Major al-Qaeda man arrested

2005-07-20 08:02

London - Armed Pakistani police on Tuesday seized a major figure from the al-Qaeda Islamist militant network who is suspected of having close links with the London bombers, a newspaper reported.

The Pakistani, who was among 24 arrested during a series of raids in Lahore and Karachi, was under interrogation over the alleged role he played in the terrorist attacks in London on July 7, The Times said in its Wednesday edition.

"We suspect two or three of the detained (from Lahore) had links with the bombers, but one in particular, who is a major figure in al-Qaeda. We are interrogating them intensively," one senior Pakistani official was quoted as saying.

The British authorities have said the bombings of three subway trains and a bus "bore the hallmarks" of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network, which is believed to have carried out the September 11 2001 attacks in the United States.

The police have identified three British-born Muslim men of Pakistani descent and a Jamaican-born Muslim convert as the four who carried out the attacks that killed at least 56 people and injured 700 others.

The Pakistani authorities said the three ethnic Pakistani suspects had visited Pakistan in the months before the bombings and were trying to determine who they had met during their visits.

- AFP