On January 15, 2010, the Department of Defense complied with a court order and published a list of Captives held in the Bagram Theater Internment Facility that included the name Ahmad Dilshad.[1][2][3]
| Ahmad Dilshad | |
|---|---|
| Born | Bahawalpur, Punjab province |
| Arrested | 2004-04 Iraq British forces |
| Detained at | Bagram |
| Other name(s) | |
| ISN | 1432 |
| Alleged to be a member of | alleged member of Lashkar-e-Tayyiba |
| Charge(s) | no charge, extrajudicial detention |
There were 645 names on the list, which was dated September 22, 2009, and was heavily redacted.[1][2]
According to historian Andy Worthington, author of The Guantanamo Files, Ahmad Dilshad was captured in Baghdad, Iraq with four other men.[3][4] Worthington reported Ahmad Dilshad was also known as "Danish Ahmad" and "Abdul Rehman al-Dakhil".
Asia Times called him a "leading LeT [Lashkar-e-Tayyiba] ringleader"—a militant group devoted to an independence for the portion of Kashmir occupied by India.[5] Asia Times reported that Dilshad had called for LeT to expand its militant activities beyond Kashmir as early as 1997. They reported he was a "known confidant of Zaki-ur-Rahman Lakhvi". They reported he had served as LeT's operational head, and had "trained many LeT fighters in its Maskar Abu Bashir camp in Afghanistan".
Worthington reports he was captured in Baghdad. Asia Times reports he was captured in Iraq's southernmost city, Basra, on its border with Iran.
References
edit- ^ a b "Bagram detainees" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. 2009-09-22. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2010-01-24.
- ^ a b Andy Worthington (2010-01-19). "Dark Revelations in the Bagram Prisoner List". truthout. Archived from the original on 2010-01-23.
- ^ a b
Andy Worthington (2010-01-26). "Bagram: The First Ever Prisoner List (The Annotated Version)". Archived from the original on 2010-01-31.
A man named Dilshad Ahmad, an alleged leader of the proscribed Pakistani terrorist organization Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, was "arrested in Iraq by British forces, and then given over to the US for interrogation"...
- ^
"Lashkar-e-Toiba: 'Army of the Pure'". South Asia Terrorism Portal. Archived from the original on 2010-01-25.
Arrests made during March–April 2004 near Baghdad brought to light links between the LeT and Islamist groups fighting the United States military in Iraq. In March - and possibly even earlier - United States forces detained Pakistani national Dilshad Ahmad and four others in Baghdad. Ahmad, a long-time Lashkar operative from the Bahawalpur area of the province of Punjab in Pakistan, had played a key role in the Lashkar's trans-Line of Control (LoC) operations, serving between 1997 and 2001 as the organisation's commander for the forward camps from where infiltrating groups of terrorists are launched into Jammu and Kashmir with Pakistani military support. Ahmad is believed to have made at least six secret visits to Lashkar groups operating in J&K during this period.
- ^
Kaushik Kapisthalam (2004-07-14). "Pakistan faces its jihadi demons in Iraq". Asia Times. Archived from the original on 2010-11-01.
In April, Indian journalist Praveen Swami, who has long experience in reporting on terrorism, defense and security matters, broke a story in Outlook about a leading LeT ringleader named Dilshad Ahmad being arrested in Iraq by British forces, and then given over to the US for interrogation. A few other people were arrested with Ahmad, who went under several aliases, including Danish Ahmad and Abdul Rehman al-Dakhil.
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