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U.S. Rejects Talks With Reporter Pearl's Captors
Thursday, January 31, 2002
(15:57)
By Edward DeMarco
Bloomberg

“No government -- the United States or any other Western government -- for the past 10 years has been willing to negotiate with kidnappers. It's not going to happen.”

WASHINGTON
The U.S. rejected any talks with the kidnappers of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in Pakistan as the captors extended by a day the deadline by which they said he would be killed.

Secretary of State Colin Powell told reporters there would be no negotiations, and he addressed the kidnappers' demand by saying terrorist suspects imprisoned at the U.S. Navy's Guantanamo Bay base in Cuba “are being treated humanely.”

The group that seized Pearl said he would die unless the U.S. frees Pakistani al-Qaeda members captured in Afghanistan, Cable News Network reported. About 160 prisoners from Afghanistan were sent to Cuba.

“We are doing everything we can to locate him and rescue him,” Powell said of Pearl, while answering questions about the Middle East with Jordan's King Abdullah II.

The first deadline set by the kidnappers ran out at 6:35 a.m. New York time. Less than two hours earlier, Journal Managing Editor Paul Steiger sent a message to the kidnappers appealing for Pearl's release.

“I propose that you view Danny as a messenger,” Steiger said. “I recommend that you provide Danny a detailed list of the issues and grievances that are important to you.” With this, Pearl, once freed, “can provide your group with the unique and unprecedented opportunity to tell the entire world your point of view,” Steiger said.
(More: Bloomberg.com News Source)
2002 © Bloomberg L.P.

Dan