QUETTA, Feb 15: Police have denied the presence of Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in a raid con-ducted for the arrest of an Egyptian Al Qaeda suspect in Quetta.

“No FBI agent or official was present during the raid,” a police spokesman said in a statement issued here on Saturday.

“The police have taken into custody an Egyptian Abdul Rehman who was living here without having legal documents. Yes, we sought the help of a sensitive agency for conducting the raid, but not of the FBI,” the spokesman said.

The police were interro-gating Abdul Rehman to ascertain the facts about his identification, the spokesman stated.

Abdul Rehman was arrested late on Thursday night on a tip-off.

“We have doubts about his identity,” Dr Shoaib Suddle, Balochistan IGP, told Dawn and added that no documents were recovered from him to confirm his identity. However, it was true that he was an Arab and was living in Quetta for the last three months.

“Further investigation is in progress to ascertain his links with Al Qaeda or any other organization,” some sources said and added that he was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and other security agencies.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation had also arrested an Iraqi doctor Shoukat Nafay from the Satellite town area in October last with the help of Pakistani security agencies. Later, two Pakistanis, Khalid Baloch and Haji Fazal, were also taken into custody from the city.

Dr Nafay was running a hospital for women and children for the last 10 years.

Wife of Dr Shoukat Nafay and relatives of two Pakistanis had filed petitions in the Balochistan High Court, praying for their early release. They describe their arrest as kidnapping.

The learned court asked the authorities concerned to present all the three arrested persons before the court. But the authorities failed to produce them.

Fifteen days ago, the wife of Dr Nafay withdrew his petition after the authorities held out an assurance that her husband would be returning soon.

Meanwhile, Khalid Baloch had reached home last week after remaining in custody of the investigation agencies for over five months.