KARACHI, Feb 13: The police raided on Wednesday several places in various localities in the city for the recovery of the kidnapped US journalist, Daniel Pearl, on a lead given by Omar Shaikh, a key suspect, but the police failed to make any success.

“We have raided several places in the city and are interrogating prime suspect Omar Shaikh. He (Omar) has given the police some clues but we cannot disclose these at this stage, which can harm the investigation process,” DIG Karachi (Operation) Tariq Jamil told Dawn on Wednesday.

Sindh police chief Syed Kamal Shah said: “Omar Shaikh had confessed to having masterminded the plot for the kidnapping of Daniel Pearl.”

He said Omar told the police he had contacted the captors of Pearl after the arrest of three suspects in Gulistan-i-Johar a week ago, and ordered them to release Pearl. Since then, he added, Omar said he had no contacts with the captors of the US journalist.

Kamal Shah said Omar was not cooperating with the police and was a “hard nut to crack.” Omar often retracted his earlier statements and was reluctant to divulge information about the possible whereabouts of Pearl, said the Sindh police chief.

About the motive behind the kidnapping, he said during the interrogation it appeared that the kidnapping was an attempt to take a revenge of Taliban-led government’s defeat in Afghanistan, although Omar had not acknowledge it, so far.

Tariq Jamil said: “We have not picked up or arrested more suspects.” The officials of the FBI, the DIG added, were not with the investigators all the time, however, they interrogated Omar Shaikh in intervals.

Meanwhile, sources said Omar Shaikh had identified various locations in the city and the police raided those places, but the kidnapped journalist was not there.

Omar, according to sources, told the investigators that he had not spoken to the captors of Pearl for the past several days and he was not aware of the exact whereabouts of Pearl. However, Omar had not yet disclosed the identity of the captors, they added.

One of the investigators, on the condition of anonymity, said Omar was being grilled and he had pointed out some places, which could be possible hideouts of the captors of Pearl.

The police conducted raids in North Karachi, Buffer Zone, Green Town, Shah Faisal Colony, Gulshan-i-Iqbal, Gulistan-i-Johar and other areas and picked up a number of suspects.

The sources, however, did not disclose whether the places raided were in residential or commercial areas. “As we have raided these places on a lead given by Omar Shaikh, we have to interrogate the suspects picked up from there. We have released some of them after interrogation as they had no criminal record or links with the kidnapping of the US journalist,” they added.

The police, however, has not yet produced Omar Shaikh in a court to seek his physical remand. Omar was arrested in Lahore on Tuesday and brought to Islamabad first and then was flown to Karachi. He landed in the city at 10pm Wednesday.

Tariq Jamil said: “We will produce Omar Shaikh in a court on Thursday to seek his physical remand.”

Daniel Pearl, a US journalist working for the Wall Street Journal, as a reporter, was last seen near the Metropole Hotel and went missing on Jan 23.