Pakistan predicts `major breakthrough' in Daniel Pearl kidnapping

KARACHI, Pakistan - Pakistan&#39;s interior minister Friday predicted a &#34;major breakthrough&#34; and more arrests within 48 hours in the search for Daniel Pearl and rejected a claim from his self-confessed kidnapper that the Wall Street Journal reporter is dead. <br> <br> Police said they were focusing their search on two suspected Islamic militants -- Mohammed Hashim Qadeer and Imtiaz Siddiqi, both of whom were believed to have met Pearl last month while he was researching a story on extremist groups. <br> <br> Interior Minister Moinuddin Haider said there was &#34;no evidence&#34; that Pearl had been killed, despite the claims by chief suspect Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh in court on Thursday. <br> <br> Saeed, a British-born Islamic militant with a history of kidnapping Westerners, &#34;has been changing his statements,&#34; Haider told reporters in the eastern city of Lahore. <br> <br> But a Pakistani newspaper quoted an unidentified &#34;ranking official&#34; saying Saeed received confirmation of Pearl&#39;s death Feb. 5 -- the day Saeed says he turned himself in to authorities. <br> <br> The newspaper, The News, said Saeed on that day called his chief accomplice holding Pearl and told him, &#34;Shift the patient to the doctor&#34; -- a coded message instructing him to release the journalist. But the accomplice replied: &#34;Dad has expired,&#34; The News reported. <br> <br> The News reported that even before that conversation, Saeed had heard &#34;from one of his sources&#34; that the 38-year-old Pearl was shot around Jan. 31 while trying to escape. Pearl disappeared Jan. 23, when he went to meet Islamic militants at a restaurant in this southern port city. <br> <br> Steve Goldstein, spokesman for Dow Jones & Co., the Journal&#39;s parent organization, said Friday that the company is still &#34;hopeful.&#34; <br> <br> &#34;We remain confident that Danny is still alive,&#34; he said. &#34;The president of Pakistan has been extremely helpful in this matter.&#34; <br> <br> According to the Pakistani newspaper report, Saeed identified the accomplice holding Pearl as &#34;Hyder&#34; but investigators believe he is actually Mansur Hasnain, who was believed to have been involved in the 1999 Indian Airlines hijacking that led to Saeed&#39;s release from an Indian prison. <br> <br> The newspaper quoted Saeed as telling police: &#34;There is no reason for Hyder to tell me a lie on Daniel. I can trust him with my life.&#34; A Karachi police official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Hasnain, whom he referred to as Mansour Hussain, is known to have at least five aliases. <br> <br> Qadeer, one of the two men police said were top targets in their search, also uses the name Arif and has been identified by police as an activist in Harkat ul-Mujahdeen, a banned Islamic group with ties to Osama bin Laden&#39;s al-Qaida terror group. Qadeer&#39;s family claims he was killed in Afghanistan but police remain unconvinced. <br> <br> Siddiqi, believed to be an alias, is believed to have spoken with Pearl by mobile phone the day he disappeared. Jameel Yousuf, head of a citizens-police liaison committee who met with Pearl just before his disappearance, said that during their meeting, the reporter received two cell phone calls from a contact whom he knew as Imtiaz Siddique. <br> <br> Police were also looking into those involved in the 1999 Indian Airlines hijacking, believing they may be linked to the kidnapping. <br> <br> &#34;We are expecting a major breakthrough within a day or two,&#34; Haider said. He said police &#34;told me that the investigators have found some leads and those linked to the kidnapping would be arrested within 24 to 48 hours.&#34; <br> <br> More people were detained overnight Thursday and on Friday for questioning, said Mukhtar Ahmad Sheikh, the government official in charge of police here in Sindh province. <br> <br> Saeed confessed to the kidnapping Thursday during his first court appearance. <br> <br> His hands bound in thick steel chains, a weary-looking Saeed said: &#34;As far as I understand, he&#39;s dead.&#34; But he gave no details on when or where Pearl was allegedly killed. A day earlier, police said Saeed had told them Pearl was alive. <br> <br> Saeed&#39;s unexpected statement came a day after Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf met President Bush to receive kudos for Pakistan&#39;s support in the war against terror. Musharraf abandoned his longtime Taliban allies after the Sept. 11 attacks and has moved to crack down on Muslim extremists who had long been tolerated and even supported by previous governments here. <br> <br> Musharraf said Thursday that his government does not believe Saeed&#39;s claims about Pearl&#39;s death because of the suspect&#39;s varying statements. &#34;I think he is possibly alive,&#34; Musharraf said of Pearl. <br> <br> Haider accused &#34;foreign elements&#34; of masterminding the kidnapping to sabotage Musharraf&#39;s visit, although he gave no details to support that. Pakistani officials for weeks have alluded to an &#34;Indian connection&#34; but have offered little evidence. Pearl, the Journal&#39;s South Asian correspondent, is based in Bombay, India. <br> <br> In an interview Thursday with The Associated Press, Bush&#39;s national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, said Pakistan police have been &#34;aggressive and active&#34; in searching for Pearl but said she did not know whether he is alive or dead. <br> <br> Pearl had been investigating links between Pakistani militant groups and Richard C. Reid, the so-called &#34;shoe bomber&#34; arrested for allegedly trying to detonate explosives in his sneakers during a Paris to Miami flight in December. <br> <br> Police had said Saeed surrendered on Tuesday. But Saeed, the son of a Pakistani-born clothing merchant who lives in Britain, said in court he turned himself in on Feb. 5 &#34;to save my family from harassment.&#34; Several of Saeed&#39;s relatives were arrested to pressure him to surrender. There was no explanation for the discrepancy. <br> <br> Saeed was jailed by India in 1994 for kidnapping four Western tourists. Saeed and his cohorts demanded the release of Islamic militants fighting Indian rule in the contested Himalayan region of Kashmir.He was shot and wounded by police who rescued the hostages unharmed. <br> <br> He spent the next five years in jail, but was never tried. He was freed in December 1999 with two other militants in exchange for passengers aboard an Indian Airlines jet hijacked to Afghanistan. <br> <br> <br>