NOVANEWS
Taliban warn “America will soon burn, Pak rulers to be overthrown for following ‘US agenda’
By M. Sarwar
LONDON: The issue of arrest of Faisal Shahzad further deepened on Wednesday when a report raised the eye-brows that a Pakistani army major has been arrested in connection with the failed bombing earlier this month in New York’s Times Square. This issue is so significant and volatile that President Barack Obama personally interfered and sent his two top security advisors to Islamabad to discuss the matter with President Asif Ali Zardari, General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani and other officials.
President Obama decided to send his closest team after attending a high-level security meeting at New York Police Headquarters in which he was briefed about Faisal Shahzad and his plan.
If the report, published by Washington Post and quoted Pakistani law enforcement sources, is confirmed, it would represent the first time someone in Pakistan’s military establishment has been implicated in the botched car bombing plot. The extent of major’s alleged involvement remained unclear, but that unnamed law enforcement sources told the paper he had met Shahzad in Islamabad and had cell phone contact with him. The newspaper has avoided mentioning his name.
Chief suspect Faisal Shahzad, a Pakistani-born US citizen whose father was a senior official in Pakistan’s air force, made his first court appearance on Tuesday in New York and did not enter a plea over the May 1 incident.
Shahzad, 30, was arrested apparently trying to flee the country on a flight to Dubai 53 hours after street vendors alerted police to smoke coming out of the vehicle in New York’s theater district on a busy Saturday night.
According to the newspaper a second suspect being held by the Pakistani authorities acted as a liaison between Shahzad and the Pakistani Taliban —blamed by the US for being behind the attempted Times Square attack.
Pakistani law enforcement sources told the paper Shahzad met the suspect three times last summer and at one meeting gave him an undisclosed sum of money for the attempted bombings. Unnamed US officials told the newspaper the amount was 15,000 dollars.
US officials say Shahzad is connected to Pakistani Taliban insurgents and President Barack Obama sent two senior national security aides this week to Islamabad to join the investigation.Federal agents last week also arrested three Pakistani men in the northeastern United States and said they were suspected of funneling money to Shahzad. However, they were not charged with terrorism.
Shahzad denied bail:
Faisal Shahzad was ordered held without bail on Tuesday in his first court appearance since his arrest two weeks ago.Magistrate Judge James Francis remanded Shahzad in custody after his court-appointed defense lawyer, Julia Gatto, opted not to challenge the prosecutors’ request that he remain jailed pending trial in Manhattan federal court.
Shahzad, 30, remained expressionless and silent as the judge read the charges. He spoke only once to say a statement about his finances was correct. Shahzad entered the courtroom unshackled, wearing a grey sweatshirt and grey sweat pants with white gym shoes, and was handcuffed before being led to jail. Shahzad did not enter a plea and the next court date was scheduled for June 1.
The Pakistani-born man, who became a US citizen last year, is accused of parking a crude car bomb in New York’s crowded Times Square on May 1. He was arrested aboard a Dubai-bound jetliner two days later. He has been charged with five felonies, including attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction and trying to kill and maim people. He faces life in prison if convicted.
Prosecutors said Shahzad has admitted to the failed Times Square bomb attack and has been cooperating with investigators since his arrest on May 3.
Prosecutors said Shahzad, who has a wife and two children in Pakistan, had traveled to a Taliban and al Qaeda stronghold in Pakistan to receive bomb-making training. The Pakistani Taliban, called Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, has claimed responsibility for the attempted bombing.
Shahzad has been charged with five felonies in the May 1 incident: attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction, attempting acts of terrorism transcending national boundaries, using a destructive device in an attempted violent crime, transporting and receiving explosives, and trying to damage and destroy property with fire and explosives.
Shahzad lived in the neighboring state of Connecticut and had recently returned to the United States after spending several months in Pakistan.
Several people have been arrested in Pakistan in the case and US authorities carried out raids last week in New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey and Maine, detaining three people.
US officials in Pakistan:
The CIA director briefed senior Pakistani officials Wednesday on the investigation into the failed Times Square car bombing and praised the country’s cooperation. The visit by CIA Director Leon Panetta and U.S. national security adviser former Gen. James Jones was the first since the failed attack.
The two men met with President Asif Ali Zardari on Wednesday afternoon, said presidential spokesman Farhatullah Babar. They also held talks with army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, ISI Chief Lt. Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha and other senior officials.
“Jones expressed appreciation for the excellent cooperation the United States is receiving from Pakistan,” the statement said. “The talks covered measures that both countries are, and will be, taking to confront the common threat we face from extremists and prevent such potential attacks from occurring again.”
US deploys special teams:
The Obama administration has started using special law enforcement and intelligence teams to interrogate suspected terrorists in the US and abroad, including Faisal Shahzad, the Pakistani-American arrested in the Times Square bombing plot, US Attorney General Eric Holder said on Tuesday.
Holder announced the formation of the High-Value Detainee Interrogation Group (HIG) in August and gave the reins to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), replacing the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) that did have the lead role in intelligence interrogations.
The programme calls for the deployment of Mobile Interrogation Teams, made up of specialists from across the law enforcement and intelligence community, to question important detainees, whether they are in US custody or in the custody of a foreign government. “There have been a number of deployments of these Mobile Interrogation Teams to include for the Faisal Shahzad case,” said John Brennan, assistant to the president for homeland security and counter terrorism.
Brennan declined to say whether the mobile teams have also been used in interrogations of the Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, who was captured in Karachi in January in a joint operation by the CIA and Pakistan’s ISI. Baradar is in Pakistan’s custody.
Arrest in America:
Three Pakistani men taken into custody in a FBI sweep across the U.S. Northeast as part of the investigation into the failed Times Square bombing attempt may have provided money to suspect Faisal Shahzad, Attorney General Eric Holder said Thursday.
Holder said it was unclear if the men knew that the funds they provided were going to be used for an act of terrorism one that Obama administration officials have claimed was aided and directed by the Pakistani Taliban.
As of late Thursday, they were being detained on civil immigration violations and had not been charged with a crime.
The raids were conducted in Watertown, Brookline and other parts of the Northeast. One man arrested Thursday had previously been ordered out of the country, according to a media report.
Arrest in Pakistan:
Pakistan has arrested a suspect linked to the Pakistani Taliban who said he helped the man accused of trying to set off a car bomb in New York’s Times Square, The Washington Post reported on Thursday. The suspect provided an “independent stream” of evidence that the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) was behind the failed attack on May 1, the newspaper said, citing US officials.The suspect also admitted helping Faisal Shahzad, the Pakistani-American man being held over the Times Square plot, to travel to Pakistan’s tribal areas for bomb-making training, the report said.
Rehman Malik denies report:
Interior Minister Rehman Malik has said that no formal arrests have been made in Pakistan in Faisal Shahzad case and Pakistani authorities are investigating the matter, which will be shared with the US and made public. While talking to the media outside the parliament house Malik said that we are fully cooperating with the US authorities and we are giving feedback on their queries. Rehman Malik denied that any operation is taking place in Kala Dhaka.
Taliban threaten US:
Taliban have warned America that it will soon “burn” while calling for Pakistan’s rulers to be overthrown for following “America’s agenda”. A Taliban spokesman, in a video message obtained by Reuters news agency, repeated a claim of responsibility, saying: “The movement proved what America could not have even imagined … It was just an explosive-laden vehicle which did not explode.”
“But it (America) will see, all imperialist forces will see that it will explode also and America will also burn,” said the spokesman, Azim Tariq, sitting cross-legged on the ground in front of a rock face and speaking in Urdu.
America’s allies would meet the same fate, he said. “They can neither eliminate the mujahideen nor jihad, nor they can harm Islam,” he said, referring to Muslim holy warriors and holy war.
“Instead, they will have to die themselves, they will be burnt themselves, they will have to dig their own graves,” said the spokesman, sporting a long black beard and turban.
Karachi safe heaven:
Hundreds of Taliban fleeing from Pakistan’s restive northwest have taken refuge in the teeming commercial hub of Karachi, where a growing nexus with banned militant organisations is a headache for law enforcement.
A huge Pashtun population, mostly in the suburbs of the city of 18 million people, provides shelter to these militants, according to security officials.
Pakistan’s financial capital has largely been spared direct militant attacks. But the man accused in the failed New York bombing, Faisal Shahzad, and his contacts in Karachi have highlighted the militant networks operating here.
The arrest of dozens of low-key members of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), the Taliban Movement of Pakistan, from the metropolis is evidence of their presence, officials say, and they have developed close ties to banned outfits as well as criminals.
