NEW YORK, March 9: An Egyptian national arrested in the raid on an Al Qaeda safe house in the border town of Quetta decided to cash in on the $25 million bounty on Khalid Shaikh Mohammed’s head, says the Newsweek in its current issue

“He turned over and made a deal with the United States,” a Middle Eastern intelligence official told Newsweek.

The Egyptian offered to dime out Khalid, but demanded an additional $2 million to relocate to Britain with his family. A law-enforcement official told the weekly that the US agreed to pay the reward to an unidentified informant, but wouldn’t discuss details.

Mr Khalid’s capture was the result of months of intelligence surveillance by the US and Pakistani intelligence. Five weeks ago, agents were tipped off to the safe house in Quetta. Mr Khalid had already escaped when they got there.

But they did capture a lesser Qaeda soldier: Muhammad Abdel- Rahman, a son of Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman, the blind Egyptian cleric convicted of plotting to blow up the United Nations and other New York landmarks.

The man who collected the bounty money was another radical Egyptian arrested in the raid. After Mr Khalid’s capture, sources told the magazine that he was quickly flown to Bagram air base in Afghanistan, where he is now under intense interrogation.

A senior law-enforcement official says Mr Khalid has given up virtually nothing. “It was standard counter-interrogation.”