Fingering Danny Pearl's Killer



U.S. officials are now convinced it was Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of 9/11, who murdered the Wall Street Journal reporter.

Who murdered Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl? Since his kidnapping and execution by Islamic militants in Pakistan in 2002, various suspects have been identified. Pakistani authorities initially put the blame on Ahmad Omar Saeed Sheik, a British-born Islamist who was convicted and sentenced to death for the crime in Pakistan in 2003. Three fellow conspirators received jail terms of 25 years.

More recently, a new book by Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf, In the Line of Fire, speculates that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, was "the man who may have actually killed Pearl or at least participated in his butchery." According to Musharraf, "When we later arrested and interrogated him, he admitted his participation." A new HBO documentary, The Journalist and the Jihadi: The Murder of Daniel Pearl, leaves the question unresolved; it focuses on the intersecting lives of Pearl and Sheik, the man convicted of the crime, but also cites unnamed U.S. and Pakistani officials who blame Khalid Sheikh Mohammed for the murder.

Now, several U.S. officials tell TIME that KSM's role in the Pearl murder appears more direct than previously acknowledged — and that the Bush Administration plans to try him for it. The officials tell TIME that KSM confessed under CIA interrogation that he personally committed the murder. Moreover, when he faces a military tribunal at Guantanamo, perhaps as soon as next year, the U.S. plans to charge him not only with the 9/11 plot, but also with direct responsibility for Pearl's death.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammad (KSM) was one of 14 "high value" prisoners recently moved to the U.S. detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, from secret CIA prisons overseas. In announcing the transfer on Sept. 6, President Bush also promised to try some of the most important captives in military tribunals, a plan that Congress approved last month.

One former U.S. national security official tells TIME there is no doubt that KSM personally wielded the knife that killed the Wall Street Journal reporter. This official says that Ahmad Omar Saed Sheik insisted under interrogation that taking Pearl ' s life was not at first part of the kidnap plot — though Sheik also told his questioners that Pearl's kidnappers could never have released him because he was Jewish. But as the scheme unfolded, someone senior to him in the al-Qaeda hierarchy, known as " the fat man, " took control of the operation and beheade Pearl.

Sheik never identified KSM as the actual killer, however. The FBI deduced KSM's role only after analyzing a video of the crime, in which only the perpetrator's hands are visible. That video was released by Islamic militants soon after Pearl's murder and then widely shown on Arab television and the Internet. Eventually, the FBI obtained its own version of the original video, as well as the camera used to photograph the murder.

Once KSM was taken into custody in March 2003, a comparison of the hands shown in the video and KSM's own hands, along with other evidence, confirmed the FBI's suspicions. Then, under interrogation, KSM confessed, national security officials told TIME, admitting without remorse that he personally severed Pearl ' s head and telling interrogators he had to switch knives after the first one, " got dull. "

KSM was interrogated in secret CIA prisons along with some three dozen other key captives, including alleged terrorists Ramzi Binalshibh and Abu Zubaydah, a close associate of Osama bin Laden. U.S. officials say all were questioned as part of a special CIA program that was in effect before Congress began legislating on interrogation policy, first last December and again in anew bill that President Bush is expected to sign soon. But with their actionable intelligence value largely exhausted in recent months — and the White House under political and legal pressure to alter the CIA's once-secret detention and interrogation system — all the captives have been shipped to Guantanamo or to third countries.

Ahmad Omar Saed Sheik, who was questioned intensively after his capture and conviction in Pakistan, insisted to his interrogators that he was personally opposed to beheading victims, and felt bad about what happened to Pearl. But he also stated that it was sometimes the only way for terrorists to prove — in videos released to the outside world — that a person was, in fact, dead.

Today, Pearl's widow, Marriane Pearl, is raising the couple's son, Adam, who was born four and a half months after his father's death. A non-profit foundation set up by the Pearl family in Daniel Pearl's name promotes interfaith dialogue and attempts to combat the mind-set that led to his murder.

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Today in history - Oct. 13


The Associated Press


Today is Friday, Oct. 13, the 286th day of 2006. There are 79 days left in the year.

Today's Highlight in History:

On Oct. 13, 1792, the cornerstone of the executive mansion, later known as the White House, was laid during a ceremony in the District of Columbia.

On this date:

In A.D. 54, Roman emperor Claudius I died, after being poisoned by his wife, Agrippina.

In 1775, the United States Navy had its origins as the Continental Congress ordered the construction of a naval fleet.

In 1843, the Jewish organization B'nai B'rith was founded in New York City.

In 1845, Texas voters ratified a state constitution.

In 1943, Italy declared war on Germany, its one-time Axis partner.

In 1944, American troops entered Aachen, Germany.

In 1960, Richard M. Nixon and John F. Kennedy participated in the third televised debate of their presidential campaign.

In 1962, "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" by Edward Albee opened on Broadway.

In 1974, longtime television host Ed Sullivan died in New York City at age 72.

In 1981, voters in Egypt participated in a referendum to elect Vice President Hosni Mubarak the new president, one week after the assassination of Anwar Sadat.

Ten years ago: House Speaker Newt Gingrich, appearing on CBS' "Face the Nation," called on Congress to investigate campaign contributions made to President Clinton's re-election campaign by the Lippo Group, an Indonesian banking conglomerate. The Yankees won the American League pennant, defeating the Baltimore Orioles.

Five years ago: Ukraine's defense minister and air defense chief offered to resign, conceding that the military was involved in the explosion of a Russian airliner over the Black Sea on Oct. 4 that killed 78 people.

One year ago: British playwright Harold Pinter won the 2005 Nobel Prize in literature. Scores of Islamic militants launch simultaneous attacks on police and government buildings in Nalchik, a city in Russia's turbulent Caucasus region, leaving 139 people dead, including 94 militants.

Today's Birthdays: Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher is 81. Playwright Frank D. Gilroy is 81. Gospel singer Shirley Caesar is 68. Actress Melinda Dillon is 67. Singer-musician Paul Simon is 65. Actress Pamela Tiffin is 64. Musician Robert Lamm (Chicago) is 62. Actor Demond Wilson is 60. Singer-musician Sammy Hagar is 59. Actor John Lone is 54. Model Beverly Johnson is 54. Actor Reggie Theus is 49. Singer Marie Osmond is 47. Rock singer Joey Belladonna (Anthrax) is 46. Actress T'Keyah Crystal Keymah is 44. Actress Kelly Preston is 44. Country singer John Wiggins is 44. Actress Kate Walsh is 39. Actress Tisha Campbell-Martin is 38. Classical singer Carlos Marin (Il Divo) is 38. Olympic silver-medal figure skater Nancy Kerrigan is 37. Country singer Rhett Akins is 37. Actor Sacha Baron Cohen is 35. Rock musician Jan Van Sichem Jr. (K's Choice) is 34. Rhythm-and-blues singers Brandon and Brian Casey (Jagged Edge) are 31. Singer Ashanti is 26. Christian rock singer Jon Micah Sumrall (Kutless) is 26.

Thought for Today: "Children are the true connoisseurs. What's precious to them has no price — only value." — Bel Kaufman, American author and educator.

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