The jihadists who slaughtered 20 hostages at a Dhaka restaurant were members of a homegrown Bangladeshi militant outfit and not followers of the Islamic State group, a senior minister said Sunday. 

"They are members of the Jamaeytul Mujahdeen Bangladesh," Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan told AFP, referring to a group which has been banned in Bangladesh for more than a decade.

"They have no connections with the Islamic State."