Daniel Pearl case: Hatchet man release!

Terrorism is the main product of Pakistan, which has been exporting continuously at regional and international level. And for this, he has faced not only condemnation but even sanctions at the global level. The punitive proceedings of the Financial Action Task Force in the past years included it in the gray list, under which its financial transactions were kept under intense surveillance to prevent the financing of terrorism. It affected the financial condition of Pakistan badly but Pakistan is not ready to withdraw from this policy. While the army and government of Pakistan are fully involved in this game of terrorism, the role of judiciary is also not beyond doubt. And recently, another such decision has strengthened this perception even further.

Due to deliberate negligence by Pakistan judiciary, a British-born and Pakistani origin terrorist Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, sentenced to death for kidnapping and beheading Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in Pakistan could walk free this week. Omar Saeed Sheikh was found guilty in 2002 of being the mastermind and arch conspirator behind Daniel Pearl’s murder, but his death sentence was overturned in April this year after Pakistani prosecutors failed to prove that he was the killer. The court also refused on Monday this week, a government request to suspend a lower court’s ruling exonerating Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh of Pearl’s murder before a 90-day detention order expires on Thursday. The supreme court of Pakistan also refused for immediate hearing of the appeal and instead allocated date 25 September for this.

Parents of Pearl had moved to the Pakistani Supreme Court against this unfair judgement of Sindh High Court. On behalf of the parents of Pearl, a lawyer named Faisal Siddiqi filed the petition which stated that “The decision by the Sindh High Court to free the men in the murder of Daniel Pearl is a complete miscarriage of justice. It is a defining case for the Pakistani state and its judicial system, involving freedom of the press, the sanctity of every life, freedom from terror, and the manifestation of a welcoming and safe Pakistan to the world.”

Post Judgement acquittal from murder conviction and death sentence by Sindh high court, Sheikh was ordered to remain in detention in April because of generating outrage from Pearl’s family, the US government, media and several right groups. So the 90-day detention was ordered under a public order regulation that allows detainees to be held longer if their release could incite violence and chaos. In this verdict the Sindh high court also acquitted three others accused in the case: Fahad Naseem, Sheikh Adil, and Salman Saqib, who were earlier sentenced to life in prison.

Pearl, 38-year-old South Asia bureau chief for Wall Street Journal, was kidnapped and beheaded in Pakistan in early 2002 while working on a story about Islamic terrorism after the terror attack of 9/11 and US invasion on Taliban regime. Pearl was beheaded by Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, who was arrested in Pakistan in 2003 and later described as the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks. Now he is a prisoner at the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay prison camp. A videotape received by U.S. diplomats in February 2002 that confirmed Pearl was dead.

A son of a cloth merchant, Sheikh was born in England in 1974, he enrolled in London School of Economics but discontinued his studies and joined the Harkat ul Ansar (HuA) during the war in Bosnia. HuA rechristened as Harkatul Mujahideen after the US banned the group in the mid-1990s and became one of the key infiltrators into Jammu and Kashmir. In 1994, he kidnapped some Western tourists in New Delhi to demand the release of Maulana Masood Azhar, then related to HuA, who had been detained by the Indian authorities. He was arrested by the Indian authorities. He was one of three men along with Maulana Masood Azhar and Mushtaq Ahamd Zargar, released from an Indian prison after militants hijacked an Indian airliner IC 814, in late 1999 and flew it to Afghanistan. After released from Indian Jail, Omar Sheikh got married in Lahore and had been living with his wife in Lahore since then. He is considered very close to Gen. Mohammad Aziz Khan, then a Corps Commander in Lahore and former deputy director general of ISI, who further designated as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee.

After Pearl’s killing, Sheikh was arrested by Pakistan's law enforcement agencies in 2002 for his involvement in Pearl's kidnapping and murder. Since then he was in Jail but despite being in jail, Sheikh was suspected to be in contact with terrorists. Pakistani Military investigators believe Sheikh drew up the earliest plans for former president General Pervez Musharraf’s assassination in 2002 and raised funds for the attacks. He is also suspected of involvement in the attack on the Indian parliament in early 2002.

Pakistan also has a well-organized rescue mechanism, from which the terrorists safely leave after completing their exploits. This work is done by the government machinery especially the enforcement agencies, army, intelligence outfit like ISI and military intelligence. And if it is not able to work proper under international pressure, then this role of ‘redeemer’ is played by the judiciary itself. Hafiz Saeed, the main accused in the Mumbai bombings, is a clear example of this.