Daniel Pearl's widow drops lawsuit VS al-Qaida

Daniel Pearl's widow drops lawsuit against bank, al-Qaida

NEW YORK: The widow of murdered journalist Daniel Pearl has withdrawn a lawsuit seeking damages against al-Qaida, a dozen reputed terrorists and Pakistan's largest bank.

In a letter Tuesday to the U.S. judge presiding over the case, lawyers for Mariane Pearl noted that Habib Bank Limited and the other defendants had not answered the lawsuit filed in July, but they otherwise did not explain their reason for dropping the action.

Messages left with the law firm representing Mariane Pearl were not immediately returned Wednesday.

The lawsuit had sought unspecified damages against people and organizations that Mariane Pearl alleged were involved in the kidnapping, torture and murder of her husband.

Pearl, 38, the Wall Street Journal's South Asia bureau chief, was abducted from Karachi, Pakistan, while researching a story on Islamic militancy after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

His execution and beheading were videotaped by his kidnappers and displayed on the Internet. His remains were found in a shallow grave on the outskirts of Karachi.

Among the defendants in Mariane Pearl's lawsuit were al-Qaida; the al-Rashid Trust, an outlawed Islamic charity; and Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the imprisoned al-Qaida No. 3 leader and mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.

Several men charged in the Pearl kidnapping and murder case have been convicted in Pakistan, including British-born Islamic militant Ahmed Omar Saeed Shaikh.

He was sentenced to death in 2002, and three of his accomplices were given life prison terms. Their appeals are pending.

Mohammed, caught in Pakistan, is being held at the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. He claimed he personally beheaded Pearl, according to a partial Pentagon transcript of his testimony at a military tribunal.

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When the background on this breaks it will light up the cable networks.

Gerald