Bomb blast at mosque on Bangladesh's navy base; six injured, two suspects arrested

Chittagong: Two bombs exploded at a mosque inside a navy base in the Bangladesh port city of Chittagong on Friday, injuring six, police said, adding that two people had been arrested. Police said the mosque inside the Isha Khan naval base in the southeastern city was packed with Muslim worshippers attending Friday prayers when several bombs were thrown. [caption id=“attachment_2551658” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Onlookers gather outside the Isha Khan naval base where two small bombs exploded at a mosque. AFP[/caption] “Of the five bombs thrown at the mosque, two exploded. They looked like small grenades. Six people were injured,” Deputy Commissioner of the Chittagong Metropolitan Police (CMP) Harun Ur Rashid Hazari told AFP. Two people were arrested at the scene but no group has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, he said. Chittagong police chief Abdul Jalil Mandal confirmed the attack, saying the bombs were thrown towards the end of the weekly prayers. The country’s armed forces in a statement said two Molotov cocktails were detonated at the mosque. The military added the wounded suffered minor injuries and were given first aid. “One person was arrested with unexploded explosives,” the military said, adding a probe had been launched. Bangladesh has been roiled by rising unrest which has seen four atheist bloggers and a publisher hacked to death this year. Two foreigners have also been shot dead — a Japanese farmer and an Italian aid worker — while several minority Sufi Muslim leaders and two policemen have been killed. Police blame an outlawed Islamist militant group, Jamayetul Mujahideen Bangladesh, for the recent violence while Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s government accuses the main opposition party and its Islamist ally of trying to trigger anarchy. The parties deny the claims. Analysts say Islamist militants pose a growing danger in conservative Bangladesh and that a long-running political crisis has radicalised opponents of the government. AFP