PESHAWAR, July 20: Family members of Adil Al Jazeri, an alleged Al-Qaeda operative, have denied his links with terrorist outfits and have requested the US government to release him.

The father-in-law and wife of Al Jazeri told Dawn that he was innocent and had nothing to do with Al-Qaeda.

“After the fall of Taliban (regime) in Afghanistan, he returned to Pakistan and was in hiding since then,” said Sufi Hameed Khan, father-in-law of Al Jazeri.

Recent reports suggested that Adil Al Jazeri, arrested by the agencies on July 16, had been shifted to Afghanistan four days ago after being handed over to the US government.

Three of five daughters of Sufi Hameed are married to Arabs. One of his son-in-law, Mustapha, belonging to Algeria, was arrested last year from Hameed’s residence in Regi village northwest of Peshawar. “Where is my father,” asked Somiya, six-year-old daughter of Al Jazeri. She said that she missed her father and was waiting for his return.

His other daughters — Hajira of 4 and Asma of 2 — were in the lap of their mother, Riazat Bibi, who claimed that her daughters missed their father. “As Somiya now understands things, she often ask about her father.”

Sufi Hameed, a prayer leader in a small mosque in Regi, said that they were passing through a critical phase. He questioned; “who is going to feed these small girls as I am a poor man.”

Bibi Riazat claimed that her husband was not involved in any objectionable activity.

Her father, an old man supporting White beard, said that Al Jazeri came to Afghanistan in aid of his Afghan brothers in their fight against the Russians. later on, he said he returned back to Pakistan and seven years back he arranged marriage of her daughter with him.

During government of Taliban, he added, Al Jazeri shifted to Afghanistan with his family as the Taliban paid respect to Arabs. However, he had to flee Afghanistan after the fall of Taliban’s government there in 2001.

Sufi Hameed believed that his son-in-law had been illegally shifted from Pakistan, adding that no human rights organisation was capable of helping him against the Americans, who he said were powerful people who did not care for innocence of people.