Bomb kills an opposition leader in Bangladesh

DHAKA (AFP) - An opposition leader has been killed in a bomb attack by an outlawed Maoist group in Bangladesh's southwestern city of Khulna, police said.

Bacchu Chowdhury, 40, died on the way to hospital late Wednesday after the blast near the shop he runs, area police chief Nasir Ahmed told AFP.

Chowdhury was a local leader of the Jatiya Party, the third biggest party in the Bangladesh national parliament.

Ahmed said the outlawed Maoist group Janajuddha (People's War) claimed responsibility for the killing in a telephone call to a local Bengali-language newspaper.

Immediately after the murder hundreds of party activists shouting anti-government slogans staged a street protest.

The murder follows a bomb attack in the city last month against a local leader of the main opposition Awami League party.

Sheikh Yunus Ali, an elected Khulna councillor, lost his right hand and suffered splinter wounds to his back after unidentified attackers hurled two bombs at him.

The outlawed Maoist group has been linked to dozens of killings of politicians and journalists in the past decade in Khulna and other southwestern districts.

A bomb attack on Tuesday in nearby Jhenidah wounded four people including a journalist. The attack, said by police to be possibly linked to a Maoist group, was the town's third in a week.