In those cases, Bangladesh government officials denied that the killings are the work of ISIS, but said they were anxious that they will hurt the garment business and the image of the country.
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The attack represents a blow for the industry which had been bouncing back strongly from a major tragedy three years ago, when the Rana Plaza factory building collapsed, killing more than 1,100 people.
She said she stayed home on the day the incident happened Saturday as well as on Sunday.
Abe said he has ordered his officials to take whatever means necessary to locate those involved in the hostage situation and ensure that the necessary information reaches Japan as swiftly as possible.
“He may not be involved”, the official said, adding that the investigation was ongoing. His 9-year-old son and 5-year-old daughter have spent days reading manga in their house.
“We protested. We said he was never a militant”.
Bangladeshi police chief A.K.M. Shahidul Haque said Monday that two men, including a suspected militant, were being interrogated. The man’s friends and police also said that one of the attackers was a student in the same department at the university where the man teaches.
Though Bangladesh has rejected the IS claim of responsibility for Friday’s attack, police said they were stepping up security in response to the video threat.
Witnesses recounted how a massive gunfight erupted on Saturday morning as more than 100 commandos launched the rescue operation, almost 11 hours after the siege began at around 9:30 pm.
Japanese media say they ranged in age from 27-year-old Rui Shimodaira, a woman who dreamed of playing an active role in worldwide development, to 80-year-old Hiroshi Tanaka, a retired railways research engineer who wanted to share his know-how with developing countries.
Britain’s clothing retailers will have to ensure security is tightened at factories they source from in Bangladesh, experts warned earlier, in the wake of the terror attack in Dhaka. But given the demonstrated ISIS and Al-Qaeda interest in Bangladesh, it does not make sense for the Bangladeshi government to dismiss out of hand any connections of the attacks to global terrorist movements.
Police believe that the outlawed Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) group, which has pledged allegiance to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, orchestrated the attack.
Bangladesh has seen a number of attacks in recent months, mostly targeting secular bloggers, atheists and religious minorities.
Six attackers were killed during the combined operation while one was arrested alive. All five are Bangladesh citizens.
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On Tuesday, police said Chowkidar was shot dead by mistake but Islam revised that, saying his death was “not accidental”, although police were unsure how he died and the role he played. The attack claimed the lives of nine Italians, seven Japanese, an American, an Indian and several Bangladeshi nationals.
