Two Germans have been arrested in Pakistan for alleged links to Afghanistan's Taliban regime or Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network, the German foreign ministry said on Saturday.
The ministry spokesman was confirming a report to appear in Sunday’s Berliner Zeitung. Pakistani authorities picked up the two Germans with an Australian. The three men had been living in the Taliban stronghold of Kandahar, southern Afghanistan, and wanted to enter Pakistan after the US-led air strikes began nearly two weeks ago, the newspaper reported.
Bin laden is Washington's prime suspect in the September 11 attacks in the United States that claimed 5,500 lives. Separately, German federal police said they were no longer considering terrorism charges against a 19-year-old German who was also arrested on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.
According to media reports at the time, the teenager, who was arrested September 22 in the western Pakistani town of Peshawar, was planning to train with Taliban forces in Afghanistan but was detained when he attempted to enter Pakistan illegally.
German police liaison officers had been involved in questioning him in Peshawar, the media reports said. Bureau Report