4.55pm: Heider has been granted a temporary stay in Britain, reports Geo Television, and has told the Asian network that he IS willing to play cricket for Pakistan again.
Geo reports:
"British interior ministry has issued a temporary identity card to Pakistan wicketkeeper-batsman Zulqarnain Haider after getting his finger prints here on Tuesday. The card will be valid until final decision in his case."
Now, given that there is no interior ministry but there is a Home Office and that there aren't identity cards but there are visas, I may need to do some checking to ascertain exactly what his status is.
Geo adds:
Sources said that any decision regarding Zulqarnain will now be made by the British interior ministry...Haider said on Tuesday he was not seeking political asylum.Zulqarnain told Geo News that he had been interviwed by British police, the border control agency and the International Cricket Council's Anti-Corruption and Security
Unit."The border agency has taken my fingerprints and isued me a temporary stay," he said."I had no intentions of applying for political asylum at this stage and, if the Pakistan government is ready to give me assurance of security for me and my family, I am ready to return to Pakistan."I have no issues playing for Pakistan again provided the Pakistan Cricket Board wants me to play."
4.16pm: Police officers and immigration officials have entered the hotel where Pakistan wicket-keeper Zulqarnain Haider is hiding after alleged threats from match-fixers, reports Sky News.
Sky News' Tom Parmenter added: "They have now left and drove off at speed in a police van. It's impossible to tell whether Haider was inside the vehicle."
3.10pm: Somewhat confusingly Reuters is now reporting that Zulqarnain Haider is NOT seeking asylum. The news agency quotes Haider saying:
The border agency has taken my fingerprints and isued me a temporary stay.I had no intentions of applying for political asylum at this stage and, if the Pakistan government is ready to give me assurance of security for me and my family, I am ready to return to Pakistan.I have no issues playing for Pakistan again rovidhttp://teamafridi.blogspot.com/2010/11/pakistan-cricketer-zulqarnain-haider.htmled the Pakistan Cricket Board wants me to play.
2.35pm: Following on from all of these statements, emailer Imran Abbas asks some pertinent questions: "Why did Zulqarnain flee rather than inform team/security manager? If someone asked him to lose the match, does it mean that other players in the same dressing room were approached? Why did he not inform the law authorities in the UAE?"
2.21pm: Zakir Khan - the director of cricket operations for the PCB hastold CNN that they are keen to speak to Zulqarnain Haider. Khan said:
We are waiting for [confirmation] to come through to us, we have not heard anything from him in person [regarding his retirement] though there is a lot of media-related statements.We have been trying to get through to him, to get hold of his family but nobody can give us satisfactory information about his whereabouts. It's a complete surprise what he has done at the moment.
Khan also comments upon Haider's decision not to take his problem to the PCB.
He is a contracted player and recently we went through with him the anti-corruption measures and what needs to be done if he was approached like this, but he has not followed any of these procedures.We want to hear from him about what has happened, because there is a big process to go through. We are all shocked [about the allegations] and want to listen to him.
The mystifying aspect to all this is that cricket's Watchdog, the ICC, is based in Dubai, where the Pakistan team have been playing.They all had a big briefing from the ICC about what to do if you get any kind of threat. I will lay good money that the ICC protocol does not include: "Scarper to the UK if you are under pressure to throw two matches".
2.00pm: Cricinfo has also spoken to the ICC, quoting chief executive Haroon Lorgat: "It is a team management issue in the first instance. We would of course be interested in speaking to him but nobody knows where he is. So we won't make any comments until we are able to establish the facts."
It adds that Lorgat said that Haider should have spoken to the Anti Corruption and Security Unit. "I think we have to build the confidence amongst the players that the right thing to do is to speak to the ACSU officials if they have got anything that they want to declare. I don't think it was wise of him to have done what he did, because it doesn't solve the problems for him as well and the right thing would have been to speak to the ACSU."
1.57pm: Andy Bull has just spoken to the International Cricket Councilwho declined to comment saying that they are waiting for "the big picture" to emerge before speaking.
1.35pm: Pakistan cricket team manager Intikhab Alam said Haider did not inform the management about the threats he claimed to have received, The Times of India reports.
"No he didn't inform me or anyone in the management about what was going on. He didn't come to us for help," Intikhab said from Dubai. "I am not a magician to know what is going on in the mind and heart of a person. We had no idea what he was up to or thinking."
There is no doubt that Haider is a decent man. His gutsy innings of 88 in the second innings of the second Test against England earlier this summer showed a fighting spirit that shamed some of his team-mates. He then donated half his match fee for that Test to the Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital & Research Centre, honouring a vow he had made when his mother died of cancer in 1998. When he was sent home from the tour of England because he had fractured a finger, he did volunteer work serving food and distributing medicine to victims of the Pakistan floods. After he hit the final runs in Friday's ODI he dedicated the win to those same victims.Player safety is, we are told, the paramount concern of the ICC and the national cricket boards. Now it seems that the PCB was unable to protect a principled man who felt that his life was in danger because he refused to bend to the will of the match-fixers.
12.44pm: Former Pakistan test players have criticised Haider, although their comments make interesting reading:
Basit Ali, who led the allegations against Salim Malik in a previous match-fixing scandal, said:
It is strange the way he acted. I think being a new player maybe he got scared by the threats, but this is nothing new for professional players. Most of us have got threats at some time to do this and that but you just ignore them.
Sarfraz Nawaz, one of Pakistan's greatest fast bowlers who has made previous allegations over match-fixing, added:
Why choose to go to the UK if you are getting threats? He should have instead returned to Pakistan.
I was told to cooperate or I would face lot of problems.This person approached me while I had gone out of the hotel for dinner. He told me cooperate with us and you can make a lot of money.He said, 'If you don't cooperate you will no longer be part of the team and we can make life very difficult for you'.
I have decided it is best for me to retire from international cricket since my family and I are constantly getting threats. It is best I leave international cricket.I received death threats to lose the fourth and fifth one-day internationals against South Africa, but I could not compromise the dignity of my country.I would rather flee away than sell out the dignity and respect of my motherland.I can assure you that I am safe and sound. I'm not arrested but I cannot tell where I am hiding for the sake of protection of my life.Immigration officials in the UK were kind to me and proposed me to hire the services of a counsellor but I am yet to reach a decision.I understand there is a rule in Britain that if you are right and if you are not a criminal, then they always protect you.
12.08pm: There is much debate as to the current whereabouts of Haider. Channel 4 News's Alex Thomson has published a string of tweets on the subject: "Am currently trying to meet Mr Zulqarnain Haider the Pakistani wicketkeeper who has fled from Dubai...Heading to Heathrow to politely inquire of hotels where Mr Haider might be...Meanwhile it's cold. It's wet. It's Heathrow Oh the glamour."
Is Haider in more danger because the media, including me, here, are reporting on his possible location? One hopes that he is not in immediate danger. Further down the line, however, may well depend upon what he says to the ICC and Scotland Yard.
Thomson also tweets: "Pakistan friends and sources saying 'why would anyone intimidate a compete nonentity - a nobody.'"
This is surely wide of the mark. In a team game, if you wanted to fix events, surely you wouldn't choose the highest profile players to pressurise? Lesser lights have less money, less public standing, more job insecurity.
11.45am: Pakistan cricketer Zulqarnain Haider has retired from international cricket. Given the events of the past few days, this is perhaps not that surprising.
By Sunday night Haider was preparing to flee after facing alleged death threats. He left a Facebook message saying: "leaving pakistan cricket because get bad msg fr 1 man fr lose the match in last game." Haider went missing from the Pakistan team hotel in Dubai yesterday and later arrived in England.
Haider plans to seek political asylum in England and has now announced his retirement from international cricket.
Andy Wilson reports that "the 24-year-old wicketkeeper-batsman is considered one of the good guys in a sport troubled by match-fixing".
