KARACHI, July 12: Judge of the Anti-Terrorism Court No 2, Abdul Ghafoor Memon, on Friday examined a prosecution witness Zhang Hong, wife of a kidnaped Chinese man, Wang, in a kidnapping-for-ransom case.

She stated that on Jan 6, at 11am, accused Khalid Jamil came to their house with their employee Ms Ye and said that he had to take delivery of leather garments from a leather merchant in Gulshan-i-Iqbal and asked her husband and minor child to accompany them for a ride and lunch.

“I waited until 8pm and went to the police station and filed an application.” She produced the copy of the application in the court.

On the same day, at 10pm, her husband called from a PCO and said that they were all right but they did not disclose their whereabouts.

On January 7, at 8pm, she said, she received a telephone call from the accused, Khalid Jamil. The accused told her that they were in a big problem as some dangerous people had kidnapped them and were demanding money.

“I inquired about my son and my husband and told him that I want to talk to them. He assured me that they were safe. Thereafter my husband made several calls from the mobile of Khalid Jamil and I inquired as to how much money they wanted for their release and insisted that I should talk to the kidnappers. But he said the kidnappers did not speak English.”

The accused said that they were demanding Rs5 million but he had settled for four million rupees. He warned me that I “should not contact the police, otherwise the kidnappers would kill us.”

On January 8, Khalid Jamil informed her that he had paid the money for their release and were coming to Karachi.

“Several calls were received by Ms Ye (the employee) made by my husband, who informed me that they were safe and will come back soon to Karachi and that I should not make any report to the police.”

On January 10, at 7 or 8pm, Khalid Jamil brought her husband and son home. — PPI