Al-Qaida suspect arrested in Pakistan

Pakistan has arrested a Tanzanian al-Qaida suspect wanted by the United States on suspicion of helping in the deadly 1998 bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the interior minister said in Islamabad early Friday.

Ghailani was arrested on Sunday in the eastern city of Gujrat along with at least 15 others, including his wife, Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayyat told Pakistan’s Geo television network.

“This is a big success,” Hayyat said.

“He was arrested a few days ago in an operation by security agencies in Gujrat. As a result of our investigation it became clear that he was a major figure wanted for the bombings.”

Hayyat said the suspect was in Pakistani custody, but indicated he might be turned over to US authorities after investigations were completed.

The United States had offered a $5m (€4.1m) reward for information leading to Ghailani’s arrest. He was under indictment in the United States for the bombings in Tanzania and Kenya which killed more than 200 people, including 12 Americans.

Ghailani also goes by the names “Foopie”, “Fupi” and “Ahmed the Tanzanian.”

Pakistan had said earlier that some of the 16 suspects arrested early on Sunday were from Africa, but had not indicated whether they were linked to al-Qaida.

The suspects were captured by police and intelligence agents during a raid on a house in the industrial city of Gujrat after a 12-hour shoot-out.

The authorities also recovered two AK-47 rifles, plastic chemicals, two computers, computer diskettes and a “large amount” of foreign currency from the home where the suspects had moved last month.

An intelligence official said on the condition of anonymity that the raid was based on information from a suspected Pakistani militant who was arrested in a separate raid in the eastern Punjab province.

Pakistan, which became a key ally of the United States in its war on terror after the September 11 attacks in America in 2001, has so far arrested more than 500 al-Qaida suspects from different parts of the country.

They included al-Qaida’s Number 3, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who was seized in March 2003 during a raid in Rawalpindi, a city near Islamabad. Almost all the foreign suspects, including Mohammed, were later handed over to US officials.