A Brief Sketch of Shafiur Rahman Farabi: Bangladesh’s Online Jihadist Troll
A Brief Sketch of Shafiur Rahman Farabi: Bangladesh’s Online Jihadist Troll
Unlike the copybook Islamic jihadists or extremist militant ideologues of the Indian Subcontinent, Shafiur Rahman Farabi is an over ground, overt Islamist who is engaged in an online pro-Islamist campaign and incitement against non-believers and free speech activists in Bangladesh. [1] He is notorious for his online hate-filled musings against the country’s secular ethos, and for tracking and threatening (or trolling) known secular writers and bloggers by using online social network tools. [2] He seems to be doing this not only with the purpose of issuing death threats, but also secretly guiding members of his group to target such writers and bloggers. His intrusive incendiary postings on his personal blog and Facebook has led to the killings of at least four bloggers so far, including the latest victim—Niladri Chatterjee—who was killed on August 7 in the capital Dhaka (Daily Star, August 7).
Farabi was arrested in early March by the elite anti-terrorism agency Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) in connection with the assassination of writer and blogger Avijit Roy. Roy, a prominent Bangladeshi-American scientist and secular blogger, was killed by armed assailants on February 26 at Dhaka University as he was returning from the Ekushey Book Fair (BDNews24.com, February 26). Following this incident, on March 30, another blogger and writer, Oyashiqur Rahman, was killed in Dhaka (BDNews24.com, March 30). Then, on May 12, blogger Ananta Bijoy Das was killed in Syhlet city in a similar fashion (Daily Star, May 12). The police suspect that Farabi could be the guiding force behind these brutal killings and that the killers are affiliated with the strike group known as Ansarullah Bangla Team, loosely linked with Ansar al-Islam, Bangladesh, an affiliate of al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) (Dhaka Tribune, August 7).
A cursory look at Farabi’s online activities, through his “Farabi Blog” and other platforms (e.g., Facebook and Twitter), shows Farabi’s extremist orientations. His posts on Islam and religious beliefs, defamatory comments about Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, her Father Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and the 1971 Liberation War, quite vividly underscore his political leanings towards a pro-Islamist regime. In one of his blog postings in June 2012, he claimed that he was working for Islam (Farabi1924, June 27, 2012). He even used the blog platform to solicit funding so he could go on a pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia, begging for funding by describing his precarious financial situation and giving his bank details online for potential donors.
Very little is known about his early life and indoctrination, but according to police investigative reports, Farabi was born in 1986 and attended Kishoreganj Government primary school and Kendua Joyhori Sky Government High School before attending Notre Dame College in Dhaka. In 2005-2006, he attended Chittagong University, where he studied physics. While there, he was initially associated with Islamic Chhatra Shibir, the student wing of Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh, and later joined the banned Islamist group Hizb-ut Tahiri-Bangladesh (HT-B) (Dhaka Tribune, March 3). Perhaps this is where his journey towards extremism started; HT-B has been very active on various university campuses in Bangladesh and aims to build an Islamic caliphate in Bangladesh, among other things. [3]
Farabi’s links with HT-B came into light in 2010, when he was arrested for vandalism on the university campus, and again in 2013, when he was jailed for threatening to kill the cleric who presided over the last rites (namaz-e-janaza) of the slain blogger Ahmed Rajib Haider, known to his online friends as followers as Thaba Baba. Farabi wrote on his Facebook page:
Rajib Haider was one of the prominent leaders of Ganajagaran Manch (People’s Awakening Platform/Stage) and a pioneer of Shahbagh movement of 2013. He had championed the call for maximum punishment for Bangladesh’s 1971 liberation war criminals. On February 15 that year, he was killed by knife wielding ABT members, and in this connection, Farabi was arrested on February 24, 2013 at the Chittagong University Staff Club. Just after Rajib Haider’s death, Farabi posted a message to his Facebook wall saying: “Thaba Baba’s body should be fed to the tigers at Mirpur Zoo. So the soil of Bengal will not let anyone, who throughout his life rebuked Allah and his Prophet using words can hardly be uttered” (BDNews24.com, February 24, 2013). Farabi was released on bail on August 21 that year. Soon after his relase, he reportedly resumed his online activities, including inciting the murder of secular bloggers often accused of being atheists.
Farabi had made several threats against Avijit Roy, founder of Bangladesh-centric blogging forum Mukto-Mona, mainly via Facebook. One of Farabi’s vitriolic social media postings stated: “It is a holy duty of Bengali Muslims to kill Avijit” (Daily Star, March 2). Farabi has so far denied his involvement in any of the killings, including that of Avijit Roy, but admitted to his interrogators that he supported the murder of Roy: “I fully support this killing [of Avijit]… I just gave death threats to Avijit, as he used to write anti-religious statements in a blog, in a bid to stop the publication of his books. I have no connection with the killing at all” (Dhaka Tribune, March 5).
His denial notwithstanding, Farabi’s Facebook postings and discussions left a trail of information about his conversations and activities in relation to Roy’s works. Farabi stated on his Facebook account that since Roy lived in America, it would not be possible to kill him now. He even said Roy would be killed one he returned to Bangladesh (Dhaka Tribune, February 27). Farabi even threatened the online bookstore Rokomari.com, forcing it to remove Roy’s books from its catalogues. He asked his U.S.-based Facebook contacts to track the whereabouts of Roy and his family by posting a family picture of them (Daily Star, March 3).
Similarly, the latest blogger-activist victim, Niladri Chatterjee, also mentioned Farabi’s name in one of his posts after finding his own name on Farabi’s list of anti-Islam bloggers (Dhaka Tribune, August 7). On August 3, days before his assassination, Niloy clearly mentioned in a Facebook post how the police did not heed his request for security protection and lamented: “My name is on the hit list of Farabi Hujur! Oh Almighty, save me” (Dhaka Tribune, August 8). There are several “hit lists” in circulation by hardline Islamists and militant groups in Bangladesh, mostly comprising individuals accused of anti-Islam or of being secularists along with an open call to attack or assassinate them. The most recent such list surfaced on August 12, naming 20 people, including bloggers, legislators, teachers and cultural activists, most of them involved with the Ganajagaran Mancha. The list and threat letter was sent by the hitherto unknown Ittahadul Mujahidin group. This list included Niladri Chatterjee’s name, which was crossed out in red ink, showing he had been eliminated (BDNews24.com, August 12).
Farabi has been in custody since his third arrest in March 2015. The investigating team believes that since Farabi’s writings incited the killers of Avijit and others, he can lead them to these militants or help solve the conspiracy behind the spate of killings. He is also under investigation for another case, filed on July 23, 2014, for posting offensive comments about different religions, including Hinduism and Buddhism, on Facebook (Daily Star, March 29). While he has not yet been charged, he is currently detained under the Information and Communication Technology Act for his open death threats to many secular bloggers and intellectuals through social media and blog platforms.
Farabi’s link with militant ideologue Jasimuddin Rahmani and the Ansarullah Bangla Team are more or less clear now. During his previous imprisonment in 2013, Farabi was jailed at the same Kashimpur High Security Jail where Rahmani was being detained and reportedly interacted with him and his cohorts there (Dhaka Tribune, March 3). Farabi’s support for Rahmani and the Hefajat-e-Islam-led Defend Islam movement can be clearly seen through his various writings and blog posts.
Farabi is under investigation for direct or indirect links with Ansar al-Islam Bangladesh and AQIS after these jihadist groups claimed responsibilities for the killings of bloggers and intellectuals like Professor AKM Shafiul Islam of Rajshai Universty (Daily Star, November 16, 2014). It is plausible that he and perhaps many others like him receive moral backing from AQIS’ leadership as al-Qaeda’s South Asia branch has prompted extremist intellectuals to confront atheists and anti-Islam activists openly. [4]
Presently, the investigations are ongoing as the attacks on secular online bloggers and writers continue unabated in Bangladesh. Most recently, on August 11, three days after Niladri Chatterjee’s murder, another threat letter surfaced, targeting six more individuals associated with the Ganajagaran Mancha in Barisal (Daily Star, August 16).
Over ground Islamists like Farabi pose a real danger, as the eyes and ears of militant groups. Surprisingly, the government security agencies advised blog writers not to cross the line and hurt anyone’s religious belief. The prevalent religious intolerance in Bangladeshi society has undoubtedly received a further boost with the government’s lackadaisical attitude, which indirectly encourages violence against secular or progressive forces.
Speculation is rife inside Bangladesh that Farabi’s release from detention is imminent because the security agencies haven’t been able to link him to the murder of Avijit Roy or other attacks so far. Even though foreign investigative agencies like the FBI were briefly involved in the investigation of Roy’s murder, there is the possibility that Islamists like Farabi Shafiur Rahman will get off scot-free and continue to operate and kill at will while the government remains a mute witness, fearing Islamist backlash.
Animesh Roul is the Executive Director of Research at the New Delhi-based Society for the Study of Peace and Conflict (SSPC).
Notes
1. An over ground worker (OGW) is one who is operating openly, acting as the eyes and ears for the underground elements/covert militants/Islamists, etc. This phenomenon is common in Jammu and Kashmir and Northeast India.
2. Farabi’s personal blog can be found here https://www.farabiblog.com, his Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/farabiSr and https://www.facebook.com/shafiur2012, and his Twitter account at https://twitter.com/farabishafiur. He also has a Google+ account.
3. Hizbut Tahirir Bangladesh (HT-B) has been a banned Islamist organization in Bangladesh since October 2009, when Dhaka Administration outlawed HT-B for its “anti-state,” “anti-government,” “anti-people” and “anti-democratic” activities in the country. The government, however, ruled out the possibility of charging HT-B activists for their past offenses, but warned them of grim action if they continue their anti-state activities. Despite the ban, HT-B is still active, and its activists operate covertly as student leaders. It criticized the Awami League government following the ban, stating: “The oppressive Awami League government, agents of U.S.-India-Britain, banned Hizb ut-Tahrir due to the party’s stance on the side of the defense forces of the country and leading the work for re-establishing the Khilafah (caliphate).” For more information, see “Hizb-ut-Tahrir Bangladesh: Transnational Islamist Movement,” South Asia Conflict Monitor, January 2014.
4. AQIS praised the ongoing killings of bloggers and secular intellectuals (e.g., Ahmed Rajib Haider, Ashraful Alam, Prof AKM Shafiul Islam, Avijit Roy, Oyasiqur Rahman Babu and Ananta Bijoy Das) in May 2015. It also claimed the latest killing of Niladri Chatterjee; see https://activist1.wordpress.com/2015/08/08/bangladesh-ansar-al-islam-aqis-claim-responsibility-for-4th-blogger-killed-this-year/.
