ISLAMABAD - Counter-terrorism officials in Islamabad have confirmed to The Media Line that the remaining terrorist sought in the 2002 murder of American Jewish journalist Daniel Pearl has been taken into custody. Azim Jan, a commander of the TTP, the Tehreek e Taliban Pakistan, an off-shoot of al Qaeda, was apprehended on Friday in a joint operation headed by Pakistan Security Forces.

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The mission was conducted in the hilly area of Mansehra, a district in the Khyber Pakhtoon Khwa province, located about 100 miles north of the capital Islamabad.

The photo posted by Daniel Pearl's abductors just before they murdered him. (Photo: AP)

Daniel Pearl was the South Asian Bureau Chief of The Wall Street Journal when he was kidnapped and beheaded by a self-proclaimed Islamist group in the southern city of Karachi in 2002. Counter-terrorism official Behram Khan said that Jan is known as a deadly expert in improvised explosive devices.

In addition to being the primary suspect in the Pearl murder, the "commander" built his reputation orchestrating the planned assassination of then-President General Pervez Musharraf, also in that year, the murder of Sind police superintendent Chaudhry Aslam, and an attack on the staff of the French Embassy in Karachi.

Azim Jan is also the lead suspect in an attack on the Peshawar Pakistan Bus Terminal and multiple murders of police officials. Intelligence official Junaid ul-Hassan said that Jan is also accused in the 2011 terror attack on the Pakistan Naval Aviation Base Mehran and an attack on a security check post in Quetta’s Hazar Ganji area that killed more than 150 members of the Hazara Shia community.

Earlier in March 2019, Mansehra police had arrested five members of the outlawed TTP. District Police Officer Zabiullah Khan said that these terrorists were wanted for attacking an American charity, World Vision, killing eight staff members of INGO World Vision, including four women, in 2010.

A partially completed memorial for Daniel Pearl near his old neigborhood in Los Angeles

Another police official said that during the course of interrogation, these terrorists revealed the presence of Commander Azim Jan in the area, so the joint operation was conducted.

In 2002, Wall Street Journal correspondent Daniel Pearl was investigating the alleged financing of al Qaeda through Pakistani terrorists. He was also trying to find links between Pakistani terror groups and Richard Reid, who became known as the “shoe bomber” after allegedly trying to blow up an airplane during a flight with a bomb in his shoe.

On January 23, on his way to interview a terrorist leader, Pearl was abducted near a Karachi hotel. The National Movement for the Restoration of Pakistani Sovereignty had claimed responsibility for kidnapping Pearl, but Pakistani security officials believed that the kidnappers were actually members of Lashkar e Jhangvi LeJ, an outlawed group associated with al Qaeda.

Pearl’s captors accused him of being an agent of Israel's Mossad intelligence agency and said he would be killed within 24 hours unless the group’s demands were met. Included among the demands were the release of Pakistanis being held in the notorious U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay.

Nine days later, Pearl was murdered and a video of the horrific act was released.

In February 2002, police had arrested Ahmed Omer Saeed Sheikh, a British born Pakistani and a member of various terrorist organizations. He was held along with his three close aides Salman Saqib, Fahad Naseem, and Sheikh Aadil.

Omer Saeed Sheikh was supposed to be a prime suspect behind the Pearl assassination.

Abdul Mateen Hashmi, a Karachi-based former police officer, said that some senior Intelligence officials had believed that Omer Sheikh trapped Daniel Pearl and promised to arrange an interview with a militant leader and later kidnapped him. During the trial, police found a dismembered body buried in the suburb of Karachi that proved to be Pearl’s remains.

Daniel Pearl in the green shirt (Photo: Private collection)

In July 2002, the anti-terrorism court announced that Saeed and his fellows were guilty of Pearl’s kidnapping and murder. Saeed and his three compatriots Salman Saqib, Fahad Naseem, and Sheikh Aadil were charged with Pearl’s kidnapping and murder.

Saeed was sentenced to death by hanging while Saqib, Naseem, and Adil each received 25-year prison sentences. Their appeal is pending.

Prof. Judea Pearl, Daniel Pearl’s father, told The Media Line: “I welcome any steps towards exposing and bringing to justice those horrendous murderers.”