Continued killing spree of secularists, atheist and religious minorities also saw Bangladesh's leading gay right activist and editor of a sexual minority magazine hacked to death, said media and officials. Julhas Mannan previously worked at the U.S. embassy before editing an LGBT magazine "Roopbaan."
Attackers entered an apartment in Dhaka killing Mannan and another unidentified individual, while a third one was injured, as reported by the BBC.
The staff at "Roopbaan" did not believe their lives were at risk though they carefully protected their identities. They had not been condemned by the government for their publishing activity and had received some support from foreign embassies, Sabir Mustafa, a BBC Bengali service editor, told the BBC.
Though the killings since February 2015 has consistently led to finger pointing to militants, the mortal attack on a university teacher two days back was suspected to be Islamist militants.
Mustafa said the extremist in Bangladesh have gained a sense of security that they could carry out killings without being punished.
Counting Deaths
In March, a Bangladeshi law student who expressed secular thoughts online was hacked with machetes and shot to death.
In 2015, four popular bloggers were also killed using machetes, reported the BBC. All four of them had featured on a list of "atheist bloggers" drawn up by the Islamic groups in 2013 and circulated widely among the extremists.
Attacks and killings have been common against members of all religious minorities including Shias, Sufis and Ahmedi Muslims, Hindus and Christians.
Officially a secular country, Muslim-majority Bangladesh has, however, failed to address the problem of extremism and islamist militancy, the report added.
