Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh

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Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh
1994 kidnappings of Western tourists in India
  • Kidnapping and murder of Daniel Pearl
    • Criminal charge(s)Kidnapping, murder
    Criminal penalty
    • 7 years imprisonment (for kidnapping)
    • Death (for murder), overturned
    Criminal statusImprisoned at Kot Lakhpat Jail
    SpouseSaadia Rauf (m. 2000–present)
    Children1 (son)

    Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh (

    Harkat-ul-Ansar or Harkat-ul-Mujahideen in the 1990s, and later of Jaish-e-Mohammed and was closely associated with Al-Qaeda.[a][b][3][4]

    He was arrested-in-action during the

    1994 kidnappings of Western tourists in India and served time in Indian prisons. He was released in 1999 and was provided safe passage into Afghanistan with the support of the Taliban in exchange for passengers aboard the hijacked Indian Airlines Flight 814. He is best-known for his role in the kidnapping and subsequent murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in 2002.[5][6]

    Sheikh was arrested by Pakistani police on 12 February 2002, in

    Central Prison Karachi) but has been moved out of death row while his acquittal for Pearl's murder is in appeal at the Supreme Court of Pakistan.[17]

    Early life

    Ahmed Omar Sheikh was born in London, England on December 23, 1973. His parents, Saeed and Qaissra Sheikh, emigrated from Pakistan to the UK in 1968 and ran a prosperous clothing business.

    General Zia-ul-Haq and returned to London as "a junior boxing champion and full of stories of contacts with organised crime, gun battles in the ghettos of Lahore, visits to brothels."[20]

    Later, he attended the

    Forest School and the LSE, Syed Ali Hasan, had described him in 2002 as "bright but rather dysfunctional" and said that he had been suspended from school on several occasions because of his violent behavior. He was known for his violence since his childhood, having punched and thrown to the floor a teacher when he was eight years old, and grew up to be a bully.[24] Becoming an adult, a "burly-chested six feet two inches" as per journalist Robert Sam Anson,[25] he would eventually translate this violence into a love for martial arts and sports, participating in the 1992 World Armwrestling Championship in Geneva, while also being a chess champion during his days at the LSE.[26] Noted for his academic abilities, he's also a polyglot who could speak five languages.[27] The Guardian reported that Sheikh came into contact with radical Islamists at the LSE, quoting Hasan as saying "[he] told us he was going to Bosnia driving aid convoys, and he never came back to university".[28]

    Former Pakistani President

    In the Line of Fire, stated that Sheikh was originally recruited by British intelligence agency MI6 while studying at the London School of Economics. He alleges Sheikh was sent to the Balkans by MI6 to engage in operations. Musharraf later says, "At some point, he probably became a rogue or double agent".[29]

    Omar Sheikh married Saadia Rauf (who holds an MA degree in English)[30] in Lahore in December 2000 and became a father in November 2001.[31][32][33][34]

    Kidnapping of American and British nationals, 1994

    Main article:
    1994 kidnappings of Westerners in India

    He travelled to Bosnia in 1993 during the

    1994 kidnappings of Westerners in India perpetrated by the Harkat-ul-Ansar (under the pseudonym of Al-Hadid), during which he had been caught.[35] The abductees included three British citizens, Myles Croston, Paul Rideout, and Rhys Partridge, and one American, Béla Nuss; all of them were rescued unharmed.[19][36]

    During his jail years, where he moved from jail to jail in different cities (e.g. New Delhi, Meerut, etc.), he was noted as wanting to read biographies of

    Stalin and described "as a tough, militant youth with a sharp, calculating brain well capable of planning and executing terror acts with precision", while his counsel in Meerut, O.P. Sharma, remembers him as a "fanatic to the core" who "believed every non-Muslim is a kafir and must perish", that "there was no concept of democracy in Islam" and even that "at times he turned very violent and behaved like a mentally-challenged person" for instance when "he once beat up one of the deputy jailors at Meerut jail."[37]

    Hijacking and release from prison

    Main article:
    Indian Airlines flight 814 hijacking

    In 1999,

    Harkat-ul-Ansar)[a] while on the way from Kathmandu, Nepal to New Delhi, India. The hijackers demanded the release of fellow Harkat-ul-Mujahideen members Sheikh and Masood Azhar (who went on to found Jaish-e-Mohammed which Sheikh later joined)[4] and Mushtaq Ahmed Zargar, leader of another Pakistan-based anti-India terror organization. The plane landed in Kandahar and Taliban militia surrounded the plane, pre-empting any Indian commando operation. After negotiations between the Indian government and the hijackers, the hostages were freed eight days after the hijacking occurred, although a passenger, Rupin Katyal, was stabbed to death by one of the hijackers. The three prisoners were released in exchange for the hostages, including Sheikh who was imprisoned at the Tihar Jail in Delhi.[35][38]

    Sheikh also had financial connections with Aftab Ansari, perpetrator of the kidnapping of Partha Pratim Roy Burman and the 2002 attack on American cultural centre in Kolkata.[39][40]

    Media descriptions

    The Times has described Sheikh as "no ordinary terrorist but a man who has connections that reach high into Pakistan's military and intelligence elite and into the innermost circles of Osama Bin Laden and the al-Qaeda organisation." According to ABC, Sheikh began working for Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) in 1993. By 1994, he was operating training camps in Afghanistan and had earned the title of bin Laden's "special son."[41]

    In May 2002, The Washington Post quoted an unnamed Pakistani source as saying that the ISI paid Sheikh's legal fees during his 1994 trial in India on charges of kidnapping.[42]

    Possible connection with 9/11 hijackers

    On 6 October 2001, a senior-level US government official, told

    Mustafa Muhammad Ahmad" had sent about $100,000 from the United Arab Emirates to Mohamed Atta. Investigators said "Atta then distributed the funds to conspirators in Florida in the weeks before the deadliest act of terrorism on U.S. soil that destroyed the World Trade Center, heavily damaged the Pentagon and left thousands dead. In addition, sources have said Atta sent thousands of dollars – believed to be excess funds from the operation – back to Syed in the United Arab Emirates in the days before September 11."[43] CNN later confirmed this.[44]

    The 9/11 Commission's Final Report states that the source of the funds "remains unknown."

    More than a month after the money transfer was discovered, the head of ISI, General Mahmud Ahmed resigned from his position. It was reported that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) was investigating the possibility that Gen. Ahmed ordered Sheikh to send the $100,000 to Atta.[41]

    Times of India: "US authorities sought General Mahmud Ahmed's removal after confirming that $100,000 was wired to WTC hijacker Mohamed Atta from Pakistan by Ahmad Umar Sheikh at the insistence of General Mahmud."[45] Another Indian newspaper, the Daily Excelsior, quoting FBI sources, reported that the "FBI's examination of the hard disk of the cellphone company Sheikh had subscribed to led to the discovery of the "link" between him and the deposed chief of the Pakistani ISI, Mahmud Ahmed. And as the FBI investigators delved deep, reports surfaced with regard to the transfer of $100,000 to Mohamed Atta, one of the ringleaders of the 11 September attacks, who flew the hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 Boeing 767-223ER commercial airliner into the North Tower of World Trade Center. General Mahmud Ahmed, the FBI investigators found, fully knew about the transfer of money to Atta."[46]

    US investigators later said that this was a confusion with

    Mustafa Muhammad Ahmad, who is currently held in Guantanamo Bay.[47]

    The Pittsburgh Tribune notes that there "are many in Musharraf's government who believe that Saeed Sheikh's power comes not from the ISI, but from his connections with our own

    CIA."[48]

    Sheikh rose to prominence with the 2002 killing of Wall Street Journal reporter

    Khalid Sheikh Muhammad personally claimed to have been Pearl's killer.[49]

    Saeed was seemingly implicated by Benazir Bhutto just before her own death in a hypothetical murder of Osama bin Laden (which must have occurred in late 2001 or 2002).[50] Several commentators have noted that, as she had previously been speaking about one of the sons of bin Laden during the interview, in all likelihood, Bhutto simply misspoke and had intended to say, "Omar Sheikh, the man who murdered Daniel Pearl," rather than "the man who murdered bin Laden" – such an important revelation about bin Laden's fate would certainly not have been stated so casually. Additionally, in subsequent interviews, Bhutto spoke about bin Laden in the context of him being alive.[51]

    Daniel Pearl kidnapping 2002

    The kidnapping (on January 23, 2002) and subsequent murder (on February 1, 2002) of American

    Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan were also stated to be involved in Pearl's kidnapping and murder.[56] The lead author of the report was Pearl's friend and colleague, journalist Asra Nomani.[14] All of the aforementioned groups were operating under the Lashkar-e-Omar umbrella.[4] Al-Qaeda leaders were also involved in the kidnapping and murder of Pearl, with Saif al-Adel playing a role in organizing the kidnapping and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was personally identified in investigative reports as the one who killed Pearl.[57] Pearl was detained and later killed at an Al-Qaeda safe house in Karachi owned by Pakistani businessman Saud Memon.[58] Matiur Rehman, another al-Qaeda leader has been identified as being involved in the kidnapping.[59]

    Sheikh was arrested by Pakistani police on 12 February 2002, in

    Ijaz Shah a week earlier on February 5.[60]

    Sheikh's lawyer Abdul Waheed Katpar claims Sheikh was arrested on 5 February 2002 and not on 12 February, and that evidence against the four suspects was fabricated by Pakistani police while the suspects were held in secret for a week. He also claims confessions were obtained under duress of torture and solitary confinement. However, Sheikh also told Pakistani officials in court in February 2002 that "as far as I know" Pearl had been killed.[61]

    The CPI and ICIJ report concluded Omar Sheikh was the mastermind of the plot to kidnap Pearl, leading to his subsequent murder. The report also confirmed the role of three codefendants convicted with Sheikh in Pearl's case. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, a former

    CIA captive, who had been tortured in 2003 in the CIA's archipelago of black sites, had confessed to the murder, and the report concluded his confession was credible. The report noted that FBI forensic experts had confirmed Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's confession through "vein matching", identifying the pattern of the veins in the killer's hands in the video.[12][15]

    In February 2014,

    Central Prison Karachi (where he was being held at the time) but had been discovered in time by prison guards and was in a stable condition. The newspaper quoted a senior prison official as saying: "He is kept in a separate cell and section of the jail as he is no ordinary criminal. […] We have filed a case against him for attempted suicide and he can face additional punishment now". A second prison official said: "He is a very intelligent, strong and sharp criminal with dangerous designs. So his attempt to commit suicide comes as a surprise".[62][63]

    Hoax calls 2008

    In the aftermath of the 2008 Mumbai attacks, tensions increased dramatically between India and Pakistan. On 28 November, a hoax caller pretending to be then Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee threatened Pakistan President Zardari with war, leading to the Pakistan military being put on high alert. Military aircraft with live ammunition were scrambled to patrol above Islamabad and Rawalpindi.[64] The same caller tried to get in touch with the real Pranab Mukherjee and US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, claiming he was President Zardari but was unable to get through to either.[65]

    A year after the Mumbai attacks, Pakistan's Dawn newspaper revealed that the hoax caller had been Sheikh. Using a mobile phone smuggled into his prison cell, Sheikh made the calls using a British SIM card.[65] After the source of the hoax calls became known, intelligence agents confiscated Sheikh's illegal phones and SIM cards and he was placed in solitary confinement.[66][65]

    In popular culture

    The Journalist and the Jihadi: The Murder of Daniel Pearl (2006) a television documentary by Indian directors Ahmed Alauddin Jamal and Ramesh Sharma which aired on HBO compares the contrasting lives of Sheikh and Danel Pearl.[67]

    Hollywood film A Mighty Heart (2007) is based on the life of slain journalist Daniel Pearl. Alyy Khan portrayed Sheikh in the film. The film's plot circulates around the memoir by Pearl's wife Mariane Pearl.[68]

    In 2008,

    1994 kidnappings of Westerners in India.[69]

    In 2017, an Indian biographical film Omerta based on the life of Sheikh was released. Rajkummar Rao portrays Sheikh and the film covers his initial radicalization, role in the 1994 kidnappings of Westerners in India, his release in exchange for hostages of the Indian Airlines flight 814, and his role in the kidnapping and murder of Daniel Pearl.[70]

    Notes

    1. ^
      Jaish-e-Muhammad was formed as a splinter group of Harkat-ul-Mujahideen by Masood Azhar in 2000.[2]
    2. ^ All of these groups played a role in the kidnapping and murder of American journalist Daniel Pearl to varying degrees. (see #Daniel Pearl kidnapping).
    3. ^ On January 23, 2002, Pearl was on his way to what he thought was an interview with Mubarak Ali Gilani at the Village Restaurant in downtown Karachi about terrorist Richard Reid's alleged training at one of Gilani's camps in Pakistan. The interview was a set-up by Sheikh and Pearl was kidnapped near the Metropole Hotel at 7:00 p.m. The two had come in contact through Khalid Khawaja, a retired Pakistan Air Force officer.[52]
    1. ^ Note that this term is more commonly used in reference to Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman

    References

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    2. Center for International Security and Cooperation. Foreign Service Institute. Stanford University
      .
    3. ^ a b "Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh". Counter Extremism Project. Retrieved 23 August 2022.
    4. ^ a b c d "Lashkar-e-Omar". South Asia Terrorism Portal. Retrieved 23 August 2022.
    5. ^ Masood, Salman (2 April 2020). "Pakistani Court Overturns Conviction in 2002 Killing of Daniel Pearl". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 15 May 2020.
    6. ^ Shah, Saeed (3 April 2020). "Pakistani Court Overturns Murder Conviction in Killing of Wall Street Journal Reporter Daniel Pearl". Wall Street Journal – via www.wsj.com.
    7. ^ a b CNN Transcript "Suspected Mastermind of Pearl Killing Arrested". CNN. 7 February 2001. Retrieved 29 June 2006. 12 February 2002.
    8. ^ Ansari, Massoud. "The Mystery Thickens". Archived from the original on 7 February 2006. Retrieved 29 June 2006. Newsline April 2005.
    9. ^ "Kidnap journalist is dead, claims militant". Archived from the original on 29 September 2007. Retrieved 29 June 2006.
    10. ^ Sadaqat Jan (18 March 2007). "Lawyer to Appeal Pearl Case Conviction". The Washington Post.
    11. ^ "Daniel Pearl's murder: Omar to utilise Khalids claim". Daily Times. 19 March 2007.
    12. ^ a b Benjamin Wittes (20 January 2011). "So KSM Really Did Kill Daniel Pearl". Lawfare. Retrieved 10 October 2013. The investigation produced a lengthy report concluding, among other things, that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was telling the truth when he boasted at his CSRT hearing of "decapitat[ing] with my blessed right hand the head of the American Jew, Daniel Pearl."
    13. ^
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    14. ^ a b Peter Finn (20 January 2011). "Khalid Sheik Mohammed killed U.S. journalist Daniel Pearl, report finds". The Washington Post. Retrieved 10 October 2013. A recently completed investigation of the killing of Daniel Pearl in Pakistan nine years ago makes public new evidence that a senior al-Qaeda operative executed the Wall Street Journal reporter.
    15. ^ a b Ben Farmer (20 January 2011). "Daniel Pearl was beheaded by 9/11 mastermind".
      The Telegraph
      . London. Retrieved 10 October 2013. The photographs were shared with CIA colleagues holding Mohammed, who used a forensic technique called "vein matching" to determine the hands belonged to the same man.
    16. Dawn.com
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    17. ^ Bhatti, Haseeb (25 March 2021). "Daniel Pearl murder case: SC allows Omar Saeed Sheikh to be moved to Lahore's Kot Lakhpat jail". Dawn.com. Retrieved 23 August 2022.
    18. ^ Ghosh, Suktara (20 February 2018). "Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, the Man Rajkummar Rao Plays in 'Omerta'". TheQuint.
    19. ^ a b McGinty, Stephen. The Scotsman, 16 July 2002. "The English Islamic Terrorist". The Scotsman. Edinburgh. 16 July 2002. Archived from the original on 19 September 2005. Retrieved 22 September 2006.
    20. ^ Daniel Flynn (25 September 2008), "Omar Sheikh, a childhood friend turned Pakistani militant", Reuters. Retrieved 31 March 2020.
    21. ^ Hendrik Hertzberg, "Kidnapped." The New Yorker. 18 February 2002. Retrieved 26 April 2011.
    22. ^ Rohan Gunaratna, Khuram Iqbal, Pakistan: Terrorism Ground Zero, Reaktion Books, 2012, p. 200
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    24. ^ Suktara Ghosh (15 March 2018), "Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, the Man Rajkummar Rao Plays in ‘Omerta’", The Quint. Retrieved 31 March 2020.
    25. ^ Robert Sam Anson (August 2002), "The Journalist and The Terrorist", Vanity Fair. Retrieved 31 March 2020.
    26. ^ Josy Joseph (6 February 2002), "Omar Sheikh: A deadly whirlpool of terror", Rediff. Retrieved 31 March 2020.
    27. ^ "Saeed Sheikh Believed to Have Abetted Terrorists", transcript from the CNN
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    30. ^ "Shaky Evidence |". magazine.outlookindia.com/.
    31. ^ "'The toughest boy in school'". the Guardian. 23 February 2005.
    32. ^ "The Daniel Pearl Case: Questions And Answers". www.outlookindia.com/.
    33. ^ "Omar Sheikh Made the Hoax Call to Zardari". www.outlookindia.com.
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    35. ^
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    39. ^ Chakravarty, Sayantan (25 February 2002). "Omar Sheikh and Aftab Ansari: The masterminds of a nexus between the underworld and jehad". India Today.
    40. ^ "Briton linked to al-Qa'ida 'behind Calcutta killings'". The Independent. 24 January 2002. Retrieved 8 September 2022.
    41. ^ a b "Center for Cooperative Research". FormsPal. Archived from the original on 7 February 2005.
    42. ^ Pearl Trial Moving to New Site After Threats The Washington Post.
    43. ^ "CNN.com - Suspected hijack bankroller freed by India in '99 - October 6, 2001". edition.cnn.com.
    44. ^ "India wants terror spotlight on Kashmir". CNN. Archived from the original on 19 September 2005.
    45. ^ "Opinion & Reviews - Wall Street Journal". WSJ.
    46. ^ "FBI, CIA benefit from RAW's inputs – The Daily Excelsior". Archived from the original on 12 December 2005.
    47. ^ Kevin McCoy (18 December 2001). "Court papers cite al-Hawsawi in funding attacks". USA Today.
    48. ^ "Did Pearl die because Pakistan deceived CIA? – The Pittsburgh Tribune". Archived from the original on 15 February 2006.
    49. ^ "Khalid Sheikh Mohammed: I beheaded American reporter - CNN". CNN.
    50. ^ justamused (1 May 2011). "Benazir Bhutto, David Frost, and Osama Bin Laden (Al Jazeera English – 'Frost Over The World")". Archived from the original on 21 December 2021 – via YouTube.
    51. ISBN 978-1566567831
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    52. ^ In a Ditch. 3 May 2010. The New Republic.
    53. Australian Parliament House. Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security
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    54. Wall Street Journal
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    55. ^ B. Raman (30 September 2004). "Why Amjad Farooqi had to die". Asia Times. Archived from the original on 22 November 2010. All accounts from Nawabshah indicate that if the Pakistani authorities had wanted they could have caught him alive and questioned him about the role of Pakistani civilian and military officials in various terrorist incidents of the past three years, including the kidnapping and murder of US journalist Daniel Pearl, the attempts to kill Musharraf himself and Shaukat Aziz, the prime minister, and the attacks directed against US and French targets in Pakistan. But they did not want him alive.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
    56. Long War Journal
      . 21 January 2011. Retrieved 23 August 2022.
    57. ^ Augustine Anthony (23 May 2011). "Study ties new al Qaeda chief to murder of journalist Pearl". Reuters. Archived from the original on 8 December 2014. Retrieved 22 September 2015. 'KSM told the FBI that he was pulled into the kidnapping by a high-level leader in al Qaeda circles, an Egyptian named Saif al-Adel, who told him to make the kidnapping an al Qaeda operation,' said the investigators in their report which was published in January.
    58. The Bureau of Investigative Journalism
      . 2019. p. 264.
    59. ^ Feinman Todd, Barbara and Nomani, Asra. "The Truth Left Behind: Inside the Kidnapping and Murder of Daniel Pearl." Archived 2013-02-04 at the Wayback Machine (Washington, D.C.: Center for Public Integrity, 2011).
    60. ^ Wright, Abi. Committee to Protect Journalists, May 2006. "Heading into Danger". Archived from the original on 29 June 2006. Retrieved 29 June 2006.
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    64. Independent.co.uk. 7 December 2008. Archived
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    65. ^ a b c Jailed militant’s hoax calls drove India, Pakistan to brink of war Dawn, Pakistan.
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    67. ^ "The Journalist and the Jihadi: The Murder of Daniel Pearl". Harvard Institute of Politics. Retrieved 6 September 2022.
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    69. IMDb Edit this at Wikidata
    70. ^ "Omerta". ZEE5. Retrieved 23 August 2022.

    External links

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