Washington, Agency. The US has reacted sharply to the Pakistan court’s decision to overturn the conviction of Omar Saeed Sheikh, convicted for the kidnapping and murder of journalist Daniel Pearl. The US House Representative’s Committee on Foreign Affairs has condemned it. Committee chairman Eliot Engle has said that the US is concerned about this attitude of Pakistan. He called upon Pakistan to show genuine commitment in addressing the terrorism problem. Let me tell you that in 2002, Sindh High Court overturned the sentence given by Pakistan’s Anti Terrorism Court to Britain-born Ahmed Omar Sheikh, the main accused in the murder of Wall Street Journal journalist Daniel Pearl.
America with victims of terrorism everywhere
Alice Wells, the deputy deputy secretary of chief of the US State Department’s Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs, also commented on the reversal of the sentence, reversing the convicts for Pearl’s murder is unfair to victims of terrorism. It is being opposed all over the world. He said that America is with the victims of terrorism everywhere.
Three other convicts serving life imprisonment also acquitted
Sheikh and three others of British origin have been convicted in Pearl’s murder case. Sheikh was sentenced to death in 2002 for being the mastermind of the murder. According to Al Jazeera, three other convicts serving life imprisonment in connection with the murder were acquitted and released by the Sindh High Court.
Pearl was kidnapped in January 2002
Significantly, Pearl was investigating armed groups in Karachi after the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, when she was abducted in January 2002. The video of his murder surfaced a few weeks later.
