Hundreds of people have gathered at a village in Pakistan's Punjab province for the funeral of key al-Qaeda suspect Amjad Farooqi. Farooqi was killed by security forces in a gun battle in Nawabshah, Sindh province, on 26 September.
Posted on 10/06/2004 10:17:03 AM PDT by LesbianThespianGymnasticMidget
Hundreds of people have gathered at a village in Pakistan's Punjab province for the funeral of key al-Qaeda suspect Amjad Farooqi. Farooqi was killed by security forces in a gun battle in Nawabshah, Sindh province, on 26 September.
His family expects to receive his body later on Wednesday now that DNA tests have proven his identity.
There is a heavy police presence in the village in Toba Tek Singh district amid fears of violence.
President Pervez Musharraf said the killing of Farooqi had removed a "serious terrorist threat".
Islamic tradition
The BBC's Adnan Adil in Lahore says an official of the Special Branch telephoned the family on Wednesday morning to tell them the body would be released later in the day.
The family says they have made all the arrangements for funeral prayers and have invited guests.
People soon began arriving from nearby towns and villages. Some reports said around 1,000 had come by nightfall.
According to Islamic tradition, Muslims should be buried within 24 hours of death, but the authorities retained Farooqi's body to confirm his identity.
One of Farooqi's relatives, Qari Sanaullah, told Reuters: "It was cruel to kill Amjad. He was a loyal Pakistani and committed Muslim."
He said Farooqi had told him 18 months ago he had been a personal guard to Osama Bin Laden and had recruited up to 400 men from his own district to fight a jihad, or holy war.
Some of the walls in the village bore slogans saying: "Long live Jaish-e-Mohammad" - the name of the militant group to which he belonged.
Farooqi had been wanted in connection with two assassination attempts on President Musharraf last December.
Farooqi was also indicted for involvement in the kidnapping in 2002 and subsequent beheading of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl.
Sounds like we should send our condolences in the form of a Jdam.
I was thinking a MOAB
Closer,... closer,...
Lots of HVTs will be there in a "target-rich" environment. -- hint --
Heh, heh, heh... 1,000, eh?
Hope the Funeral Director has a group discount...
A nice array of Cluster Bombs and Napalm from the US would fit quite nicely.
OK, who's got enough pig guts to fill a 6x3x6 hole?
What I find somewhat disturbing about this article is that when the "HVT" was someone Mussharaf really wanted (for spearheading the assassination attempts against him), he got him. Zawahiri and Bin Laden's ghost/corpse, on the other hand, remain at large in the NorthWest Provinces.
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