Britain asks Pakistan to extradite terror plot suspect

ISLAMABAD: Britain has asked Pakistan to extradite British airline bomb plot suspect Rashid Rauf, the Pakistan foreign ministry said on Monday.

"Yes they have sought his extradition and the matter is under consideration," foreign ministry spokeswoman Tasnim Aslam told reporters after she was asked if Britain had requested his extradition.

Aslam said Rauf had been arrested in the city of Rawalpindi near the capital Islamabad early this month. He was being investigated over links to Al-Qaeda and to possible extremist activities in Pakistan and Britain, she said.

"Rashid Rauf was arrested in Rawalpindi. Presently he is under detention," Aslam told a briefing.

"The information is being shared with United Kingdom through diplomatic channels," she said a weekly briefing.

Pakistani officials have described Rauf as a "key suspect" in the conspiracy to detonate liquid explosives on planes flying from Britain to the United States. The plot was foiled in Britain early this month with more than a dozen arrests in the UK.

The Pakistani officials have also previously said that Rauf was arrested after coordination with British and US intelligence on August 4 in the central city of Bahawalpur.

Rawalpindi is a garrison city near Islamabad from where key Al-Qaeda leader Khalid Sheikh Mohammad was arrested in 2003.