Karachi, Dec 27 (IANS): Pakistan's Sindh province will not release the four men accused of kidnapping and murdering American journalist Daniel Pearl 18 years ago, a media report said on Sunday citing informed sources.

The sources told The Express Tribune that the Pakistan Peoples Party-led Sindh government believes that the Supreme Court's September 28 order with regard to the accused persons -- Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, Fahad Nasim Ahmed, Syed Salman Saqib, Sheikh Adil -- is still in the field.

A three-judge Supreme Court had noted that till the next date of hearing, the accused will not be released.

The report came three days after the Sindh High Court (SHC) on December 24 ordered the Sindh government to immediately release the four men.

The sources told The Express Tribune that the Sindh government will also challenge the SHC December 24 order in the Supreme Court.

Earlier on October 2, an SHC division bench on April 2 commuted Sheikh's death sentence to seven years and acquitted the three others who were serving life terms for abducting and killing Pearl, Wall Street Journal's former South Asia bureau chief, in 2002.