Days Could Be Numbered for Ex-Guantanamo Kidnapper

Reuters ^ | 10/15/04 | David Brunnstrom

[TexKat]

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Pakistan will hunt down a former Guantanamo Bay inmate who masterminded the abduction of two Chinese engineers, one of whom died after a rescue operation in which five kidnappers were killed, officials said Friday.

Al Qaeda-linked tribesman Abdullah Mehsud directed the six-day hostage drama -- which caused consternation in key ally China -- from a hideout in the hills of the South Waziristan tribal region along the border with Afghanistan, they said.

After Pakistani commandos killed the kidnappers in the nearby Chagmalai area Thursday, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf promised Chinese President Hu Jintao the masterminds would be "pursued relentlessly and meted out the most severe punishment."

Nek Mohammad, who like Abdullah was in his 20s, had set himself up as a sort of latter-day Robin Hood, leading a group of tribesmen helping to shelter hundreds of al Qaeda-linked militants, including Arabs, Chechens and Uzbeks.

Abdullah was likely to share his fate.

"We have to hunt him down. Now we will evolve a strategy and do some planning," a security official told Reuters. "The man has become too big for his shoes."

Abdullah, freed from Guantanamo in March after the Pentagon said he was no longer a threat to the United States, has made little effort to keep a low profile, giving interviews to local journalists throughout the kidnap drama.

RASH FANATIC

Journalists have been taken to meet him at secret locations by tribal go-betweens and he could prove more difficult to find than Nek Mohammad, as he has been using a long-range cordless telephone harder to detect than a satellite phone.

But Abdullah may find it difficult to evade capture too long after angering members of his own tribe who tried unsuccessfully to negotiate the release of the Chinese.

"By kidnapping the Chinese citizens, (Abdullah) Mehsud and his handful of supporters have lost all respect," said National Assembly member Maulana Mirajuddin Khan, who led this effort.

"They have disgraced the movement against U.S. influence in the region," he told the Washington Post.

Rahimullah Yusufzai, who met Abdullah Thursday shortly before the end of the siege, described him as a rash fanatic, who appeared so careless of operational security, he even let him speak by telephone to the kidnappers.

"He's a very uncompromising person, a hard-liner and very emotional too. He's careless to the point of irresponsibility."

Abdullah, heavyset with a pale complexion, crinkly black hair and a false leg, may also find it more difficult than some to adopt a disguise and melt away into the tribal region, even if he does get protection.

Diplomats said Pakistan would be particularly eager to avenge the affront to China, who Foreign Minister Khursheed Mehmood described Thursday as Pakistan's "closest friend."

A traditional ally of Pakistan, supplying it with arms and hundreds of millions of dollars in development finance, Beijing had urged Islamabad to do its utmost to rescue the engineers and to increase security for their co-workers.

It was the second time this year Chinese workers have come to harm at the hands of militants opposed to Pakistan's role in the U.S.-led war on terror. In May, three technicians working on a port project were killed and nine wounded in a bomb attack in the southern city of Gawadar.

"I've a feeling Abdullah will soon get a missile through his window just like Nek Mohammad," said a diplomat. "The military doesn't like Robin Hoods floating around the tribal areas."

[TexKat]

Pakistan will hunt down Abdullah Mehsud, a former Guantanamo Bay inmate who masterminded the abduction of two Chinese engineers, one of whom died after a rescue operation in which five kidnappers were killed, officials said on October 15, 2004. The Al Qaeda-linked tribesman, seen after his release from Guantanamo March 16, directed the six-day hostage drama -- which caused consternation in key ally China -- from a hideout in the hills of the South Waziristan tribal region along the border with Afghanistan, officials said. (Ahmad Masood/Reuters)

[dagoofyfoot]

I still can't believe we let this guy go. He should have faced a tribunal and then promplty executed!


What the hell are we thinking?

[wideawake]

The spin:

He was a nice little tribesman until the evil US wrongfully imprisoned him in a tropical paradise with more and better food than he'd ever seen.

When he was released from the vacation spot . . . um, hellhole, he had become radicalized. We created a monster.

[Brilliant]

It was the Democrats who wanted us to release these guys from Guantanamo. Remember? We had no legal basis to hold them.

[silverleaf]

Once the Pakis get him, his time in Gitmo is going to seem like an interlude at Club Med.

[TexKat]

Abdullah Mehsud ping.

[TexKat]

If I remember correctly, Mehsud was a DOD release based on a DOD screening process mistake.

23 posted on 10/14/2004 11:22:23 AM CDT by FreeReign

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1244912/posts

[Coop]

While we're on the topic:

Pakistani police arrest Al Qaeda linked group’s militant (AFP)

15 October 2004

KARACHI - Pakistani police said Friday they have arrested an Al Qaeda linked local militant suspected of involvement in an attack on a top army general and a foiled attempt to blow up the United States consulate here.

Police identified the suspect as Syed Adnan Shah, 26, a member of the Jund Allah or Army of God militant group, whose members had been trained by Al Qaeda in camps near the Afghan border.

Shah was arrested from a house in Karachi’s Nazimabad neighbourhood late Thursday, senior police official Manzoor Mughal told AFP.

“Adnan was the one who opened fire on (army) commander Ahsan Saleem Hayat and was also wanted in connection with an attempt to blow-up an explosive-laden car outside the US consulate,” he said.

Lieutenant General Hayat, former military commander of southern Sindh province, narrowly escaped the attack on his convoy on June 10. Seven soldiers, three policemen and a passerby were killed in the attack.

Mughal said Shah was also involved in an attempt to blow-up a car laden with 650 litres of chemical explosives outside the US consulate in Karachi in March.

He described the Jund Allah group as dangerous and said police were looking for other members who may be hiding in the city.

A Pakistani court last month indicted 10 members of the group, including its chief Attaur Rehman, for the attack on Hayat’s convoy.

Karachi, Pakistan’s largest city and commercial capital with 14 million people, is a hotbed of Islamic extremism.

http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticle.asp?xfile=data/subcontinent/2004/October/subcontinent_October496.xml&section=subcontinent

[nuconvert]

Thanx for the ping

[TexKat]

BTTT

[sheik yerbouty]

He should've been planted like an onion in the first place.

[Brilliant]

It's too easy to make these mistakes. There should be a big pit that we simply dump these guys into.

[BushisTheMan]

After Pakistani commandos killed the kidnappers in the nearby Chagmalai area Thursday, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf promised Chinese President Hu Jintao the masterminds would be "pursued relentlessly and meted out the most severe punishment."

Sort of makes me want to live in Pakistan where terrorists are taken care of and I don't mean by the way Clinton and cronies did it or how Kerry intends to do it.

[Boot Hill]

8	“Pakistan will hunt down a former Guantanamo Bay inmate...We have to hunt him down...Abdullah [was] freed from Guantanamo in March...”

There is a whole genre of Hollywood films based upon the character of the maniacal hunter who releases some hapless victim into the wild and then hunts him down and kills him for sport.

"The Most Dangerous Game (1932)"
"Run for the Sun (1956)"
"Deadly Prey (1987)"
"Deadly Game (1991)"
"Final Round (1993)"
"Hard Target (1993)"
"Surviving the Game (1994)"

Some would even consider this to be more sporting than a trial before a military tribunal.

--Boot Hill

[Coop]

But the sobering reality is more innocents are dead because this scumbag was set free.

[Boot Hill]

"But the sobering reality is more innocents are dead because this scumbag was set free."

The sobering reality is that war always results in the death of innocents; it is the nature of the beast. If there is any decency in war, it may be found in limiting those deaths, while still securing victory over an enemy that is the primary cause of the those deaths. Ironically, releasing Abdullah Mehsud may well be an example of this.

--Boot Hill

[TexKat]

There is a whole genre of Hollywood films based upon the character of the maniacal hunter who releases some hapless victim into the wild and then hunts him down and kills him for sport.

I was thinking the same thing.

Did you ever see that old movie with Mickey Rooney as a town sheriff. He would let inmates escape from jail so that he could go hunt them down in order to put more knotches on his belt. In the end the table turned on him.

Quote from the end of that movie: "What you wanna go do that far, I'm da law."

[FreeReign]

Thanks for the ping TexKat.

Hopefully we'll get this guy real soon.

[dagoofyfoot]

He should've been planted like an onion in the first place.


I'm thinking planted like a septic tank...a big hole, and throw a whole lot dirt on top!

[sheik yerbouty]

Don't forget the pig entrails!