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The bodies of the Bangladesh's first LGBT magazine editor and local USAID staff, Xulhaz Mannan and his friend Tanay Majumder are brought out from a building after police primary investigation at their house at Tetul Tala, Kalabagan, Dhaka, Bangladesh, on April 25, 2016.(Photo: Abir Abdullah, EPA)
A U.S. government<span style="color: Red;">*</span>employee,<span style="color: Red;">*</span>who was editor of an LGBT magazine in Bangladesh, was hacked to death Monday in the capital of Dhaka, officials said.
A group of assailants stormed the home of Xulhaz Mannan, a staffer for the<span style="color: Red;">*</span>U.S. Agency for International Development, stabbing<span style="color: Red;">*</span>him and a friend<span style="color: Red;">*</span>to death,<span style="color: Red;">*</span>police told The Daily Star. Mannan was a senior editor of<span style="color: Red;">*</span>Roopbaan, the first<span style="color: Red;">*</span>gay rights magazine in the country.
The second victim was identified as<span style="color: Red;">*</span>Tanay Majumder.<span style="color: Red;">*</span>Police said five or six assailants stormed Mannan’s first-floor apartment about 5 p.m. local time.
The State Department condemned the slaying.
"We’re outraged," State Department spokesman John Kirby said.<span style="color: Red;">*</span>"An act like this is simply beyond words, it’s inexcusable, and heartfelt support goes out to his mother,<span style="color: Red;">*</span>his family and his friends."
Mannan was a staunch supporter of LGBT rights, Kirby said.<span style="color: Red;">*</span>The U.S. government is offering to support Bangladeshi authorities to<span style="color: Red;">*</span>make sure those responsible are held accountable, Kirby said.
The killing<span style="color: Red;">*</span>took place<span style="color: Red;">*</span>after Saturday's hacking death<span style="color: Red;">*</span>of<span style="color: Red;">*</span>Rezaul Karim Siddiquee, an English professor<span style="color: Red;">*</span>at<span style="color: Red;">*</span>Rajshahi University in northern Bangladesh.<span style="color: Red;">*</span>The Islamic State claimed responsibility for<span style="color: Red;">*</span>Siddiquee’s killing, accusing him of atheism,<span style="color: Red;">*</span>according to the SITE Intelligence Group, based in Washington, D.C.
No one has claimed responsibility yet for Monday's attack on the two men.
Amnesty International said this<span style="color: Red;">*</span>latest in a series of killings<span style="color: Red;">*</span>"underscore the appalling lack of protection being afforded to a range of peaceful activists in the country."
There have been four killings<span style="color: Red;">*</span>this month, said Champa Patel, the human rights<span style="color: Red;">*</span>group's<span style="color: Red;">*</span>South Asia director. Patel<span style="color: Red;">*</span>called on authorities to protect "those who express their opinions bravely and without violence, and bringing the killers to justice."
The government of Bangladesh condemned Monday's slayings, as well as other killings<span style="color: Red;">*</span>of secular bloggers in recent months, and blamed it on incitement by the country's Islamist political opposition.
Shamim Ahmad, a<span style="color: Red;">*</span>spokesman at<span style="color: Red;">*</span>Bangladesh's embassy in Washington, said authorities<span style="color: Red;">*</span>"are determined to catch the culprits soon."
Ahmad said several arrests have been made in connection with the death of<span style="color: Red;">*</span>Siddiquee<span style="color: Red;">*</span>and bloggers killed last year.
Last year, assailants killed four prominent secular bloggers with machetes, in what The Indian Express called a systematic series of assaults on minorities, intellectuals and foreigners in the majority Muslim country. The State Department listed such attacks by extremists among the country's most significant human rights<span style="color: Red;">*</span>problems in an April report.
The U.S. said earlier this month that<span style="color: Red;">*</span>it is considering granting refuge to some<span style="color: Red;">*</span>secular bloggers facing<span style="color: Red;">*</span>danger in Bangladesh, the Associated Press reported.<span style="color: Red;">*</span>Kirby said<span style="color: Red;">*</span>Monday that it remained an option.
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