- (AFP) -- Pakistani national Mir Aimal Kasi was executed
here by lethal injection for the murder of two Central Intelligence Agency
employees, a Virginia state prison spokesman said.
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- Kasi was pronounced dead at 9:07 pm Thursday (0207 GMT
Friday) at Greensville Correctional Center, said Larry Traylor, spokesman
for the state Department of Corrections.
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- Kasi, 38, was executed over the 1993 murders of two Central
Intelligence Agency employees with an AK-47 military rifle in front of
the agency's Langley, Virginia, headquarters. Three others were wounded
in the shootings.
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- Virginia Governor Mark Warner refused Kasi's request
for clemency after the US Supreme Court denied a last-minute appeal for
a stay of execution.
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- "Mr. Kasi has admitted to the crimes for which he
was convicted and showed no remorse for his actions. After a thorough review
of Mr. Kasi's petition for clemency and the judicial opinions regarding
this case I have concluded that the death penalty is appropriate in this
instance. I will not intervene," said Warner in a statement.
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- Kasi's family and the Pakistani government had asked
for his life to be spared and his sentence commuted on humanitarian grounds.
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- "Kasi said he wanted to teach the US a lesson not
to meddle in other countries' affairs, especially Muslim countries,"
said Brad Garrett, the FBI agent in charge of Kasi's case.
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- His execution also sparked fears of reprisals by Islamist
militants, despite Kasi's pleas for peace.
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- "I don't want that anybody should attack, like Americans,
in Pakistan or any other Muslim country. I don't encourage people to attack
anybody," Kasi told NBC News.
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- Nevertheless security around the prison here was tight
and US authorities in Pakistan were on a heightened state of alert. Armed
patrols circled the low white prison buildings and gunman surveyed the
scene from watchtowers.
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- The US State Department issued a worldwide warning last
week of possible reprisals from Islamist groups angered at Kasi's scheduled
execution. Officials said the US embassy in Islamabad and consulates in
Peshawar, Lahore and Karachi will close early Friday as a precaution.
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- Hundreds of demonstrators in Kasi's hometown of Quetta,
in the desert tribal province of Baluchistan in southwestern Pakistan,
protested the execution.
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