Five Islamist extremists who murdered a Japanese farmer in a drive-by shooting in 2015 were sentenced to death by a Bangladeshi court on Tuesday.
The sentence on the five members of the Jamayetul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) was handed down by a judge who found them guilty of murdering Kunio Hoshi in October 2015.
He was one of a number of foreigners to be murdered in recent years in a campaign which has battered Bangladesh’s international image.
Judge Naresh Sarker said the five had killed Hoshi as part of a “campaign to destabilise the country and smear its image”.
“It was a premeditated murder,” the judge told the court in the northern city of Rangpur.
Four of the men were in the court amid heavy security but one of was sentenced in absentia.
A defence lawyer said they were disappointed with the verdict and would appeal to a higher court.
The 66-year-old Hoshi was shot dead by a gunman riding on the back of a motorbike on a dirt road where he was working on a project to grow grass for cattle.
Among those sentenced was Masud Rana, the JMB’s 24-year-old area chief.
Prosecutors say he fired the fatal shot at Hoshi near his farm near Rangpur.
Chief prosecutor Abdul Malek said two other people who had helped plan the attack, including the alleged mastermind Saddam Hossain, had already been killed in shootouts with police.
“They recced Hoshi’s home and his movements for days,” Malek said. “It was a targeted killing aimed at launching an Islamic movement in the country.”
Friends of Hoshi revealed after his death that he had converted to Islam but Malek said the attackers were not aware that he was Muslim. Hoshi was later buried in a Muslim graveyard in Rangpur.
His killing came just days after the murder of an Italian aid worker in the capital Dhaka, one of a string of attacks to be claimed by the militant Islamic State group.
Although both IS and a branch of Al Qaeda have claimed responsibility for many of the attacks, the government insists the JMB are to blame for most of them and denies that international jihadist networks have a presence in Bangladesh.
