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Pakistan fears Taliban 'Osama' plot
Source: Agencies |
September 10, 2011, Saturday
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PAKISTAN is warning that the Taliban are plotting to secure the freedom of Osama bin Laden's wives and children by kidnapping a high-ranking government official and then offering to exchange him or her for the slain terror chief's family.
US Navy seals killed bin Laden in a May helicopter-borne raid on his house in northwestern Pakistan.
They took the corpse with them, but left at least two of his wives and several children in the house. They were detained by Pakistani authorities.
Pakistan's Interior Ministry warned of the purported kidnap plot in a letter that was sent to top security officials on August 23 - just three days before gunmen seized Shahbaz Taseer, the son of a wealthy provincial governor who was killed by an Islamist militant earlier this year.
Interior Minister Rehman Malik said there was no evidence that the group that had seized Taseer from the streets of the Punjab provincial capital, Lahore, was hoping to exchange him for bin Laden's family members.
A local reporter obtained a copy of the letter, stamped "secret" yesterday.
It said the information that led to the warning was reliable. It doesn't say which Pakistani official the Taliban plan to kidnap, but said the most likely location was one of the country's four provincial capitals.
Pakistan has reportedly released Taliban prisoners before in exchange for kidnapped government officials and army officers.
Taseer's kidnapping was the second high-profile abduction in Lahore in August. On August 15, gunmen seized a 70-year-old American aid expert from his house. The man, Warren Weinstein, is still missing, and police have declined to speculate on who may be holding him.
Meanwhile, Pakistani police said they were preventing foreign journalists and other visitors from getting close to the house of bin Laden ahead of the 10th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks in the US.
The Danish Ambassador to Pakistan and his wife, and two French journalists, were among several people detained this week in Abbottabad - the Pakistani garrison town that was bin Laden's last hideout. They were held briefly before being allowed to return to the capital Islamabad. Ambassador Uffe Wolffhechel said he asked security officers at a checkpoint on the road to the house whether he and his wife could get in viewing range of it and "they said 'we are sorry, no,' and we shook hands and said 'have a nice day'."
US Navy seals killed bin Laden in a May helicopter-borne raid on his house in northwestern Pakistan.
They took the corpse with them, but left at least two of his wives and several children in the house. They were detained by Pakistani authorities.
Pakistan's Interior Ministry warned of the purported kidnap plot in a letter that was sent to top security officials on August 23 - just three days before gunmen seized Shahbaz Taseer, the son of a wealthy provincial governor who was killed by an Islamist militant earlier this year.
Interior Minister Rehman Malik said there was no evidence that the group that had seized Taseer from the streets of the Punjab provincial capital, Lahore, was hoping to exchange him for bin Laden's family members.
A local reporter obtained a copy of the letter, stamped "secret" yesterday.
It said the information that led to the warning was reliable. It doesn't say which Pakistani official the Taliban plan to kidnap, but said the most likely location was one of the country's four provincial capitals.
Pakistan has reportedly released Taliban prisoners before in exchange for kidnapped government officials and army officers.
Taseer's kidnapping was the second high-profile abduction in Lahore in August. On August 15, gunmen seized a 70-year-old American aid expert from his house. The man, Warren Weinstein, is still missing, and police have declined to speculate on who may be holding him.
Meanwhile, Pakistani police said they were preventing foreign journalists and other visitors from getting close to the house of bin Laden ahead of the 10th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks in the US.
The Danish Ambassador to Pakistan and his wife, and two French journalists, were among several people detained this week in Abbottabad - the Pakistani garrison town that was bin Laden's last hideout. They were held briefly before being allowed to return to the capital Islamabad. Ambassador Uffe Wolffhechel said he asked security officers at a checkpoint on the road to the house whether he and his wife could get in viewing range of it and "they said 'we are sorry, no,' and we shook hands and said 'have a nice day'."
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