Man linked to dead reporter

KARACHI, Pakistan -- An al Qaeda militant arrested with alleged Sept. 11 organizer Ramzi Binalshibh has been identified as one of the killers of Wall Street Journal correspondent Daniel Pearl, a senior police official said Tuesday.\nThe identification was made by a Pakistani held but not charged in the kidnap-slaying of the newspaper's South Asian correspondent, according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.\nAccording to the official, the Pakistani, Fazal Karim, was taken to an intelligence agency safe house where 10 suspects, including Binalshibh, were held. Most of them were Yemenis, officials have said.\nThe official refused to identify Pearl's alleged killer by name but said he was not among the five people, including Binalshibh, who were handed over to U.S. authorities Monday and flown out of the country.\nIf true, Karim's statement would be the first evidence that al Qaeda may have been involved in Pearl's abduction and killing. Pearl was kidnapped in January while investigating links between Pakistani militants and Richard C. Reid, who was arrested in December on a flight from Paris to Miami with explosives in his shoes.\nHis dismembered body was found in May in a shallow grave in Karachi. Police officials have said they were led to the grave by Karim and two others.\nIt was unclear what impact the revelation would have on the government's case against four Pakistani militants who were convicted of Pearl's abduction in July. British-born Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh was sentenced to death by hanging and the others received life sentences. All have appealed.\nPearl's body was found after the trial of the four had already begun. The government has never charged Karim or the two others or officially confirmed they are being held.\nPolice officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, told The Associated Press last month that the three men gave them detailed accounts of Pearl's days in captivity. They said a group of Arabs believed to be Yemenis cut Pearl's throat three days after he tried to escape.\nThe Yemenis were not brought into the equation until after the trial. According to Karim, the Yemenis did the killing.\nIn Karachi, President Pervez Musharraf said the arrest of Binalshibh and the others shows that security forces have broken the back of terrorist networks in Pakistan.\nThe suspects were arrested in two raids last week in this port city, which has long been suspected as a hide-out for al Qaeda and Taliban figures who fled Afghanistan following the collapse of Taliban rule there.\n"The recent action taken by the law enforcement agencies against terrorist networks, especially al qaeda, have improved the law and order situation in Pakistan," Musharraf said. "The police, the (paramilitary) Rangers and the intelligence agencies have broken the terrorist network."\nThe last major terrorist incident in Pakistan took place last month when three gunmen attacked a Presbyterian hospital compound in Taxila near Islamabad. Five people including one attacker died.\nSince then police have announced a series of arrests of Islamic militants believed linked to attacks on Christian and Western interests in Pakistan.\nThey include suspects accused of bombing the U.S. Consulate in Karachi in June, plotting to kill Musharraf in April and of planning attacks on Western fast-food outlets in Karachi.\nMusharraf declined to talk about the handover of Binalshibh and the others. Pakistani officials said they were no longer in the country but would not disclose their final destination.\nThose handed over to U.S. custody Monday also included Umar al-Gharib, a brother of al qaeda leader Tawfiq Attash Khallad, according to a U.S. defense official in Washington who spoke on condition of anonymity.\nKhallad is thought to be one of the masterminds of the deadly October 2000 bombing in Yemen of the USS Cole as it refueled in the port of Aden. Though not a leader in al qaeda, al-Gharib may have valuable information nonetheless, the official said.