ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Feb. 6 (UPI) -- The wife of kidnapped Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl on Wednesday appealed to his abductors to release him in the name of the same justice the kidnappers claim they are seeking.
"This is an innocent man, with an innocent wife and an unborn son," said Mariane Pearl, whose written statement was published in Pakistan's The Nation newspaper.
"Danny is not a spy," said Pearl, who is six months pregnant with the couple's first child. "He is not working for any government. He is an independent journalist who for 12 years has written for The Wall Street Journal, an international newspaper that is serious and highly respected."
Pearl said she and husband were dedicated to creating a "bridge between cultures" as journalists -- she is one as well -- and urged her husband's release so he could relay their message to the world through his reporting.
"Over the last 13 days, since my husband has disappeared, I have been trying to address the people holding him," Mariane Pearl wrote from the port city of Karachi, where her husband disappeared while on assignment for the Journal.
"The first thing I want to explain to them is that by holding Danny they are preventing a man from writing about their concerns and accomplishing his chief work: to create a bridge between cultures so we can start finding true solutions to the conflicts that are causing so much suffering in the world," Mariane Pearl said.
She added Daniel Pearl's concerns included issues that abductors have expressed in e-mail messages about the reporter.
"When I say suffering I want to emphasize that, to me, an innocent person who suffers ceases to be an Afghan, U.S. or Pakistani national. Instead, the person is another victim of a cycle of misunderstanding, and like all people who are suffering, deserves the world's attention," Mariane Pearl wrote.
Daniel Pearl, 38, is the bureau chief of the Wall Street Journal in Bombay, India, but had moved to Pakistan after the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States to cover the war in Afghanistan.
He was kidnapped on Jan. 23 while working on a story about Richard Reid, who is being held in the United States for allegedly trying to bomb an airliner with explosives hidden in his shoes. A group that claims to be holding Pearl has sent messages to several U.S. news organizations saying they will execute the reporter unless their ransom demands are met.
Calling itself "The National Movement for the Restoration of Pakistani Sovereignty," the previously unknown group demanded repatriation of Pakistani prisoners taken from Afghanistan to Cuba and the release of F-16 fighter aircraft purchased in the 1980s by the Pakistani government. The delivery of the planes was canceled by Congress in 1990 in response to Pakistan's efforts to develop nuclear weapons.
The group initially accused Pearl of being a CIA agent, only to accuse him later of working for the Israeli intelligence service Mossad. Pakistani authorities say they are close to solving the case and that Pearl is likely to be found alive, despite the lapse of a deadline set by kidnappers last week and e-mail silence from them since. Pakistani officials have refused to reveal details about the investigation, saying any disclosure could jeopardize efforts to rescue Pearl.
