Pakistan to Try Murderer of Polish Hostage

Polish Geologist Piotr Stanczak

WARSAW: Pakistani authorities have arrested a man wanted in connection with the murder of a Polish hostage decapitated by militants in February, Poland's foreign minister announced Thursday.

‘The Pakistani authorities yesterday captured a man who is probably one of the murderers, seen on a film of this terrible execution,’ Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski told the private television station Polsat News.

‘This man, called Attaullah, was captured in Islamabad...I am happy for him to be tried in Pakistan where the death penalty exists,’ he said, adding that there is no extradition agreement between Poland and Pakistan.

Geologist Piotr Stanczak, 42, who worked for a Polish geophysical exploration company, was seized by suspected Taliban militants in Pakistan's northwest in September 2008. His kidnappers killed his driver and bodyguard.

The minister expressed the hope that the arrest would help bring about the capture of the man's accomplices.

Polish authorities reacted strongly to the filmed beheading of Stanczak, with Justice Minister Andrzej Czuma accusing the Pakistani government of aiding terrorist activities of the Taliban through its ‘inertia.’

Source: Pakistan Dawn