Pakistani court asks why militant handed to US

KARACHI, Dec 19 (Reuters) A Pakistani court asked the government today to explain why a Pakistani citizen, suspected of having links with al Qaeda, had been handed over to the United States, a lawyer said.

Pakistan has arrested and handed over about 700 foreign al Qaeda suspects to US authorities, including some senior members of the militant network, since the country joined the US-led war on terror after the September 11 attacks on the United States.

But the government says no Pakistanis have been handed over to US authorities.

The suspect, Majid Khan, was arrested in the city of Karachi in March 2003 and later sent to the US military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, said lawyer Nisar Mujahid, who represents Khan's wife.

Mujahid said US authorities suspected Khan of having links with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, mastermind of the September 11 attacks, who was arrested in Pakistan the same month as Khan and handed over to the United States.

Mohammed is of Pakistani origin but was born in Kuwait.

The High Court in the Pakistani province of Sindh, considering a petition filed by Khan's wife, ordered authorities to explain why he had been handed over to foreign authorities.

''The court has asked the government to respond by January 11 and also explain what measures were being taken to bring him back,'' Mujahid told Reuters.

Mujahid said Khan's family heard from him for the first time since 2003 in November, when he sent a greeting card from Guantanamo for the Islamic festival of Eid-al-Fitr, via the International Committee of the Red Cross.

A senior government security official confirmed that Khan was in Guantanamo Bay but said it was still the government's position that it had not handed over any Pakistanis to the United States.

''Technically, we did not hand him over directly to the Americans,'' said the official, who declined to be identified or to elaborate.

In July, a US court convicted another Pakistani, Uzair Paracha, 26, of supporting an al Qaeda plot to blow up US petrol stations. He was sentenced to 30 years in prison.

US prosecutors said Paracha attended meetings in Pakistan with a suspected al Qaeda member identified as Majid Khan, and Paracha had agreed to mail travel documents to Khan in Pakistan.

The US government believed Khan was planning to blow up petrol stations in the United States.

It was not immediately clear if the Majid Khan mentioned in the US court case was the man of the same name in detention in Guantanamo Bay.

The US military opened Guantanamo as a prison camp for suspected Islamic militants in 2002. Most inmates are suspected al Qaeda members captured in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The prison has drawn strong criticism from foreign governments and rights groups ever since.

REUTERS LL VV1953