AS soon as Khalil Dale's kidnapping was confirmed, his employers and the UK Government would have turned to an established programme of procedures to deal with the crisis.
His family would have been contacted and a team set up to liaise between them, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
As well as formal contact with the Pakistani authorities, both the charity and the UK Government are likely to have used the so-called "back channels" which can open up unofficial communications with kidnappers and their often shadowy go-betweens.
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