An FBI agent has been telling a Pakistan court how he traced emails sent by the suspected kidnappers of Wall Street Journalreporter Daniel Pearl.
Computer expert Mr Ronald Joseph presented a 50-page report to the court describing the photographs attached to the emails showing Pearl in captivity. Mr Joseph also gave other details of the messages and the routing they took.
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A photo of Daniel Pearl sent
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The defence said Mr Joseph testified that he had determined that the messages, which included photographs of Mr Pearl, had been sent from a laptop seized by authorities. Mr Joseph told the court he examined the computer.
The FBI's tracing of the email is regarded as a major break in the case because it led to the arrests of the four defendants. The emails complained about the treatment of al-Qaeda and Taliban prisoners at Camp X-Ray and threatened to kill other Americans in Pakistan, ordering them to leave the country.
Mr Pearl disappeared on January 23rd while researching Pakistani extremists and their possible links to Richard Reid, the alleged shoe-bomber.
Also testifying was a hotel clerk who identified the chief defendant, British-born Islamic militant Mr Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, as having met Mr Pearl in a hotel room in Rawalpindi earlier in January.
A few days after Mr Pearl disappeared, the previously unknown National Movement for the Restoration of Pakistani Sovereignty announced his kidnapping in emails to US and Pakistani news organisations.
Three of the co-defendants were arrested after the FBI and police traced the emails to the laptop, which belonged to one of them, Mr Fahad Naseem. Mr Naseem confessed and said Mr Saeed told him three days before the kidnapping that he planned to abduct someone who is "anti-Islam and a Jew".
Mr Saeed and his three co-defendants plead innocent to charges of murder, kidnapping and terrorism. They face the death penalty if convicted.
AP