Via Reuters ,

Three die in Bangladesh tomb blast
Tue 13 January, 2004 08:37

DHAKA (Reuters) – Bangladesh has suspended an annual festival at a Muslim saint’s tomb after a bomb killed three devotees and wounded about 50.

Police said two people died instantly when the bomb exploded on Monday night as thousands of disciples sang and prayed at the tomb of Hazrat Shah Jalal. A third victim died later in hospital.

Police and officials said the blast at the 650-year-old tomb in Sylhet town, 300 km (180 miles) from the capital Dhaka, was the first act of violence in the pilgrimage spot, and spread panic among the town’s two million residents.

This disturbing development apparantly has the authorities stumped as to who did it and why. I can hazard a good guess even if they can’t! It’s most likely the same group of cowards who poisoned the fish in the famous fishpond at the Yemeni saint’s shrine a few weeks ago and who killed seven people at the shrine of another Muslim saint in Tangail district a year ago. These murderers probably killed the seventeen people who died at two cinema bombings in the northern town of Mymensingh back in late 2002 and the nine people whose lives were destroyed at a concert in Dhaka back in April 2001.

One of the things I remember from my Quranic studies days was a particularly zealous teacher admonishing us, his hapless students, against the ‘evils’ of cinema, television and radio and telling us also that not only was music and dance forbidden but so too was chess!

I’ve since learned better from wiser souls.

Anyway, that was a long time ago and I’ve watched enough telly and listened to enough music and even played enough chess to be irredeemably condemned in the eyes of his ilk who unfortunately seemed to have been reinforced, back in the ‘desh at least, by a different kind of Afghan asylum seeker. Thank you Uncle Sam.

I wonder if Osama likes fish?