The overturning of the death sentence of British-born top al-Qaeda terrorist Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, who was convicted in the abduction and murder of US journalist Daniel Pearl in Karachi in 2002 raises questions about the credibility of the judicial system in Pakistan.
There are fingers pointed, too, at the role of the army of which the ISI is an intelligence adjunct and the Pakistan government in crucial judgements that have a bearing on the country’s external relations and internal politics. Omar Sheikh, who was the mastermind behind the abduction and killing of Pearl, was arrested from Lahore in February 2002 and sentenced to death five months later by an anti-terrorism court.
The Sindh High Court while clearing Omar Sheikh of the serious charge of killing Pearl in its recent verdict has instead found the 46-year-old Omar Sheikh, who was earlier released from Indian custody under duress to rescue 150 passengers of a hijacked flight from Srinagar in 1999, guilty of the lesser charge of kidnapping and commuted his death sentence to seven years in prison. Sheikh has been in jail for the past 18 years.
The revised conviction means that Omar Sheikh would have been freed within a few days but subsequent US intervention behind the scenes has ensured that he would remain in detention for at least another three months, maybe more, until his fate is finally decided on appeal to the Supreme Court in Pakistan.
As a result of the then Vajpayee government’s deal with the terror groups, Saeed Sheikh, along with Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Masood Azhar and another terrorist Mushtaq Ahmed Zargar were given safe passage to Afghanistan in exchange for the hijacked plane’s hostages. The deal had then been much criticised by the Opposition but it was considered necessary to save the lives of innocent Indian passengers. In India, Omar Sheikh’s detention was for kidnapping of some western tourists in Kashmir.
Daniel Pearl who was bureau chief of Wall Street Journal, was killed because he had laid his hands on Pakistan ISI’s nefarious activities and was all set to unmask it in his despatches. Pearl was believed to have been investigating a story on the alleged links between the ISI and al-Qaeda. In the intelligence politics of the world where there are wheels within wheels there is no knowing what further deals would be struck in the Daniel Pearl killing. But there can be little doubt that American prestige is at stake while the Pakistanis are out to save Omar Sheikh from the gallows.
Whether the country’s highest court would get enmeshed in the messy cover-up is a moot point. The verdict on Thursday came more than a month after Paris-based Financial Action Task Force warned Pakistan that stern action will be taken against it if the country fails to check the flow of money to terror groups like the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) among others. The FATF, which supervises effective implementation of legal, regulatory and operational measures for combating money laundering, terrorist financing, last year placed Pakistan on its "Grey List" of countries for failure to curb funnelling of funds to terror groups like the LeT and the JeM.
If not removed from the list by April end, Pakistan may move to a blacklist of countries such as Iran that face severe economic sanctions. For a country whose economy is tottering on the brink, this could be a major blow. There is of course the hidden hand of China which has been protecting Pakistan from being declared a terrorist state, be it at FATF or in regard to sheltering terrorists and abetting their activities. The exoneration of Omar Sheikh in the case of killing Pearl will evoke derision among countries and its ratification by the apex court would embarrass the Pakistan government further.
But more than anything else, it is the unmasking of Islamabad before the FATF that could jeopardise the recalcitrant country’s credentials and push it towards being deemed to be a terror state deserving of economic sanctions. The Chinese are pushing Pakistan into serious indebtedness through the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor and are looking at a virtual control over the levers of power. How far they would succeed is anybody’s guess but the Pakistanis need to protect their sovereignty before it is too late. The Chinese stranglehold needs to be loosened.
