Birmingham terrorist Rashid Rauf killed in US missile strikes

Nov 22 2008 By Ben Goldby

Rauf’s from Alum Rock, Birmingham, was acquitted and will not face a retrial.

In a bizarre twist, Rauf managed to break free from custody in Pakistan just before Christmas last year.

Though charges relating to the alleged airline plot had been dropped, he was still facing deportation to the UK so that West Midlands Police could quiz him over his uncle’s murder.

Rauf had been attending a hearing in Islamabad before his guards stopped at a roadside mosque to allow him to pray. They uncuffed him and the militant quickly escaped through a back door.

Reports from inside Pakistan suggested Rauf could have been “disappeared” by the infamous ISI, the Pakistani equivalent of MI5.

At the time of his disappearance, British intelligence officials were also keen to question Rauf about possible links to July 7 London bombers Mohammed Siddique Khan and Shehzad Tanweer.

But even before his “escape” both US and British secret services were denied access to question Rauf over his role in the alleged transatlantic airline plot by Pakistani authorities, despite requests at diplomatic and government level.

After managing to break free from his captors in Islamabad, Rauf is understood to have fled back to the lawless tribal areas of North Western Pakistan, a stronghold of the Taliban and Jaish-e-mohammed, and beyond the reach of the authorities.

It was there that he was killed by a pilotless American drone aircraft yesterday morning.

The US raid came just days after Abdullah Azzam al-Saudi, a senior member of Al Qaeda, was killed along with six others in another American missile strike inside Pakistan’s borders.

That bombing led Pakistan to lodge a protest with the US State Department over attacks on suspected terrorists inside its borders.

The raids have sparked a diplomatic stand-off between America and new Pakistan President, Asif Ali Zardari.