In fear after attacks, gay Bangladeshis retreat into closet and flee abroad

BANGKOK: Seven months after al Qaeda-linked militants hacked Bangladesh’s most prominent gay activist to death, the South Asian country’s LGBT community remains in hiding, while more than a dozen LGBT people have fled abroad.

“The whole community has been sent back to the closet. Any kind of work - whatever we had been doing - it has been completely shut down. There is no movement, no visibility, no work. It is a horrible situation. We have never imagined the situation would be like this,” a gay activist in exile told the Thomson Reuters Foundation on condition of anonymity because he fears for his safety.

Bangladesh’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender ( LGBT) community was already marginalised, with gay sex being illegal, punishable by a maximum of life in prison.

Then there was a coming out of sorts with the 2014 launch of the country’s first LGBT-themed magazine, Roopbaan, which became a subject of interest in the media and on social media, prompting a backlash and threats.

The community suffered escalating threats and then on April 25, Xulhaz Mannan, the founder and publisher of Roopbaan, and gay actor Mahbub Rabbi Tonoy were hacked to death at Mannan’s home in Dhaka.

The attack, claimed by the regional arm of al Qaeda, was the first of its kind to target the LGBT community, although it followed more than 30 killings since early 2015 of academics, bloggers and atheists who published views critical of Islam.

“We had been very visible over past two years. A huge number of young people came up and volunteered for our work. After this one incident... the whole community collapsed,” the activist told the Thomson Reuters Foundation on the sidelines of an international LGBT conference in Bangkok last week.

“This one incident broke the sense of security. More than 15 people left the country. More than 10 want to leave. People in Bangladesh don’t want to talk to us. The whole community is so scattered and scared.” — Reuters