By Mohammad Jamil Khan and Shariful Islam in The Daily Star, Mar 10, 2017
Around 82 percent of the arrested militant suspects in Bangladesh were radicalised through social media platforms, a police study has found.
“Conducting a research among the 780 militants arrested since 2010, we found that around 82 percent of them became radicalised from propaganda materials on social media platforms,” Mohammad Moniruzzaman, assistant inspector general (confidential) of police headquarters, told The Daily Star yesterday.
The “militants” are from Jama’atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), Ansarullah Bangla Team, Ansar al Islam, Hizb ut-Tahrir and Neo JMB.
Police would seek help of the Facebook authorities for curbing militancy in the upcoming conference of police chiefs of South Asia and neighbouring countries, said the police official.
He hoped that Facebook’s assistance would be very helpful to rein in the spread of misinformation.
“For this reason, we decided to hold a bilateral meeting with Facebook officials, who are coming to Dhaka to join the conference of police chiefs of South Asia and neighbouring countries next week,” said Moniruzzaman.
The conference, scheduled to be held between March 12 and 14, would be the first of its kind in Dhaka.
Facebook Trust and Safety Manager Vikrarm Langeh is expected to attend the conference.
Top officials of police headquarters said they would seek permission from the Facebook authorities for access to the online activities of any suspected user.
According to sources, the use of Facebook began in Bangladesh in the middle of 2006. There are now over 2 crore Bangladeshi Facebook user.
Citing security reasons, Bangladesh government kept Facebook along with some other social media blocked from 18 November to 10 December in 2015. Later, the government held a meeting with senior officials of Facebook Southeast Asia.
Apart from the Facebook officials, some 58 other foreign delegates, including police and law enforcers from 14 countries and high officials of Interpol, IGCI, FBI, ASEANPOL and ICITAP, would join the conference.
The 14 countries are Afghanistan, Australia, Bhutan, Brunei, China, India, Indonesia, the Maldives, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, South Korea, Sri Lanka and Vietnam.
Bangladesh police would also hold bilateral meetings with delegates of several countries, including India, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, South Korea, China, Brunei and Myanmar.
South Korea has expertise in cyber crime investigation and detection, while China is very good at making arms and ammunition, according to sources in the police headquarters.
Police would also raise militant hideout issues while holding a bilateral meeting with Malaysia and yaba issues while holding a bilateral meeting with Myanmar.
AKM Shahidul Hoque, inspector general of police, said the main theme of the conference is regional cooperation in curbing violent extremism and transnational crime.
Although Bangladesh police have a great success in combating militancy, the country is still not safe from threats of militancy, he said.
“We hope that the conference would give us a clear idea about extremism and organised crime of the region and help build a strong network among the police chiefs of neighbouring countries,” said the police chief while addressing a briefing at the police headquarters conference room yesterday.
The IGP said they would prepare a work plan for combating transnational crimes and sign a joint declaration.
In the conference, police would also try to sign a memorandum of understanding with the 14 countries for exchanging criminals, said the police chief. “If these countries do not agree to sign it, we will try to establish a relationship with them so that we can deal with such issues.”
Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal will inaugurate the conference at Sonargaon Hotel on March 12, while Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali will be the chief guest at the concluding session. http://www.thedailystar.net/frontpage/82pc-militants-radicalised-thru-social-media-1373665
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