The US on Tuesday underlined that $10 million bounty for LeT founder Hafiz Seed is not about finding his location, but to seek information that can convict the alleged mastermind of the Mumbai terror attacks in a court of law.
“We all know where he is, every journalist in Pakistan and in the region knows how to find him, but we’re looking for information that can be usable to convict him in a court of law,” State Department spokesman Mark Toner said, adding that his conviction could be in any US or foreign court of law.
He said, the US is looking for “…people to step forward that provide that kind of evidence that the Pakistanis can then arrest this individual and try him,” he said when asked about the statement from Pakistani officials that the US should provide concrete information on Saeed.
The US has said that the bounty offered on Hafiz Saeed's head is so that people with information that can get him tried, come forward with the same. Reuters
He told reporters at his daily news conference that the US was looking “for evidence that can withstand judicial scrutiny” against Saeed and “information that can be used against him to convict him in a court of law”.
The clarification from the State Department came hours after Saeed at a news conference in Pakistan dared the US to arrest or kill him the way they did with al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.
Toner said the $10 million “is not about his location but information that leads to an arrest or conviction”.
He said it is about “information that could withstand judicial scrutiny” and “not seeking this guy’s location”. The American official said Saeed is free to give press conferences at this point of time as he is a free man, but hoped that he would soon be behind bars. “He’s free to do that, unfortunately, up to this moment. But we hope to put him behind bars,” he said.
PTI
