Claim: Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, who was born December 23, 1973 in London, England, was criminally charged for kidnapping and murder for being involved in the 1994 kidnappings of Westerners in India, which was the abduction of four foreign tourists in New Delhi, India on October 20, 1994.
Evidence: Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh (Urdu: احمد عمر سعید شیخ‎; sometimes known as Umar Sheikh, Sheikh Omar, Sheik Syed or by the alias Mustafa Muhammad Ahmad; born 23 December 1973) is a British terrorist who was arrested and served time in prison for the 1994 kidnappings of Western tourists in India, an act which he acknowledges. The 1994 kidnappings of Westerners in India was the abduction of four foreign tourists in New Delhi, India on 20 October 1994, by terrorists. A violent insurgency had been going on in Jammu and Kashmir since 1989. Kidnappings of foreign tourists had been attempted by Pakistan's ISI sponsored terrorists, most notably the attempt to kidnap seven Israelis in 1991. However, until this point the separatists had not kidnapped anybody outside of the disputed state. Three of those kidnapped, Paul Benjamin Ridout, Christopher Myles Croston and Rhys Partridge (Australian citizen of British heritage), were from Great Britain and a fourth, Béla Nuss, was an American from San Francisco, California. The tourists were all befriended by young British Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh who was a member of Harkat-ul-Ansar and pretending to be an Indian under the name "Rohit Sharma". Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh was incarcerated in Tihar Jail and stayed in prison till December 1999 when he was released in exchange for the passengers aboard hijacked Indian Airlines Flight 814. He subsequently was alleged to be involved in the murder of Daniel Pearl. Daniel Pearl (October 10, 1963 – February 1, 2002) was an American journalist for The Wall Street Journal. He was kidnapped and later beheaded by terrorists in Pakistan. Pearl was working as the South Asia Bureau Chief of The Wall Street Journal, based in Mumbai, India. He was kidnapped when he went to Pakistan as part of an investigation into the alleged links between British citizen Richard Reid (known as the "shoe bomber") and Al-Qaeda. Pearl was killed by his captors. Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, a British national of Pakistani origin, was sentenced to death by hanging for Pearl's abduction and murder in 2002 but his conviction was overturned by a Pakistani court in the summer of 2020. In March 2007, at a closed military hearing in Guantánamo Bay, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, a member of Al-Qaeda, claimed that he had personally beheaded Pearl. Researchers have also connected Al-Qaeda member Saif al-Adel with the kidnapping. (1973-12-23) 23 December 1973 (age 46)
London, England British Kidnapping, murder Death, commuted to life imprisonment