Pakistan Releases Pro-Taliban Leader

Some ally on the War on Terror. FoxNews

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Pakistan released a pro-Taliban leader Monday who sent thousands of militants to fight against the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan, officials said.

There was no immediate comment from the government on the freeing of Sufi Muhammad, but the move appeared to be part of efforts to broker peace with Islamic militants in Pakistan's Swat Valley.

Muhammad, the father-in-law of the current militant leader in the region, was jailed in 2002. He was shifted to a hospital in the northwestern city of Peshawar five months ago because of poor health.

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Ajmal Khan, the deputy superintendent of Peshawar's main jail, said the government "issued an order for the release of Sufi Mohammad, and I have conveyed this order to him."

Shortly after, Muhammad left the hospital under police escort, accompanied by followers wearing black turbans, said Zafar Khan, a paramedic at the hospital.

Muhammad founded the Tehrik Nifaz-e-Sharia Mohammed — or Movement for the Enforcement of Islamic Law — which sent thousands of volunteers to fight in Afghanistan against the U.S.-led invasion that toppled the Taliban regime in 2001