Pakistani accused in terror attack freed on bail (AP)

By BABAR DOGAR and ASHRAF KHAN, Associated Press Babar Dogar And Ashraf Khan, Associated Press – Thu Jul 14, 10:38 am ET

LAHORE, Pakistan – An Islamist militant accused in dozens of killings and a 2009 attack on Sri Lanka's cricket team was freed on bail Thursday after 14 years in custody because the Supreme Court decided there was not enough evidence to keep holding him, his lawyer said.

The release of Malik Ishaq, a leader of the banned Sunni Muslim extremist group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, underscores the difficulty Pakistani prosecutors have convicting suspects in a justice system that lacks resources, is plagued by corruption and is rife with tales of witness intimidation.

Members of extremist groups have routinely escaped justice in Pakistan because of the legal system's perceived ineptitude.

Also Thursday, Pakistan's largest city, Karachi, reeled from fresh political violence that killed at least 14 people and added to the nation's instability.

Ishaq was arrested in 1997, and has been accused of a slew of crimes, including attacks on minority Shiite Muslims. In 2009, he also was blamed for orchestrating the attack on the Sri Lankan cricketers in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore. Six security officers and a driver died in that assault.

Although he's been implicated in some 44 cases, he was convicted in just two minor ones, and has already served the time for those, said his lawyer, Qazi Misbah. But prosecutors have tried to keep Ishaq behind bars, even as they've struggled to prove other cases and persuade frightened witnesses to testify.

The Supreme Court on Monday decided that there was not enough evidence to prevent Ishaq from being granted bail. After posting bonds worth $11,600 (1 million rupees), Ishaq walked free Thursday, Misbah said. TV footage showed hundreds of Ishaq's supporters greeting him as he left the jail in Kot Lakhpat, a town on the outskirts of Lahore.

Ishaq told Pakistan's private Geo TV channel that he had been falsely accused and that he would do whatever possible to ensure peace in Pakistan.

Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and the affiliated Sipah-e-Sahaba are among the most notorious extremist groups in Pakistan. Jhangvi, in particular, is suspected of ties to al-Qaida and roles in a variety of terrorist attacks, including the 2008 bombing of the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad.

Criminal conviction rates hover between 5 and 10 percent in Pakistan, according to a report by the International Crisis Group, a respected think tank. Terrorism convictions are rare, even in major cases, and convictions in lower courts are frequently overturned by appeals courts. Part of the problem is that police are ill-trained in the art of gathering evidence, while witnesses are often afraid to testify.

Prosecutors could not immediately be reached for comment in the Ishaq case Thursday.

In Karachi, meanwhile, residents were dealing with another round of violence that has brought the death toll in two weeks to more than 100.

Late Wednesday, Zulfiqar Mirza, a senior member of the ruling Pakistan People's Party, called Altaf Hussain, chief of the city's powerful Muttahida Qaumi Movement, a murderer and an extortionist. He also maligned the city's Urdu-speaking community that makes up the MQM party's main base.

Karachi echoed with gunfire soon after a local TV channel aired Mirza's comments. Angry mobs also torched more than a dozen vehicles. Fourteen people were killed in the fighting, said Manzoor Wasan, home minister in Sindh province, where Karachi is the capital.

Karachi has a long history of political, ethnic and sectarian violence, and much of the fighting is blamed on gangs allegedly affiliated with political parties. Last week, dozens were killed in violence believed to be linked to the MQM's decision to leave the federal ruling coalition and join the opposition.

Mirza apologized for his comments Thursday, calling members of the Urdu-speaking community his "brothers." His mea culpa came as thousands of people rallied in the center of the city to condemn him and burn his effigies.

Hussain, who lives in self-imposed exile in London, appealed to his supporters to call off protests, which seemed to help calm the situation by Thursday evening.

A large number of MQM's supporters are Urdu-speaking descendants of people who came to Karachi from India soon after the birth of Pakistan in 1947. The party dominates politics in urban areas of Sindh, including Karachi, but over time it has seen challenges to its power from the People's Party and the Awami National Party, a Pashtun nationalist party.

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Khan reported from Karachi.

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UK, Pakistani leaders hold terror talks in London (AP)

LONDON – Pakistan has agreed to cooperate more closely on counterterrorism issues with Britain after the killing of Osama bin Laden, the prime minister's office said Friday.

David Cameron and Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari held their first face-to-face discussions in London since the May 2 raid by U.S. Navy SEALs in Abbottabad during which bin Laden was killed.

Pakistani leaders have denied knowing that bin Laden was in Abbottabad — and U.S. officials have said there's no evidence yet that the upper ranks of the Pakistani military or civilian leadership helped hide him. But Pakistanis are furious that the U.S. staged the raid without any warning or Islamabad's consent.

Earlier this week, it was revealed that Pakistan had ordered Britain to withdraw some of its military training teams from the country. Britain's military said the 18 trainers had been asked to leave over security concerns expressed by Pakistan's government following the Abbottabad raid.

Downing Street did not mention the incident, instead emphasizing cooperation between the two countries.

Cameron angered Pakistani officials last year when, on a visit to India, he said Pakistan must not be "allowed to look both ways" on terrorism. Since Bin Laden's death, he has argued that the West must continue to cooperate with Pakistan.

Cameron's office said the two leaders "discussed terrorism, agreeing that it is a global phenomenon that should be fought by intensifying cooperation at all levels."

It added: "Cameron appreciated Pakistan's full commitment to fight terrorism and stressed that there was now an opportunity to move decisively against al-Qaida."

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US trial to open window on Pakistani terrorists (AFP)

CHICAGO (AFP) – A Chicago trial due to start Monday will open a window onto two Pakistani terrorist organizations and the men who plotted the 2008 Mumbai attacks, amid fears it could further inflame regional tensions.

It comes amid a diplomatic crisis as Pakistan struggles to deflect suspicion of official complicity with terrorism after US commandos killed Osama bin Laden in an urban compound only 55 kilometers (35 miles) from Islamabad on May 2.

Chicago businessman Tahawwur Hussain Rana, 50, is charged with providing material support to terrorists by acting as a messenger and providing a cover for a key figure in the bloody 60-hour Mumbai siege in which 166 people died.

David Coleman Headley -- Rana's old friend from military school in Pakistan -- has been cooperating with prosecutors ever since his October 2009 arrest and will be a star witness at Rana's trial.

Jurors are also expected to hear a series of conversations between the two men secretly recorded by the FBI.

Headley formally admitted to 12 terrorism charges in March 2010 after prosecutors agreed not to seek the death penalty or to allow him to be extradited to either India, Pakistan or Denmark to face related charges.

The Washington-born son of a former Pakistani diplomat and American woman, Headley admitted to spending months scoping out sites for the Mumbai siege and plotting to kill a Danish cartoonist.

In a plot that reads like a movie thriller, Headley spent two years casing out Mumbai, even taking boat tours around the city's harbor to find landing sites for the attackers and befriending Bollywood stars as part of his cover.

He was so eager to kill a Danish cartoonist, who sparked outrage with cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed, that he began working seriously on that plot two months before the Mumbai attack.

Headley also had Bollywood and one of India's most sacred Hindu temples in his sights as he began plotting a second India attack during a March 2009 surveillance trip.

India and Washington blamed the Mumbai rampage on Pakistan's banned militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT).

The attacks stalled a fragile four-year peace process between the two nuclear-armed south Asian rivals which were only resumed in February.

Rana -- who holds Canadian citizenship -- insisted after his October 2009 arrest that he is a pacifist who was "duped" into letting his old friend use his immigration services company as a cover.

But in pre-trial motions, his lawyers proposed defending Rana's actions by arguing he believed Headley was working on behalf of the Pakistan's ISI spy service, not terrorists.

Headley testified to a grand jury that he had told Rana about "my meetings with Sajid and others in Lashkar" and "how I had been asked to perform espionage work for ISI," court records show.

"I explained to him that the immigration office would provide a cover story for why I was in Mumbai," Headley said, according to court records.

Judge Harry Leinenweber ruled against this proposed defense on legal grounds -- Rana is being prosecuted for his actions in the United States and even if Headley were acting on behalf of the ISI neither he nor Rana would be exempt from US laws.

However, the trial could nonetheless lend credence to suspicions that the ISI was involved in the attack because three of the conspirators named in the indictment are ISI officers, court records showed.

"This is going to be yet another brick in this very large wall of suspicion that we have about Pakistan," said Khalil Marrar, a political science professor at DePaul University who has been following the case.

None of the men are in US custody and a spokesman for the US attorney's office declined to say whether the US government would be seeking their extradition or even knows their whereabouts.

Headley -- who changed his name from Daood Gilani so he could hide his Pakistani heritage -- joined LeT in 2002, attending terrorist training camps five times over the next three years.

He began working with an Al-Qaeda-linked group in Pakistan called Harakat-ul-Jihad-Islami on the Danish plot after LeT became distracted with the final planning for the Mumbai attack, a plea agreement said.

Jury selection in Rana's begins Monday. Opening statements are not expected until May 23.

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