Prosecutor in Daniel Pearl murder trial accused of blasphemy

The trial of the Briton accused over the murder of US reporter Daniel Pearl has been adjourned after a defence lawyer accused the chief prosecutor of blasphemy.

Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, 28, from Wanstead, east London, and three alleged accomplices face the death penalty if convicted of kidnapping, murder and terrorism.

Defence lawyer Rai Bashir said prosecutor Raja Quereshi had made "derogatory remarks against Islam".

"He ridiculed Islamic laws and the sayings of the prophet Muhammad and he did not show any respect in mentioning his name," Bashir said outside the makeshift courtroom in Hyderabad jail.

Quereshi, who won higher court approval last week to move the trial from Karachi because he feared for his life, had already left when Bashir made the accusation.

It was feared the defence lawyer's remarks could have an inflammatory effect on Islamic radicals in Pakistan.

But before he left, Quereshi said the move of the trial to Hyderabad was proved right today when a suspected suicide bomber killed nine French engineers outside the city's Sheraton Hotel.

Pearl, the Wall Street Journal's south Asia correspondent, disappeared on January 23 in Karachi while researching links between Pakistani militants and Londoner Richard Reid, who is awaiting trial in the US after being caught on a transatlantic flight with explosives in his shoes.

The defendants called for the trial to be declared invalid, but Quereshi said they were using "delaying tactics".

Saeed is a London School of Economics dropout who went to the same public school as England cricket captain Nasser Hussain.