WASHINGTON, July 27: A five-member Pakistani team is arriving in the United States later this week to interrogate Pakistani prisoners at the American prison facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, official sources told Dawn.

A senior official of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, Director-General America, Tariq Farooq Mirza, will head the team which also includes five Lt-Cols from the Inter Services Intelligence.

“During their 12-day (July 1-12) stay in the United States, they will team up with a U.S. team for jointly interrogating the prisoners,” an official source said.

“They are coming here for intelligence gathering and background checks,” he added.

There are about 40 Pakistani prisoners in Guantanamo

Bay, most of them arrested from the northern Afghan province of Kunduz in November last year.

Pakistani prisoners in Guantanamo Bay received international publicity when a group of previously unknown militants kidnapped Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, demanding better facilities for the prisoners in return for Pearl’s release. However, instead of negotiating with the U.S. and Pakistani officials, the abductors killed Pearl. Since then four militants have been convicted for his murder, one sentenced to death and four sent to prison for life. All have appealed against the verdict.

The Northern Alliance forces captured hundreds of Pakistanis from Kunduz, the only Taliban stronghold in northern Afghanistan. Most of them were religious volunteers who went to Afghanistan to help the Taliban fight the American forces.

Later, many were released by Afghan warlords who collected US$3,000 - 6,000 each from their relatives for setting them free.

Dr Najeeb bin al Nauimi, a Qatar lawyer who is representing Arab prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, says that the warlords received as much as $30,000 each for releasing some rich Arab prisoners captured in Kunduz.

Nauimi said that a consortium of wealthy Muslims, whom he declined to identify, told him that two lieutenants of a northern warlord Gen Rashid Dostum led the negotiations with the relatives of the prisoners.