e_Paper, Monday, August 7, 2017

4
MONDAY, AUGUST 7, 2017
DT
News
No progress made two years after
blogger Niloy’s murder
• Md Sanaul Islam Tipu
CRIME
Even after two years, there has
been no significant headway in
the investigation of the murder of
blogger Niloy on August 7, 2015.
Niladri Chatterjee Niloy, 27, was
popularly known as Niloy Neel on
blogging platforms and Facebook,
was killed by four assailants with
machetes posing as prospective
tenants at his Goran residence in
Dhaka.
At least 23 dates were fixed by
Dhaka Chief Metropolitan Magistrates
Court asking the investigators
to submit their probe report
but the investigators have missed
every extended deadline provided.
Dhaka Additional Chief Metropolitan
Magistrate Lutfor Rahman
Shishir has again asked the Investigation
Officer of the case, Counter
Terrorism and Transnational Crime
(CTTC) of Police, Inspector Bahauddin
Faruki, to submit the probe
report by September 17, yesterday.
Niloy, well known for his secularist
and atheist views worked for
an NGO called Research and Development
Collective, was afraid
for his safety that summer saying
he was being followed and tried to
file a general diary with the police
twice but was instead told by a police
officer to “leave the country as
soon as possible.”
Officers at both Khilgaon and
Shahjahanpur police stations
claimed that Niloy’s concerns did
not fall within their jurisdictions
as they sent him back and forth
between the stations, with one officer
explaining off the record that
police were unwilling to register
such diaries because the recording
officer would be held responsible
for the safety of the complainant.
His post-mortem examination
revealed 14 stab wounds with eight
deep wounds that killed him on the
spot.
After the murder, the victim’s
wife Ashamoni had lodged the
murder case with Khilgaon Police
Station.
Law enforcers arrested eight
suspects, speaking to the Dhaka
Tribune investigators said they
found involvement of members of
the banned militant organisations
Ansarullah Bangla Team and Ansar-Al-Islam
behind Niloy’s murder.
Tarikul Islam, Masum Rana,
Saad Al Nahiyan, Kamal Hossain,
Kawsar Hossain, Mortuja Faysal,
Mufti Abdul Gaffar and Abdur
Rashid—were arrested in connection
with Niloy’s murder.
Investigation Officer of the case,
CTTC inspector Bahauddin Faruki
said: “After we interrogated the arrested
men we found the involvement
of several other people in the
case and we are trying to catch them.
“We would submit the charge
sheet shortly, as soon as we arrest
the rest of the suspects.” •
Trump turns to base
to protect imperilled
presidency
• AFP, Bedminster
WORLD
Beset by investigations, dire
approval ratings and growing
party dissent, Donald Trump
is stirring up his base, hoping
to mobilise an army of political
shock troops to protect his
presidency.
Revelations that a grand
jury has been impanelled to investigate
his finances and his
campaign’s ties to Russia raises
the spectre of indictments
and subpoenas that would
shake any administration.
But for Trump, who is just
six months into his presidency,
it represents more turmoil
after an exodus of top White
House officials and humiliating
recent reverses in Congress.
Facing the prospect of
limping through another three
and a half years, Trump is settling
on a strategy of shoring
up the support of voters who
propelled him to the White
House with a series of rightwing
policy announcements
and red-blooded speeches.
In little more than a week,
Trump has encouraged police
to dole out rough justice,
summarily threatened to kick
transgender personnel out of
the military and played up the
threat of Hispanic gangs.
Energising the core
There is still little clarity on
how the ban on transgenders
can be implemented while
White House sources admit
that the immigration proposal
has scant hope of passing
through Congress.
Emily Ekins, polling director
at the CATO Institute,
believes it is too simplistic to
think of Trump voters as a homogeneous
group, but rather
a loose coalition of conservatives,
free marketers, cultural
preservationists, anti-elites
and the politically disengaged.
But, she says, opposition to
immigration is a rare common
thread running through most
of the US president’s base.
“The thing that really made
this election distinctive were
attitudes toward immigration,
his core supporters were the
most energised on the issue of
immigration,” Ekins said.
After losing a key vote on
health care and then having
his hands tied on dealing with
Russia by a vote on sanctions
that he has tried to disown,
Trump has become openly
critical of Congress – even
though his Republican party
has a majority in both houses.
While Trump regularly
railed against the Washington
“swamp” on the campaign
trail, he appeared to recognise
the need to work with the Republican
establishment once
in power by bringing some of
its main movers and shakers
into the White House.
But the recent exits of his
chief of staff Reince Preibus and
chief spokesman Sean Spicer
has made Trump’s already difficult
relationship with the GOP
look ever-more tenuous. •