Getting back to people wanting to photograph their worst deeds. This certainly is not a right wing thing. It's a humanity issue.
Daniel Pearl 'refused to be sedated before his throat was cut'
By Massoud Ansari in Karachi
(Filed: 09/05/2004)
Horrifying new details of how Daniel Pearl, the murdered Wall Street Journal reporter, met his death have emerged from the interrogation of new suspects by Pakistani police.
Pearl, who was kidnapped in Karachi in January 2002, knew for several hours that he was about to be killed, but resisted repeated attempts to sedate him, police now believe.
He was fully aware of what was happening when the Arab extremists who took control during his final days cut his throat, according to information gleaned from Pakistani militants now in police custody.
Shocking video film of Pearl's murder, seen around the world via the internet, was in fact a partial reconstruction of what had happened a few moments earlier, officers have been told.
The camera operator made a mistake and missed the moment of his death, which his murderers then re-enacted, before decapitating the reporter.
The revelations have fuelled anger among police investigators that at least a dozen leading suspects in the kidnap and murder of the 38-year-old journalist have been arrested, but have not been charged or tried in connection with his death.
Some have been accused of unrelated - and mostly lesser - offences. The three most recently captured suspects have not yet been charged, and their arrests have never been officially announced.
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Investigators say that senior officials in the Sindh police - the force responsible for Karachi - are "petrified" that if militants arrested in the past year were tried for their part in Pearl's murder, their earlier case against Omar Sheikh might unravel in the courts.
One official close to the investigation said: "Even if these men have admitted their roles in the kidnapping and killing of Daniel Pearl, we simply cannot charge them because of its impact on that earlier case."
Police have pieced together new details of how Pearl was held in captivity for two weeks, and eventually killed, from those involved - including two who witnessed his final hours.
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Eventually, Saud Memon, who is believed to be al-Qaeda's chief financier in Pakistan and owned the house where Pearl was held, contacted a group of Arab extremists who took over custody and decided he would be killed.
Armed with a video camera, three Arabs arrived, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, third-in-command of al-Qaeda - since handed over to the Americans.
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Before he was murdered, they forced him to relate his Jewish background and express sympathy with detainees in Guantanamo Bay before putting the knife to his throat once - and then again, a second time, owing to the faulty camera.
One of those present told police: "When they were slaughtering him in front of me I thought it was a bad dream. I had seen the cutting of a goat or chicken many times, but had never seen a human being slaughtered in front me."
telegraph.co.uk. |
