A Japanese citizen was shot dead in Bangladesh yesterday, police said, the second killing of a foreign national in the South Asian nation within a week.
Concerns that more foreigners might be targeted prompted Western embassies to curtail diplomats’ movements in Bangladesh this week after an Italian was shot dead in the first attack in the country claimed by Islamic State.
Attacks on foreigners are rare in Bangladesh, despite a rising tide of militant violence over the past year that has seen four online critics of religious militancy hacked to death, among them a US citizen of Bangladesh origin.
Hoshi Kunio, 65, was attacked by unidentified assailants at about 10am on a visit to Kownia, in Rangpur district, 335km north of the capital, Dhaka, and died on his way to hospital, police said.
“He was shot on his chest and also in his hand and leg,” the officer in charge of the local police station, Rezaul Karim, said.
Karim did not comment on a possible motive for the killing, saying “We are investigating.”
An Japanese embassy official in Dhaka said she was trying to ascertain the details of the incident involving Kunio, who was born in Bangladesh.
Cesare Tavella, an Italian citizen working in Bangladesh on a food security project, was shot dead on Monday by three gunmen in Dhaka.
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