December 15, 2001	Saturday	Ramazan 29, 1422

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PESHAWAR, Dec 14: The Pakistan army on Wednesday arrested more than a dozen foreign Al Qaeda fighters trying to cross into Pakistan, highly-placed sources told Dawn.

The sources said that Jawans of the 69th-Baloch Unit, acting on a tip, arrested 15 men riding aboard two Peshawar-bound passenger coaches near Gulshanabad in Kohat, 60km to the south of Peshawar, at around 1635 hours Wednesday.

They included nine Saudis, one Afghan, and five Pakistanis. “They were all wounded,” one source said.

During preliminary interrogation, the men said they were wounded in recent fighting in Afghanistan. They did not say precisely where.

The men said they had sneaked into Miramshah, headquarters of the tribal North Waziristan Agency that borders Afghanistan’s southern Khost province, early this week, and had stayed at Madressah ‘Nizamia’ in Mir Ali before undertaking their journey to Peshawar.

They told interrogators that two Harakatul Mujahideen activists who accompanied them from Afghanistan had arranged their journey.

The sources said that the nine Saudis were admitted to Combined Military Hospital, Kohat, amid tight security.

The Pakistanis and the lone Afghan from Gardez were locked up in the 69th-Baloch quarters guards pending further interrogation by a Joint Interrogation Team (JIT) of military and civil intelligence agencies in Peshawar.

This is the second biggest group of foreign citizens caught in Pakistan fleeing the fighting in Afghanistan.

Last month, Pakistani authorities arrested two Turks and four Macedonian-Albanians who were entering Pakistan through Ghaki Pass in Bajaur Agency, a tribal area bordering Afghanistan’s eastern Kunar province.

Pakistan early this week deployed more than 4,000 troops to plug possible escape routes from Afghanistan into Pakistan along its tribal border.

But the latest arrests indicate that Al Qaeda loyalists could still manage to sneak into Pakistan through other unfrequented and unmanned routes. Over 1,000 Al Qaeda loyalists, including its chief, Osama, are thought to be hiding in the Tora Bora mountain region in the foothills of Spin Ghar mountain range bordering Pakistan’s Khyber and Kurram tribal agencies.

The six foreigners last week remain in the custody of JIT in Peshawar pending interrogation.

Authorities have now arrested more than 20 foreigners they believe to be supporters of Al Qaeda.

The nine Saudi nationals are identified as Abu Asim, Abdur Rehman, Hamza, Abdullah, Abdul Raham, Khalid, Hakim, Saifullah and Muhammad. The lone Afghan has identified himself as Asadullah from the village of Zarmat.

The Pakistanis are from Charsadda district and Miramshah. At least one of them, Muhammad Rafiq from Charsadda, a central district of the NWFP near Peshawar, is an active member of Harakatul Mujahideen.