Bangladesh, India’s northeastern neighbor and a hub of Islamism following the ousting of Sheikh Hasina, its elected prime minister, is a new hot spot of Turkey’s Islamist ambitions as part of its broader strategy to attract South Asian Muslims.
Now it appears that Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence, its Bangladeshi proxy Jamaat-e-Islami, and Turkey are building an alliance to sabotage India. This jihadist nexus reportedly entails the flow of funds, arms, and radical Islamist ideology to Bangladesh from Pakistan and Turkey.
Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence, its Bangladeshi proxy Jamaat-e-Islami, and Turkey are building an alliance to sabotage India.
Prior to the 1947 partition of India, influential Muslim leaders Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy engaged in anti-Hindu and extremist communal politics, supporting Mohammad Ali Jinnah’s Muslim League to create an independent, Muslim-majority Pakistan from British India.
After Pakistan’s formation, Bangladesh, then East Pakistan, resented West Pakistan’s dominance and suppression of its cultural and linguistic identity. Relations between West and East Pakistan worsened irreparably after West Pakistan’s politicians and generals stalled Mujibur Rahman’s efforts to form the government despite his 1970 electoral victory.
As the refugee crisis further exacerbated with the Pakistani army’s suppression of the local population and the massacre of Hindus, India intervened militarily, forcing the surrender of the Pakistani army and confirming Bangladesh’s independence.After independence, Pakistan’s proxy Islamist organizations like Jamaat-e-Islami continued to have a strong presence in society. Despite Sheikh Hasina’s secular Awami League government, society remained receptive to Pakistan-backed Islamist ideology, which Jamaat-e-Islami spread and propagated. Sheikha Hasina banned Jamaat-e-Islami and executed its leaders as war criminals for supporting Pakistani forces in 1971; however, after her ouster in June 2024, Jamaat-e-Islami has regained freedom and resumed power and activity.
Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party has supported the Muslim Brotherhood and Jamaat-e-Islami since 2010. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan condemned the execution of Jamaat-e-Islami war criminal Motiur Rahman Nizam in 2016 and withdrew his ambassador in protest. On July 26, 2025, Yasin Aktay, a former member of the Turkish parliament and Erdoğan’s advisor, met Jamaat-e-Islami chief Shafiqur Rahman at the group’s Dhaka office. Reportedly, the Turkish intelligence service Milli İstihbarat Teşkilatı funded the renovation of Jamaat-e-Islami office. Through its state institutions, Turkish Cooperation and Development Agency, Directorate of Religious Affairs (Diyanet), and pseudo-nongovernmental organizations, Ankara has funded local charities to export Islamist ideology to a society prone to religious extremism.
Favorable conditions will enable Turkish intelligence to deepen its penetration into these terror groups and arm them with advanced weapons.
Growing diplomatic, trade, and defense ties, with Bangladesh becoming the fourth-largest buyer of Turkish weapons, serve as another critical pillar of Ankara’s influence in Bangladesh. Turkey supports Bangladesh on Rohingya refugee issues in the multilateral forums. Recently, a Turkish delegation led by Haluk Görgün, president of the Defence Industry Agency, met with Bangladesh’s interim leader Mohammad Yunus, Chief of Army Staff Waker-Uz-Zaman, Navy Chief Nazmul Hasan, and Air Chief Marshal Hasan Mahmud to discuss defense collaboration, procurement of high-tech defense equipment including Bayraktar TB-2 drones, TRG-300 rocket systems, artillery shells, infantry rifles, machine guns, Otokar Cobra-II Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles (MRAPs)—and the transfer of critical technology. Additionally, Görgün promised support to build two defense complexes in Chittagong and Narayanganj. Turkey has offered easy credit lines, co-production, technology transfer, duty exemptions, infrastructure development, and investments in defense, mining, e-commerce, logistics, and clean energy.
After Hasina’s ouster, an array of Islamist and terrorist organizations have reemerged, such as Ansarullah Bangla, Jamaat-ul-Mujahiddin, Harkat-ul-Jihad-Islami Bangladesh, Lashkar-e-Taiba, and Jaish-e-Mohammed. With Jamaat-e-Islami’s strengthening influence in the social and political spaces, these terrorist organizations will find a congenial environment to operate and plan anti-India sabotage. Such favorable conditions will enable Turkish intelligence to deepen its penetration into these terror groups and arm them with advanced weapons. Recently, a Turkey-backed nongovernmental organization in Bangladesh depicted eastern and northeastern Indian states as a part of Greater Bangladesh, creating a diplomatic row between the two countries, amidst an already rocky relationship after Hasina’s ouster.
Pakistan is a key player, supporting and enhancing Turkey’s Islamist influence in South Asia, including Bangladesh. In the future, Turkey’s and Pakistan’s strong footholds in Bangladesh could harm India’s national security. Pakistan views Bangladesh as an alternative front to target India in the fragile northeast, impacted by local insurgencies and the volatile “Chicken’s Neck” corridor, a narrow strip linking mainland India with the northeast.
American policymakers increasingly view Turkey’s turn toward Islamism and terrorism as a problem for the United States, Israel, and general stability in the Eastern Mediterranean. Too seldom, however, do policymakers understand the Turkish threat goes much farther and has now essentially gone global.
