LONDON, April 30: Pakistan has asked Britain to hand over eight suspected members of the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) in a trade-off for extraditing to Britain Rashid Rauf, suspected ring leader of the alleged plot to blow up transatlantic airliners.
Among the Baloch suspects are three brothers, Zamran, Khairbiyar and Balach Marri, who are being sought in relation to the murder of a senior judge.
According to a report in the Daily Telegraph on Monday, the request for the extradition of Rashid Rauf has been stalled by Pakistani demands for greater "reciprocity" from Britain.
Pakistan has presented London with a list of demands, including the extradition of at least eight suspected members of the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), an armed group fighting a low-intensity insurgency in the south-western province of Balochistan. Pakistan has also urged the government to ban a British-based wing of an international extremist organisation, Hisb-ut-Tahrir.
The report quoting officials in Islamabad say the group has repeatedly called for the assassination of President Gen Pervez Musharraf.
"Britain has not fulfilled its side of the bargain. Over the years lists of wanted people have piled up," said a senior Pakistani official. "England is harbouring all sorts of terrorists and criminals."
He added: "The problem is that we find there are double standards. Terrorism is terrorism whether in Pakistan, London or Madrid."
The report said the row has soured Anglo-Pakistani relations at a time when Britain is seeking greater cooperation to combat terrorism.
Rauf, who holds dual nationality, was arrested in Pakistan last August. His detention led to a series of arrests in Britain where 15 people have now been charged in relation to the alleged plot to destroy airliners leaving Heathrow for the United States.
London is seeking Rauf's extradition in relation to the murder in Birmingham of his uncle, Mohammed Saeed, in 2002.
But Pakistan has dropped terrorism charges against Rauf and is holding him under security laws.
British officials in Islamabad admitted that Pakistani demands to extradite Baloch nationalists and others had "come up in the same conversations as Rauf" and that "innuendos and hints were dropped".
But they insisted that there was no possibility of an exchange.
Although Britain proscribed the BLA in 2005, it will be difficult to extradite Baloch nationalists as Pakistan regularly imposes the death penalty.
