May 31, 2006	Wednesday	Jumadi-ul-Awwal 3, 1427

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PESHAWAR, May 30: The World Prisoners’ Relief Commission has demanded an inquiry into ‘unlawful detention of innocent foreigners’ in Pakistan. Speaking at a press conference here on Tuesday, the commission’s chairman Javed Ibrahim Paracha said those who talked about the inhuman treatment meted out to prisoners in Guantanamo Bay should also look at excesses suffered by foreign detainees in Pakistani prisons, including the Adiala Jail.

Accompanied by two Tajik boys and an Egyptian youth, who were released recently, Mr Paracha said they had been kept in prison on the false charge of having links with Al Qaeda. “They have no information about their families. Who says they are terrorists. A few months ago, the Tajik boys were paraded in front of the local media for having links with Al Qaeda terrorists.

At that time, security agencies had planted a concocted story in the media, but now the boys have been freed,” he said.

Mr Paracha also criticised Jihadi organisations and said they had been collecting billions of rupees in the name of Jihad but remained quiet about the fate of the innocent children.

Khalid, 12, and Hussain, 11, from Tajikistan, were arrested from Makeen Madressah in Wana. They had come via Kunar for religious education.

He alleged that the boys were tortured for one week to get information about terrorists. They were shifted to the jail in Waziristan and were later handed over to security forces.

Mr Paracha had filed a writ petition in the Peshawar High Court against their illegal detention and the children were handed over to him through the interior ministry on Friday.

The other released boy, Abdur Rehman is from Egypt. His father Farooq bin Saad, mother Dr Fatima Zuhra, three sisters and three brothers were arrested.

The father had come on work visa. He had suffered injuries in his eyes during an attack by allied forces on his home in Kunar, and had been left blind.

Mr Paracha said members of the family were admitted to Al Shafa hospital in Pakistan because the Americans had certified they had no links with terrorists.

The family, he said, was kept in detention for three years and was freed when the detention was challenged in the court.