Karachi, Aug 06: A British-born Islamic militant sentenced to death for the kidnapping and murder of wall street journal reporter Daniel Pearl has refused to meet a British Embassy official who requested a routine visit with him at a Southern Pakistani prison, his lawyer said today. Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, a British citizen, would not meet ``Any Britisher, saying they are enemies of Muslims,'' his attorney, Abdul Waheed Katpar, told the associated press. The British embassy had been seeking consular access to Sheikh - a standard practice to inquire about the welfare of its citizens, a provincial official told a news agency on condition of anonymity. The British Embassy in Islamabad declined to comment on the case.


But Sheikh's lawyer said officials at his prison in Hyderabad, in southern Sindh province, had asked the prisoner if he wanted to meet a British official.


Sheikh was sentenced to death last year for Pearl's January 2002 kidnapping. Three other militants - Fahad Naseem, Salman Saqib and Sheikh Mohammed Adeel - were given life sentences. All four have filed appeals.


Katpar said a hearing in sheik's appeal has been set for tomorrow before a panel of two-judges at the Sindh High Court in Karachi. But he said the hearing might be delayed as others have been.
``Sheikh Omar is spending much of his time in his Hyderabad prison death cell reading Quran and other books,'' he said. ``he is a knowledge seeker and reads all the time in his cell.''


Bureau Report