(AP)
A 12-hour standoff with terrorists that had taken hostages at a Dhaka restaurant in Bangladesh concluded early Saturday when Bangladeshi police stormed the building. The police killed 6 attackers and rescued 13 hostages, but 20 of the hostages and 2 police officers were killed.
The hostages are believed to have been all or mostly foreigners including at least nine Italians, seven Japanese, and one Indian, according to the Associated Press. One other Italian remains unaccounted for.
Abinta Kabir, a rising sophomore at Emory University’s Oxford, Georgia, campus, and Faraaz Hossain, who was set to begin at Emory’s Goizueta Business School in Atlanta after completing 2 years at the Oxford campus, were among the slain hostages. Kabir was a United States citizen from Miami in Dhaka visiting friends and family, and Hossain was a Dhaka native. Tarushi Jain, an Indian student who was studying at the University of California at Berkeley, was also among the killed victims.
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Sharp domestic objects, guns and explosive devices were wielded by the attackers. Local media are reporting that some of the victims were beheaded. Rescued hostages have said that those who couldn’t recite from the Koran were tortured, according to reports. The attackers are believed to have all been Bangladeshi citizens, according to the police.
At least one of the assailants has been reportedly taken into custody.
The assailants took control of the Holey Artisan Bakery in Gulshan, an upscale neighborhood near the nation’s embassies, at 9:20 p.m. Friday. They were reportedly chanting “Allahu Akbar” (God is great) as they fired their guns. A media group online linked to the Islamic State took credit for the attack, though it remains unclear, and under investigation, if ISIS has a genuine operational presence in Bangladesh.
“It was an extremely heinous act,” Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina said in a televised statement, according to the BBC. “What kind of Muslims are these people? They don’t have any religion. My government is determined to root out terrorism and militancy from Bangladesh.”
The horrific attack is the most recent episode in Sunni-majority Bangladesh’s ongoing problem with militant Islam.
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