Pak snubs US, turns down request to hand over Baradar

Islamabad, Feb.25 (ANI): The Pakistan government has turned down a US request to hand over the Taliban's second-in command Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, who was recently captured in Karachi, to it.

According to insiders, during his meeting with officials of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Intelligence Bureau (IB) and Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), Federal Bureau of Investigation's (FBI) Director Robert Mueller had urged them to extradite Baradar to the US for further interrogation.

However, Mueller was told that an accused arrested in Pakistan could be repatriated to the country of his origin only if he had not committed any crime here.

Pakistan has already made it clear that it would only hand over Baradar to Afghanistan if Kabul requests it to do so.

The arrest of Mullah Baradar was kept secret for about a week before Islamabad and Washington confirmed the prize catch last week terming it as a 'big success' in the fight against terrorism.

Mullah Baradar is regarded as second only to Mullah Mohammad Omar, Taliban's supreme commander.

Interior Minister Rehman Malik had also rejected the White House' request to hand over Baradar, saying Pakistani agencies would first investigate his links with the banned terrorist network, and could hand him over to Afghanistan if the need arises but not to the US.

"First we will see whether they have violated any law.If they have done it, then the law will take its own course against them, but at the most if they have not done anything, then they will go back to the country of origin, not to the US," Malik had said earlier. (ANI)