In answer to niclas' points;
1. I have written the article from the point of view that Mr Burki is giving a truthful account, which I very much believe he is. And if so, the term 'Al-Qaeda' describes the seized cache far better than many examples where the media bandies it around like confetti, say with the incredible discovery of
bags of fertiliser in a lock up, or of the asylum seekers'
plan to blow up Old Trafford. There are many other examples! Is it then proper journalism with regard to Al-Qaeda to blindly accept the whispers of police officers and politicians? If so, well I'm happy leaving that to the 'professionals'. The very existence of the organisation is even questioned by intelligence analysts. My use of the term here is not in refute of that question, but in regard to public conception.
2. He was warned that his life was in danger by one of the CTSU officers who provided statements for him. Possibly DC Wong, though there was another plain clothes officer also.
3. Other corroborating sources who witnessed the cache are not named in accordance with their wishes. However, Abbas Malik was there, and we have the Daily Jang article.
4, 6. They appeared to be associates. I know that Mr Burki had cheques which arrived to pay rent (I think covering both rooms), and provided the details to the police. I don't know if he had further leads.
5, 7. It helps understand the nature of the hotel to stay the night there. Much of the hotel's trade came from council referrals of homeless people, also the police statement mentions people on bail. Mr Burki's command of English is not fantastic. After the incident, the council referrals stopped.
8. I cannot provide more detail on this aspect of the story.
12. Interesting question. If it was planted on you for the police to find you might be in a sticky situation.
13. If the police have specifically confirmed or denied any of the items listed I would be very interested to know exactly what they said.
14. This would be nice to know. As a postscript to the story, this policeman returned to the hotel, having been sacked, to warn Mr Burki to be careful.
15. Mr Burki.
16. I believe Abbas Malik was called early on, before the CTSU arrived. I wouldn't blame Mr Burki for not calling a lawyer, sensible though that may have been with the benefit of hindsight.
17. I cannot say for certain; presumbaly alerted either by Mr Malik, or the uniformed police officer first at the scene.
18. The story is taken from the testimony of Mr Burki (and other unnamed sources).
19. Whether there was a real threat or not doesn't appear to be the issue. It would seem the evacuation of the hotel was to control the scene, and the car crash a misdirection for the subsequent road-sealing.
20. Again, this is something that is easy to say with the benefit of hindsight
21. Perhaps you would like to demonstrate your investigative abilities by obtaining the names of the police officers at the scene.
22. I'm not so sure.
23, 24. I'm not sure that this was the idea, but there could have certainly been a very convincing 'terror swoop'; muslim hotel - unoccuppied rooms - Al-Qaeda stash. Again, remember the previous such swoops that get trumpeted in the media based on absolutely nothing at all.
25. Yes, hence the word 'may'.
26. Seems to be in accordance with what they are saying now, although their recent comments are interesting. Or have you heard that they seized 'unsuspicious material'? Would seem a strange thing to do.
Last point - well that's the idea of a cover-up operation, to remove any hard evidence and play down the whole thing. The CTSU have appeared to show no interest in doing anything else.
