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Police Try to Contact Kidnap Mastermind
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| Pearl's trail has gone cold |
KARACHI, Feb. 11 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Pakistani police have tried to contact the alleged mastermind behind the kidnapping of U.S. journalist Daniel Pearl through the jailed leader of the outlawed Jaish-e-Mohammad group, a senior officer said Sunday.
But Jaish leader Masood Azhar, who has been in prison in Pakistan since December 22, denied knowing alleged kidnapper Sheikh Omar, the chief of police in Sindh province, Kamal Shah, told AFP.
Authorities have declared Omar, a 29-year-old British born sheikh, the chief suspect in the Wall Street Journal correspondent's kidnapping here 17 days ago. They have described him as being an important member of Jaish, which is focused on fighting Indian occupation in the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir.
But despite detaining several of Omar's relatives, including an uncle and two cousins, in the hope this will put pressure on Omar to give himself up, police have been unable to locate him, and Azhar failed to bring them any closer. "He was contacted but he denied either having any links with the kidnapping or any control over Sheikh Omar," Shah said.
As the trail of Pearl and his captors grew cold, police speculated that Omar might be hiding in eastern Punjab province or over the border in Afghanistan.
Pakistan said Sunday that concerns were mounting over Pearl’s safety, with no word from the kidnappers or major breakthroughs in the case for several days. "Of course we are [becoming increasingly concerned]... because we were hoping for breakthrough in the last two or three days - but all of us are trying very hard," Pakistan's interior minister, Moinuddin Haider, told reporters Sunday.
"He is certainly not in Karachi or in Sindh, but he might be hiding somewhere in Punjab," Shah added, stating that search parties were combing the eastern cities of Lahore, Bhawalpur, and Jehlum to trace Omar. It was also possible that he had escaped into Afghanistan, he said.
Haider, however, said he believed Pearl, 38, was still being held captive in Karachi, where he vanished on January 23 as he tried to track down elusive Islamic leader Mubarak Ali Shah Gilani. Since the last photo e-mail was sent on January 30, there has been no word from those holding Pearl.
"We very strongly feel he [Pearl] is in Karachi. He could not have moved out of Karachi by road, rail or air. He would have been detected," Haider said to news agencies. "His abductors would not take this risk because there are many check posts along the route."
Police have charged three men over the abduction and will bring them to a Karachi court on Monday. The three are alleged to have sent e-mails containing photos of Pearl in captivity, threatening to kill him by January 31.
With the help of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), police say they traced the e-mails to 21-year-old Fawwad Naseem. He was picked up Tuesday, and led police to two other men suspected of having links to Islamic groups.
The three suspects, expected to appear in court Monday, told police Sheikh Omar gave them the photographs of Pearl, investigators said. Haider said the three had been charged with terrorism and being accomplices to kidnapping.
"I can say one thing with confidence, that the kidnappers know that we are close," Shah said Sunday.
So far, the failure to solve the case threatens to cast a shadow over Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf's official visit to Washington, which begins Tuesday.
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