Karachi - A radical cleric on Friday softened his stance on
an American girl student holed up in his madrassa in Pakistan's
southern port city Karachi, saying he would allow the teenager to
return to her homeland if the government comes to terms with him.
Muna Abanur Mohammed, an American girl of African origin, is among
eight foreign students studying at Jamia Binoria who were blacklisted
by Pakistani authorities and asked to leave the country immediately
following the expiration of their visas.
However, the head of the seminary, Mufti Naeem, refused last week
to serve the order to the students while vowing to resist any attempt
by police to round them up.
The talks between the madrassa administration and the Pakistani
government, which is under growing pressure from Western governments
to expel their students from Pakistani seminaries that promote jihad
in their education, remained deadlocked.
'We have no objection if they want to go to their countries on
their own will, but we are concerned about their well-being,' Naeem
told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa on Friday.
He said the madrassa administration did not want the expelled
students to be investigated in their own countries as suspects of
terrorism. 'We desire a peaceful resolution,' he added.
Besides, Muna, two more teenage Americans, four girl students from
Thailand and one male student from Fiji are among the blacklisted
students.
Two American teenage brothers were taken out of the country early
in July by US Federal Bureau of Investigation agents after a
documentary movie, Karachi Kids, showed the them studying there under
force.
The Jamia Binoria has around 500 foreign students, including
around 80 American students, while all over Pakistan around 600
American students are getting religious education in some of the
country's more than 12,000 seminaries.
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