Kidnap suspect quizzed

Police in Pakistan are today questioning a man suspected of leading US reporter Daniel Pearl into a kidnap trap.

The 38-year-old Wall Street Journal's correspondent in south Asia disappeared in the Pakistani city of Karachi on 23 January.

Police have detained Hashim Qadeer, one of the last people to see Mr Pearl before he vanished. They believe he offered to put Mr Pearl in touch with a radical Islamic group believed to have links to Richard Reid, the Briton charged with trying to blow up an American airliner with explosives stuffed in his shoes.

Mr Pearl had been working on a story about Reid and is understood to have travelled to Karachi with Hashim. Police said that questioning of Hashim led them to believe that Mr Pearl was still alive. His kidnappers threatened to kill him last Friday if their $2million ransom demand was not met.