KARACHI, 3 December 2004 — Pakistani authorities yesterday refused to release two doctors accused of helping injured Al-Qaeda militants and local extremists despite acceptance of their bail plea by a high court, officials said.

Heart specialist Akmal Waheed and his brother, orthopedic surgeon Arshad Waheed, were seized in July in Karachi for alleged ties to Osama Bin Laden’s network and to a group accused of a deadly attack on a top Pakistan army general’s convoy.

The provincial high court in Karachi accepting their bail application early yesterday told the pair to deposit their passports to prevent them fleeing the country, public prosecutor Habib Ahmed told AFP.

Ahmed said he had opposed their release, “but the court ordered their release on bail, if not required in any other case.”

However, provincial home minister, Rauf Siddiqui, said their release could cause security problems. “They were detained under the Anti-Terrorism Act,” he said.

“Their release could cause security problems since they have links with international terrorist groups,” the minister said.

Defense lawyer Ilyas Khan criticized their continued detention as illegal. “Their detention is illegal and we will challenge it in the court,” he said. The brothers face charges of providing medical aid to militants from the Al-Qaeda-linked group Jund Allah, which was blamed for the attack on Lt. Gen. Ahsan Saleem Hayat in June.

The attack in Karachi killed seven soldiers, three policemen and a passer-by. Hayat narrowly escaped. Police said the doctors had also provided medical treatment to two foreign Al-Qaeda operatives, Abu Hashim and Abu Mussab.

Akmal Waheed’s wife Fouzia, also a doctor, has denied her husband was involved in any terrorist activities. Karachi is a seen as hotbed of Islamic extremism.

Its crowded apartment blocks have been used as hideouts by several senior Al-Qaeda fugitives, including alleged Sept. 11 attack planners Ramzi Binalshibh and Khalid Sheikh Mohammad.

Members of Jund Allah were trained in camps run by Al-Qaeda in the rugged tribal district of South Waziristan near the Afghan border, where Pakistan’s military is engaged in an ongoing hunt for militants, police said.

Meanwhile, the United States has provided Pakistan with sophisticated equipment to prevent suspected Al-Qaeda and Taleban militants from carrying out terrorist operations along the western border with Afghanistan, a US Embassy announcement said in Islamabad.

The equipment delivered Tuesday to the Frontier Corps manning the Pak-Afghan border includes 68 spotting scopes, 74 hand-held Global Positioning Systems (GPS) and 200 bullet proof vests.

“The equipment will enhance the capabilities of the Frontier Corps as it fulfills its vital mission of making the border areas more secure from terrorists, drug trafficking and all criminal elements,” the newly appointed US envoy to Pakistan Ryan Crocker said at a delivering ceremony in Peshawar city.

The new consignment is a component of the US government’s ongoing border security program in Pakistan. It has already delivered 345 vehicles and $850,000 worth of communications equipment.

This is in addition to the equipment, training and funds the US government is providing Pakistan for the construction of outposts on western border.