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Top Islamic Leader, Khalid Shaikh Muhammad
Captured in FBI Raid near
Islamabad, Pakistan
Whisked out of Pakistan, Being Tortured in a
Third Country
In a flurry of news reports,
U.S.
media
reported on March 1, 2003 in
the afternoon that Khalid Shaikh Muhammad, top
Al-Qaida leader, was arrested
in Rawalpindi (near Islamabad) at 3 a.m. on
Saturday morning (Pakistan time).
The U.S. reports indicate that the raid was
carried out jointly by the
FBI and General Musharraf's special forces (ISI).
Another U.S. news report indicates that the
overall operation was
supervised by the
CIA.
The Pakistanis however are
taking sole credit for the
operation.
The most detailed report came from
Fox News
in an interview with former
Director of the CIA, Woolsey. This report
indicated that Khalid Muhammad was
immediately whisked away to a third (unnamed)
country for "interrogation" so
as to extract maximum information from the
prisoner. The nuance of this
report is that the raid was totally controlled by
the U.S. because Pakistan
is not in a position to whisk prisoners to third
countries for torture.
In a late night report on
CNN
(early March
2), Peter Bergen pointed out
that the purpose of taking Khalid Muhammad to a
"third country" is to carry
out torture which would be difficult in Pakistan.
Peter Bergen also connected Khalid Muhammad
to Pakistan's Jamaate
Islami Party. The captured leader, Bergen said,
was staying with a Jamaate
Islami leader. [Other reports say that another
unnamed "Arab" and a Jamaate
Islami person were also arrested.]
Khalid Muhammad is accused by the U.S. of
"masterminding" the
9.11
attacks as well as attacks on U.S. embassies in
Africa and the attack on the
USS Cole.
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2003-03-02 Sun 08:42ct