How al-Libbi was nabbed!

The News, May 6, 2005
How al-Libbi was nabbed

By Rahimullah Yusufzai

PESHAWAR: Abu Faraj al-Libbi's luck finally ran out in Mardan. His Sindhi cap and shalwar-kameez failed to provide him a foolproof disguise and his desperate attempt to escape floundered as he ended up in a besieged room after having scaled walls and roofs to get away.

The drama of his arrest played out in an unlikely place like Mardan, the second biggest city in the NWFP after Peshawar. All the action happened in the suburban Shah Dhand Baba locality, named after the patron saint of the area.

The Libyan Islamist was captured on May 2 but it was only on Wednesday that his identity was made public. The delay was deliberate and apparently meant to provide time to interrogators to grill al-Libbi and seek information that could lead to arrest of other important al-Qaeda suspects.

In fact, it is believed that the raids on three homes owned by activists of the banned Islamic group Tanzim Nifaz Shariat-I-Mohammadi (TNSM) in Bajaur tribal agency's Mamond area Wednesday were conducted on the basis of information gleaned from al-Libbi. The raids netted seven people, including an Uzbekistani national who reportedly served as courier for al-Qaeda operatives.

Announcement of al-Libbi's capture triggered speculations that he could provide crucial leads and put life back into stalled efforts to hunt down Osama bin Laden. The Western media, obsessed with bin Laden, was brimming with excitement over the renewed hopes of getting the world's most wanted man. Almost unknown until President Musharraf named him as the mastermind of the attempts on his life, al-Libbi is now being described as the Number 3 in al-Qaeda after bin Laden and Dr Ayman al-Zawahiri.

Mohalla Shah Dhand Baba's resident Zakir Shah had no idea that the bearded man desperately seeking refuge in his home was someone whose arrest would prompt President George W Bush to describe it as critical victory in the war on terror. He had never heard al-Libbi's name and was unaware that he was wanted for twice plotting to assassinate President General Pervez Musharraf. What to speak of Zakir Shah, even the intelligence agents, soldiers and policemen deployed in Shah Dhand Baba to apprehend al-Libbi were unaware about the identity of the man they were supposed to catch.

Unknown outside his circle of friends and relatives, Zakir Shah is now into his fifteen minutes of fame. The media has been seeking his eyewitness account of the events that led to al-Libbi's arrest from his home Monday. In fact, the house where al-Libbi was caught belongs to Zakir Shah's brother-in-law Khalid, who lives in Switzerland. Circumstances have pushed Zakir Shah, in his early 30s, into the limelight. Here is his version of al-Libbi's arrest narrated by him to reporters. "The bearded man wearing Sindhi cap first entered an underconstruction house in our neighbourhood. From there he scaled the wall and walked over to our hujra's roof. He then took the stairs down to the hujra and ended up in a room. He bolted the door from inside. My maid saw a gunman in civilian clothes on our roof and told me. I took my pistol and asked him about his intentions.

The gunman said he was from the ISI and was looking for a dacoit. Several other armed men then came knocking at our door and sought permission to search our home. I took our women and children to our neighbour's house and allowed them to carry out the search. They caught up with their prey in the hujra. The room where he was hiding was gassed by throwing a canister through the broken window. He was almost unconscious when captured and driven away in a double cabin pick-up."

According to other accounts, al-Libbi was taken to Mardan city to the Punjab Regiment Centre where a waiting helicopter flew him to Rawalpindi. His accomplice, who is believed to a Pakistani, was also with him.

Children who saw al-Libbi being taken away said he spoke Pashto. Another eyewitness said he had a glowing face, much fairer than the one in pictures splashed across every newspaper in the world. Some of the eyewitnesses said there was blood on one of his hands and that he was in considerable pain as he slowly walked in a crouched position.

The blood could be from the hit that he took when security officials fired a single gunshot at him to stop him from fleeing. Some of the residents of the area said they had seen unfamiliar people and even Western men frequenting Shah Dhand Baba in recent days and seeking information about Arabs.

Earlier, al-Libbi had been followed while driving a motorcycle on a side road from Fatima village to Mardan. Eyewitnesses came up with two different stories as to what happened when the motorbike was intercepted near Shah Dhand Baba. One group of eyewitnesses said that riding on the back seat of the motorbike was another man, who wore a burqa.

The other version is that al-Libbi was wearing burqa and seated behind the local man who drove the motorcycle. Some eyewitnesses even claimed that three of the six security officials riding three motorbikes also wore burqas. If true, it was a clever move to intercept burqa-wearing suspects through burqa-clad intelligence agents. All those wearing burqas, security men as well as al-Libbi, threw them away as they struggled to accomplish their respective missions.

The man accompanying al-Libbi was quickly overpowered but he wasn't done yet. He managed to run away, forcing his pursuers to give him a long chase before disappearing into the narrow streets of Sahib Zar Koorona near the shrine of Shah Dhand Baba. He had been on the run for more than three and a half years in Afghanistan, Waziristan and many other places after the fall of the Taliban regime and his choices of hideouts had become limited. His last run ended in that gas-filled room in an empty hujra.

There are many theories as to how his pursuers finally caught up with him. One believable theory is that the arrest of five men, three Afghans and two from Punjab, from a mosque in Bakhshali village in Mardan district on February 27 provided vital clues to the intelligence agencies to locate al-Libbi.

The five men had rented a home near the mosque only three days before their arrest and it appears that al-Libbi was also living in Bakhshali, Fatima or another adjacent village. It is said al-Libbi's luck ran out with the arrest of those five men in Bakhshali. And those pursuing bin Laden are hoping that the al-Qaeda chief's luck too run out with the seizure of his lieutenant al-Libbi.