Daniel Pearl was not rescued

Today an unpleasant information came from Pakistan, although everyone hoped not to hear it at all. Wall Street Journal journalist Daniel Pearl, kidnapped on January 23, has been finally killed. The murder has been committed despite today’s Muslim holiday Eid Al Alkha (Kurban-Bairam), when any violence towards other people is prohibited.

Everybody hoped till the very end that the journalist would be found. FBI together with the Pakistani authorities seemed to be succeeding with it. Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, one of the most odious leaders, head of the Jaish-i-Muhammad group, was arrested during the operation. But the arrested knew nothing about Pearl’s fate. At first he said the journalist was dead, but later he denied the words and said Daniel Pearl was alive. This became a slightest hope for the journalist’s relatives and colleagues.

One problem is still ignored about the situation. It is incredible, how The Wall Street Journal leadership could approve of Pearl’s trip to Pakistan? The journalist was a Jew, and this very fact is quite enough for the militants, who say to be struggling for Islam, to kidnap a man. They do not care, that the trip was only a professional duty for the journalist. The Islamic fundamentalists have proved once again, they are not to be dealt with. The only thing to be done is to annihilate them. However, the problem will not become exhausted with it.

The conflicting India and Pakistan pursued their own interests in Pearl’s kidnapping. In several days after the kidnapping, the Pakistani leadership accused Indian authorities of the journalist’s kidnapping. Deli rejected the accusations. Meanwhile, authorities of both countries should have consolidated in searches of the journalist, instead of accusing each other.

Let us hope, the murderers of Daniel Pearl will be found. We condole with the journalist’s family. It may sound high-flown, but Daniel Pearl was a high-professional journalist, who had done his professional duty.

Vasily Bubnov PRAVDA.Ru

Photo from BBC archives

Translated by Maria Gousseva

Read the original in Russian: http://www.pravda.ru/main/2002/02/22/37457.html