June 15, 1997: Killer of CIA Officers Captured in Pakistan and Rendered to US

Mir Aimal Kasi, an Islamic militant who killed two CIA officers and wounded another three in 1993 (see January 25, 1993), is arrested in Pakistan by a joint US-Pakistani team.
Betrayal – The capture is a result of reward money offered for information about him. After the shooting, Kasi hid in Pakistan, where he was protected by a local tribal leader. However, the leader decides he would like the reward money, and sends an emissary to the US consulate in Karachi, where he speaks to the FBI and provides evidence the leader can deliver Kasi. Pakistan’s ISI agrees to help and the three agencies send representatives to the town of Dera Ghazi Khan. [Coll, 2004, pp. 374-5; Associated Press, 12/27/2005] The town is in the Punjab, in central Pakistan. [Columbia Encyclopaedia, 2007] The tribal leader lures Kasi there and he is captured by the joint team, then rendered to the US.
Tenet’s Reaction – CIA Director George Tenet calls hundreds of the agency’s staff together to celebrate the operation, declaring, “No terrorist should sleep soundly as long as this agency exists,” and encouraging employees to “have a cocktail before noon.” [Coll, 2004, pp. 374-5; Associated Press, 12/27/2005]
Reason for Rendition – National Security Council official Daniel Benjamin will explain why Kasi and Bojinka plotter Ramzi Yousef (see February 7, 1995) are not extradited in the normal manner, but rendered: “Both were apprehended in Pakistan, whose leaders decided that the nation would rather not have those two—folk heroes to some—sitting in jail, awaiting extradition. Pakistan’s leaders feared that cooperating with the United States would be dangerously unpopular, so they wanted the suspects out of the country quickly.” [Washington Post, 10/21/2007]