Delhi: Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasreen said on Wednesday she had left her home in India for the United States after receiving death threats from Islamists behind the recent murders of atheist bloggers in her home country.

Nasreen, who fled to Europe in 1994 after protests against her work by Muslim extremists and now lives in New Delhi, tweeted that she did not feel safe in the Indian capital.

‘Was threatened by Islamists who killed atheist bloggers in B’desh. Worried,’ she tweeted. ‘Will be back when feel safe.’

Nasreen, who is 52 years old, said she had asked for a meeting with India’s Home Minister Rajnath Singh after receiving death threats but had received no response.

The move came weeks after masked attackers hacked secular blogger Ananta Bijoy Das to death in Bangladesh, the third such deadly attack by suspected Islamists since February.

Das had written a poem eulogising Nasreen, who left Bangladesh after she was accused of blasphemy over her novel ‘Lajja’ (Shame), which depicts the persecution of a Hindu family.

After leaving Bangladesh, Nasreen spent a decade in Europe and the United States before India granted her a temporary residential permit in 2004.

The gynaecologist-turned-author holds Swedish citizenship but she has long been seeking permanent residence in India, which she describes as her ‘cultural home’.