WAYLAID: It is unclear whether Pearl is alive but police officials are optimistic

Jehadi revenge, an attempt at extorting ransom or an Indian plot to defame Pakistan? Officials investigating the abduction of Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reporter Daniel Pearl in Karachi on January 23 are still not close to giving a definitive answer about his kidnappers' motives. As teams of the FBI, Pakistani Police and intelligence agencies try to trace the missing journalist, false leads and messages have added to the confusion surrounding the probe.

Investigators now say they are on the verge of solving the case. On February 6, the police identified three prime suspects in the kidnapping of 38-year-old Pearl, who had been pursuing a story on alleged "shoe bomber" Richard Reid and his possible links with militants close to Osama bin Laden's Al Qaida. Of the three, Hashim "Arif" Qadeer had been identified earlier as a former Harkat-ul-Mujahideen activist. Another suspect is named Bashir. But the biggest breakthrough has been Imtiaz Siddiqui. Sources reveal that Siddiqui is in fact 29-year-old British born London School of Economics graduate Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh alias Sheikh Omar, who along with Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) leader Maulana Masood Azhar was released by India in return for the hostages aboard the Indian Airlines ic-814 plane hijacked to Kandahar in 1999. FBI agents believe Sheikh has close links with the Al Qaida.

PRIME SUSPECT: Sheikh Omar

Sheikh was identified as the person under whose directions three men from Karachi sent the first two e-mails on behalf of the National Movement for the Restoration of Pakistani Sovereignty, a hitherto unknown group. Sent to various news organisations, the e-mails included pictures of Pearl with a gun to his head. The three suspects were picked up from their home when the police traced the e-mails to their computer.

Sheikh was also the man Pearl had gone to meet in Karachi. "He was sitting in my office when he received two calls from an Imtiaz for a meeting half-an-hour later," says Jamil Yusuf, chief of the Citizens' Police Liaison Committee. "Now that we know who the people are, it is only a matter of time before they are tracked down," he says.

The alleged involvement of Sheikh, who is considered close to Azhar, has pointed the probe in the direction of the JeM. A few investigators, however, doubt this. "This operation is too well-organised to be the work of a few people," says an investigator, who did not want to be named. "We don't know who Sheikh is working for, whether renegade elements of the Pakistani intelligence are behind him or he is working as a 'double agent' for India's raw."

Suspicions about an Indian connection have been aroused because a number of calls were made to India from Sheikh's rented cell phone soon after Pearl's abduction. These calls, say Pakistani officials, were traced to a number of "high-ranking" Indian officials, a charge the India has termed "preposterous". Pakistan has, however, refused to identify the officials at this stage.

Complicating matters further is the belief of some investigators that Pearl's case is actually one of ransom. In fact, WSJ's executive editor wrote an open letter to the captors seeking more confidential and frequent contact.

Little is known whether Pearl is still alive. But what is known is that the Mumbai-based Pearl had met his abductors, who promised to arrange an interview with Mubarik Shah Gilani, the head of Jamiat-u-Fuqra, a little-known militant group with roots among black Americans. The other was on the US list of terrorist organisations in 1997-98. Gilani, who lived in the US in the 1980s and is now living in Lahore, has denied knowledge of the abduction. "He may have just been the bait," says Yusuf, "an unknowing pawn in the kidnappers' game plan."

For reporters pursuing stories on underground militant movements, things may never be the same again.