Terror: Toward the Next Islamist Hub of South Asia? by Uzay Bulut

On March 7, thousands of members of Bangladesh's banned Islamist militant group, Hizb-ut-Tahrir, defying police barricades, marched through the streets of Dhaka to demand that the country's secular democracy be replaced by an Islamic caliphate.

Gatestone Institute : On March 7, thousands of members of Bangladesh's banned Islamist militant group, Hizb-ut-Tahrir, defying police barricades, marched through the streets of Dhaka to demand that the country's secular democracy be replaced by an Islamic caliphate. Demonstrators chanting "Khilafat, Khilafat" - a direct call for Islamic rule -- gathered for the "March for Khilafat" procession outside the Baitul Mukarram Mosque after Friday prayers. The mob at the march turned violent — complete with stone-throwers who clashed with police. The police, in turn, fired back with tear gas and stun grenades.

Hizb ut-Tahrir, which has been banned in Bangladesh since 2009 for posing a threat to national security, organized this rally in defiance of a government ban on public gatherings.

Notes veteran Bangladeshi journalist and commentator Syed Badrul Ahsan:

"Politics steadily worsens in Bangladesh. The economy is in free fall, law and order is in a cul-de-sac. The rule of law is under organised assault, with detained politicians, cultural activists and journalists unable to come by bail in court....

The [Muhammad] Yunus regime, which has no constitutional basis, has nevertheless embarked on what it touts as a reform agenda.....

Yunus' interim government has demonstrated, unabashed­ly, its intent to erase Bangladesh's history.

The refrain of the August 5 change, for those who hold power at present, continues to be one of a student-led revolution. It was anything but. Muhammad Yunus, on a visit to the US in September, publicly made it known in the presence of his friend Bill Clinton that the agitation against the Sheikh Hasina government had been me­ticulously planned.

Bangladesh's crisis is existential. All the values instrumen­tal to its emergence 50-plus years ago are systematically being jettisoned by a regime that lacks constitutional legitimacy.

And there is another reality that cannot be ignored. In terms of the constitution, Sheikh Hasina remains prime minister. When the military had her leave the country in August, she was not given the opportunity to meet the president and submit her resignation. Her followers have thus continued to refer to her as the legitimate leader."

Some of the major groups, which were previously banned but, under Bangladesh's new leadership of Muhammad Yunus, now encouraged, include: Hizb ut-Tahrir, Tawhidi Janata, Hefazat-e-Islam, Jamaat-e-Islami, and the Ansarullah Bangla Team.

According to the Counter Extremism Project:

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