REUTERS

LONDON A LABOUR peer on Tuesday denied offering a 10 million pound reward for the capture of US President Barack Obama, an allegation reported then later retracted by Pakistan’s Express Tribune newspaper.

Nazir Ahmed, a member of the House of Lords and a long-time member of the Labour party, said he was deliberately misquoted during a recent speech in an effort by political enemies in Pakistan to discredit him.

“I never mentioned Obama and I never mentioned a bounty. I do not support terrorism and would never urge anybody to attack someone or capture someone,” Ahmed, who was suspended by the Labour party pending an investigation, told Reuters.

The Express Tribune newspaper, affiliated with the International Herald Tribune - the global edition of the New York Times - on Tuesday said Ahmed did not say the word “bounty” or Obama’s name and that its earlier story was incorrect.

Ahmed told Reuters last week that he would be ready to help raise money for the prosecution of former US President George Bush and former Prime Minister Tony Blair for what he considered war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan.

His comments were in response to a $10 million (6 million pound) reward announced earlier this month for help in the arrest of Pakistani Islamist leader Hafiz Mohammad Saeed.

Saeed is suspected of masterminding attacks in India but is a free man in Pakistan after being released from house arrest in 2009.