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Pakistan interrogates Al-Qaeda No. 3, recaptures escaped Musharraf plotter
EFL:
 ISLAMABAD - Pakistani security officials said Thursday they hoped the capture of a Libyan accused of being Al-Qaeda's number three and of planning to kill President Pervez Musharraf could lead them to Osama bin Laden. Intelligence agents said they had separately recaptured an air force officer who escaped jail late last year after being sentenced to death in one of the assassination plots masterminded by top terror suspect Abu Faraj al-Libbi. In another apparent coup, officials said a second militant seized on Monday with al-Libbi, who has a five-million-dollar US bounty on his head, was himself a key Al-Qaeda figure with a reward tag of four million dollars. However they would not name the other terror suspect, saying it could harm efforts by Pakistani interrogators to extract information from al-Libbi about bin Laden.
| So, who's the 4 million dollar man? I'll have to go digging in the wanted posters. |
"The man arrested with al-Libbi is an important Al-Qaeda operative, but we cannot disclose his name. We understand the bounty on his head is four million dollars," a senior government official told AFP on condition of anonymity. The official declined to give any other details.
Junior air force official Mushtaq Ahmed, 26, was sentenced to death in November for his role in the bombing of a bridge which collapsed moments after Musharraf's convoy had passed through in December 2003. He escaped jail soon afterwards but was arrested last week on a bus near Islamabad on a tip off despite having changed his appearance by shaving off his beard, a security official told AFP. Officials said they were not aware of any link between Ahmed's recapture and the arrest of al-Libbi.
Posted by: Steve 2005-05-05 |
