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| India-Pakistan |
| One of the Karachi 7 was an Attash associate |
| 2004-01-21 |
| Some two of the five al-Qaeda men, held from a Gulistan-e-Jauhar apartment in a raid on Sunday, are likely to be handed over to the US within the next two or three days, The News has learnt reliably. "Out of the five arrested foreigners, two Arabs are very important and after completing our investigations, we will hand them over to the country, which wants their custody," a senior official said. Without naming the country, he said: "So far we have not found any evidence, regarding involvement of these foreigners in any subversive activities here. If any of them is involved in any terrorist activity here, we will deal with him as per the law of the land. Otherwise, we will hand them over to the custody of the country, where they were required." He disclosed that so far only Pakistani security officials were interrogating the arrested men. "But they (the FBI agents) are also aware of the investigations and maybe they also join investigations with us," he added. Declining to give the identities of any of the arrested men, including two Arabs, the official said: "Investigations are going on and at this stage I cannot disclose their identities. But we suspect that one of the five men may be on FBI’s most-wanted list." Sources said the women and children, who were also taken into custody, would be sent back to the country of their origin. It is learnt that the arrested men were being interrogated by a joint interrogation team for ascertaining their links with local militants. However, an intelligence official told The News that one of the five arrested men was a close associate of Waleed al-Attash, the mastermind of USS Cole bombing and he had avoided arrest from a Korangi house last year. Walid al-Attash is another name for Tawfiq Attash Khallad, a key al-Qaeda leader in Pakistan who was picked up last April along with one of KSM’s nephews. At the time, he was planning to take out of the US Embassy in Karachi. He said the arrested persons were also in contact with a senior al-Qaeda leader. Without naming the leader, the official said: "We believe that he is in Karachi and we are tightening the noose around him." This is likely another of KSM’s murderous relations. Karachi was Khalid’s base for over a decade and he has a lot of contacts still in the city even after his arrest in Rawalpindi. Before 9/11/02, a good chunk of al-Qaeda was run out of Karachi with Khalid, Ramzi Binalshibh, Tawfiq Attash Khallad, and Ammar al-Baluchi all running their operations out of the city. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |