Pakistan has handed to the US senior al-Qaeda suspect Abu Farraj al-Libbi who was wanted for two assassination attempts against President Pervez Musharraf, an official said yesterday.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Jalil Abbas Jilani confirmed a reported comment by Musharraf published in a newspaper in the United Arab Emirates yesterday that al-Libbi had been handed over, but gave no further details.
``The president made a statement to this effect. The president's statement was self-explanatory. I don't have further details,'' Jilani told a news conference in Islamabad.
Some officials have described al-Libbi as al-Qaeda's No. 3 leader, after Osama bin Laden and Egyptian surgeon Ayman al-Zawahri. However, he does not appear on the FBI list of the world's most-wanted terrorists, and his exact role in al-Qaeda is murky.
He was arrested May 2 after a shootout in northwestern Pakistan.
On May 31, Musharraf told CNN that Pakistan would hand al-Libbi, who is a Libyan, to the US.
In an interview with United Arab Emirates daily al-Ittihad he confirmed that had already happened.
``Yes, we turned Abu Farraj al-Libbi over to the US recently, and we don't want people like him in our country,'' Musharraf was quoted as saying.
He did not say when or how al-Libbi was handed over or provide other details.
In Pakistan, al-Libbi was wanted for allegedly masterminding two attempts on Musharraf's life in December 2003. The president was unhurt, but 17 people died in the second attack. The assassination attempts carry a maximum penalty of death by hanging. The personal nature of the attacks led many to believe Musharraf would seek to try al-Libbi in Pakistan.
Pakistani officials have said that al-Libbi was behind a suicide attack against Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, weeks before he took office last year. Nine people died, including Aziz's driver.
It was not entirely clear what charges if any al-Libbi might face in the US, or if he has been indicted by any US court.
In Washington last week, US State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said the US was talking to Pakistan about al-Libbi but had not yet discussed his extradition.
Pakistan says it has captured more than 700 al-Qaeda suspects since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the US, sending most of them to the US. They include al-Qaeda's former No. 3, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who was arrested in March 2003 during a raid near Islamabad.
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