The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

Saturday, February 23, 2002, Chandigarh, India

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Harkat behind murder?
Rajeev Sharma
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, February 22
There is a suspicion in knowledgable circles here that Harkat-ul-Ansar (HuA) which was banned by the USA years ago and said to be defunct since then could be behind the brutal murder of American reporter Daniel Pearl.

According to well placed sources here, certain leads have surfaced linking “Al Faran”, the outfit which came into limelight with the kidnapping and murder of four Westerners from Jammu and Kashmir in the mid 90s and which specialises in kidnappings for political demands, to Pearl’s kidnapping. The name Al Faran indicates a pan-Islamic connection. The valley from where Prophet Mohammad came is also referred to as “Faran”.

Sources said there was enough incriminating evidence to suggest that either Al Faran was an outfit operating under the patronage of HuA or the HuA itself had given it another name — Al Faran.

While who killed Pearl is a subject matter of investigation, sources said there were several reasons why he was killed. Here are some major reasons :

* The very name of the organisation that claimed to have kidnapped Daniel Pearl — National Movement for the Restoration of Pakistani Sovereignty — itself claims the motive behind his brutal killing. Post-September 11, most Pakistanis believe that their country has lost its sovereignty to the USA. Any killing of an American is seen as a revenge by the jehadi elements.

* Militant outfits have charged Pearl with being a “spy” and an “agent” for Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) of the US and Israeli intelligence agency, Mossad.

* Pearl was after the whereabouts of those Taliban ministers and top guns who had escaped to Pakistan and were being provided with all amenities, obviously secretly. Knowledgable sources here suspect that Pearl was perhaps investigating whether the banning orders against the jehadi groups had been carried out and whether the top-rung Taliban cadres were being given shelter in Pakistan.

* He was following a story the main thrust of which was that militant groups in Pakistan were thriving despite post-September 11 and post-January 12, 2002 crackdown.

* He had done a story in which he had quoted Jaish-e-Mohammad (JEM) representatives saying that police “left behind enough people to keep their office running.”

* He had also reported about a JeM regional centre operating near Bahawalpur and about still-functioning bank account even though a freeze had been ordered by Pakistan’s State Bank.