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India says Pakistan trial of Mumbai suspects a 'facade'
India's home secretary says Islamabad concerned that senior government officials might be implicated.
Fire engulfed the top floors of the Taj Mahal hotel following a grenade attack by the militants in Mumbai in 2008. PHOTO: AFP/FILE
NEW DELHI: India’s home secretary says Pakistan’s efforts to prosecute those behind the 2008 Mumbai attacks are a “facade” with Islamabad concerned that senior government officials might be implicated.
In an interview published in the Wall Street Journal on Monday, G.K. Pillai said India had provided Pakistan with extensive information on the identities of key conspirators behind the attacks that killed 166 people.
Some of the most compelling evidence was garnered from interrogating David Headley, a Pakistani-American who pleaded guilty to surveying the hotels and other targets ahead of the assault blamed on Pakistan-based militants.
Pillai said Headley had identified the voice of key conspirators from Indian intelligence intercepts and the information had been passed on to the Pakistani authorities.
“I don’t think they’re going to do anything about it,” Pillai told the Journal, adding that Pakistan’s moves to advance the case are a “facade” and ignored the people in the “control room” who orchestrated the attacks.
Pillai argued that Pakistan was wary of cracking down on top militants, for fear they will “sing” and implicate Pakistani government officials in the attacks.
“They just can’t do it,” he said.
The Mumbai attacks, which began on November 26, 2008, caused carnage as 10 heavily-armed Islamist gunmen stormed India’s financial capital, sparking a bloody, 60-hour siege shown live on television around the world.
Nine of the gunmen were killed and the sole survivor, Mohammed Ajmal Kasab, was condemned to death by a Mumbai court in May. He is challenging the sentence.
Seven suspects in Pakistan, including alleged mastermind Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, have been put on trial in the country, but none has been convicted
The trial process has stalled, with Pakistani officials demanding Kasab be allowed to testify, which New Delhi has refused. Pakistan also wants to send a fact-finding commission to India to gather more evidence.
India sees these moves as stalling tactics and says it has handed over enough evidence to convict the accused men. Pakistan says the evidence is inadmissible in court.
The Mumbai attacks continue to dog relations between India and Pakistan, whose slow-moving peace process broke down after the assault.
Reader Comments (12)
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This whole drama is a facade.
Where are the Indian terrorists who carried out Samjhota Express Blast? Where are they? Is pakistani blood any cheaper than their’s? We also want the Terrorists who did this act of Terror. We need them to be trialed and Punished.Recommend
@G.Khan
Darling! get a sense of scale.
How can you compare an act of terrorism suppoted by Pak government as a policy, funded by Pak tax money and orchestrated by (former?)employees of Pak govt. be compared to a one off act of terrorism by a group that was rendered useless since?!
It seems that past one and a half decades of cross-border terrorist activities by Pak are counter-balanced by a single one off act by a miniscule radical group.
No wonder Pak rots a little bit every day. Those who enjoy ride ON the tiger (of terrorism) will one day end up riding IN the tiger.Recommend
@G.Khan,
“Where are the Indian terrorists who carried out Samjhota Express Blast?”
–> In Jail. Undergoing trail. They were unearthed by Indians themselves and India didn’t wait for Pakistanis to provide dossier after dossier to take action. Pakistan had thought Pakistanis must be involved till India told them otherwise.
You dont see the leader of the group which was responsible the Samjhota Blasts giving speeches unlike Hafiz Saeed of LeT.
So, please dont compare Oranges and Apples.Recommend
Samjhota Express attacks according to US State dept was carried out by Hizbul-e-Islami of Ilyas Kashmiri.Now Congress govt in India wants to implicate the opposition(BJP/RSS) by throwing around such claims.Court hasnt accepted any of these “media leaks”.Besides,crime was comitted in Indian territory..so naturally India has to&have taken up investigation.Even the leads are not even provided by Pakistanis nor investigations started by request of Pak or international pressure.In case of Mumbai attacks,crime was committed in India,therefore Pak gotta extradite the suspects..and shutdown the terror structure..both of which it has not done and is continuing with facade…even the minimum of providing voice samples of Sajid Mir,Iqbal,Zakvi etc hav not been provided.Recommend
G.Khan, it is for your country to punish the man responsible. His name is Saeed Hafiz.Recommend
The amount of evidence given by India and US are huge. Still it is not to belittle Samjotha blast. Friends dont worry, the Indian govt or army or establishment is not part of any terrorist plots. The accused Indian terrorists will be brought to book, The Indian govt is not waiting for Pak evidence or any action by Pak govt. It is the Indian incident and will be suitably taken care of . India is not dilly doleying like Pakistan govt trying to push everything under the carpet of legalism. Recommend
ofcourse they wont do anything about mumbai conspiracy.. state as always was hand in glove with terrorists.. they will always talk samjhouta express.. well wait and see we will book the terrorists.. India is different from pakistan.. atleast we investigate… we enquiry…and there is so much criticism of extreme elements that even if they dont go to jail.. they pretty much know they are not welcome.. Recommend
Dear Mr. G Khan,
Eight people are behind the bar in the samjhauta express blast case. One of them was a RAW official called Purohit and he along with a Sadhvi (Pragya Singh) formed an organization called Abhinav Bhrat where heading the ring.
The other six people, believed to involved in Samjhauta Express blast were believed to be involved in other terror activities in India. So they in custody of Rajasthan ATS. Of these six accused in the Ajmer case, five hail from Indore and surrounding areas, except Gupta, who is from Ajmer. While Lokesh Sharma, the alleged main supplier of materials; Sandeep Dange, the suspected bomb maker; and Ramji Kalsangra, another “bomb maker”, are all from Indore; Sunil Joshi, believed to be the brains behind the plot and Chandrashekhar Leve, a courier, hail from Dewas and Shajapur in MP, which are 45 km and 120 km from Indore respectively.
According to the ATS charge sheet, the list of targets, as garnered from questioning those in custody, included Delhi’s Jama Masjid, the Ajmer Dargah, the Mecca Masjid in Hyderabad, the Samjhauta Express and Malegaon, which have all witnessed terror attacks.
Senior ATS officials believe, as stated in their chargesheet, that Dange and Gupta were RSS pracharaks, and Sharma, Kalsangra and Leve were RSS workers in their respective cities, who were all brought together under Swami Aseemanand, who was recently arrested by the CBI from Haridwar.
Further, please not that these culprits are not under house arrest or having fun, they all in jail, proper jail like a criminal. Recommend
that is i like the most about Indians they don’t want to heard any thing that cause any damage to their ideology. one Pakistani comment and instant thrush of Indians.
and on the topic, i think we are blaming each other for last 60 years so it doesn;t effect us now any more, Neither Indians are trying to listen us nor we do Recommend
As the “26/11″ attacks were a facade, so should the trials. Not enough evidence to convict anybody. Salman Bashir has rightly called the “evidence” that india keeps harping about as literature.Recommend
All Pakistani friends – most Indians are BJP/RSS supporters and respect these organizations because they are NATIONALISTS above all, provide good governance and represent our core Vedic/Sikh/Buddhist/Jain values. However, the thing to note is that NOBODY in BJP/RSS is above Indian laws.Recommend
@Mir Agha,
I guess yesterday’s bomb blasts were also a facade. A trick by the ISI to get more aid from NATO on the pretext of War on Terror.
9/11 is a facade. It is a conspiracy by Zionists and Jews. And, oh yeah, a few Hindus sprinkled in.Recommend