LAHORE:
Three years after the siege that rocked Mumbai, the probe to investigate the attacks has seen sluggish progress due to a lack of cooperation between Pakistan and India. The government of Pakistan has now issued a gazette notification for the appointment of members to preside over the judicial commission in Mumbai, The Express Tribune has learnt.
As per the order of the Special Judge of Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC-I) Rawalpindi, the members will work together with Indian authorities to record statements of witnesses and interrogate Ajmal Kasab – the lone gunman caught alive after the attack.
The Pakistani team headed to Mumbai includes FIA’s Special Investigation Group (SIG) chief Khalid Qureshi, M Azhar Chaudhry and FIA Senior Public Prosecutor Chaudhry Zulifqar. Other members of the team include the defence counsels of the accused imprisoned and prosecuted in Pakistan.
The witnesses include doctors who conducted autopsies of the attackers as well as the victims, the chief metropolitan magistrate who recorded the confessional statement of Kasab, the chief investigation officer (head of the joint investigation team) who had approved the recovery memos for articles including those belonging to the terrorists, sources familiar with the matter revealed.
All expenses of defense counsels will be covered by the Pakistani government and the arrangements of their visas will also be processed by the government, a senior officer in the interior ministry said.
Indian authorities also sent the name of their Judicial Officers (JO) of a Judicial Commission to work with Pakistani authorities in the last week of November, 2011. The officials of both countries will cooperate with each other for the first time, during which they will interrogate Kasab and record the statements and evidences of Prosecution Witnesses in India.
An anti-terrorism court hearing the Mumbai attack case was informed on November 29 that the chief justice of the Mumbai High Court has nominated a magistrate who will preside over the joint judicial commission.
Chaudhry Zulfiqar informed ATC Judge Shahid Rafique that chief metropolitan magistrate SS Shinde would chair the proceedings on behalf of ATC Rawalpindi and interact with commission members for recording statements of witnesses.
The public prosecutor had also requested the court to direct the defence counsels to provide passports and other necessary documents to the interior ministry for arranging their Indian visas.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 9th, 2011.
COMMENTS (18)
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@CommonSense: Just for your info, India already convicted accused in "Samjhouta Express" incident.
@PK:
You are refusing to accept which even your Government had accepted. This is from Wikipedia on Ajmal Kasab: "Mohammed Ajmal Amir Kasab (Urdu: محمد اجمل امیر قصاب) is a Pakistani Islamic terrorist who was involved in the 2008 Mumbai attacks in India. Kasab is the only attacker captured alive by police and is currently in Indian custody. The Government of Pakistan initially denied that Kasab was from Pakistan, but in January 2009, they officially[4] accepted that he is a Pakistani citizen." You can of course say you are more knowledgeable than your govt!
@ashok sai: yeah freed kort is in Pakistan but that doesn't prove Indian's claim of ajmal being resident of Pakistan, we will interrogate who else in freed kort knows about ajmal before attack, obviously other than Indian media and govt which directly pointed their fingers towards Pakistan even before ajmal was caught and they were also aware of the fact that the guy they are not able to catch for three days is from freed kort in Pakistan. I think people across the border do have some common sense other than blind patriotism and they do think rationally.
Vienna,December 9,2011 Good news. Please inform friend Amol Palekar of the Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Mubaiwood fillim/chillum industry to be ready with a camera team under a director.A would be box office hit. Arrange for payments to the hippie guests of the roadside Cape Leopold where traces of bullet marks are still visible trouist attraction. Also the Mossad Chabad House in the Nuriman Villa. Taravadu Taranga Trust for Media Monitoring TTTMM India --Kulamarva Balakrishna
@Sidhoo No it doesnt. Infact I don't think it makes a difference to anyone as to what Pakistan does or does not do. Have the Indians lost 30,000 lives in war on terror? No, but we have. We have a politically, economically and security wise messed up country but we still continue to fight. Yet as the NATO attacks of last month show, that is still not enough, India US and Americans will still find reasons to complain. So yea I dont think most Pakistanis now care about so called credibility.
Indeed, in light of these "resentments that exist in both countries", it would be wiser to appoint an independent court to provide a fair trial for the accused!
@Kondratyuk No, it means you are sleeping over your own problem. Since you guys are such investigative experts that you blamed direct Pak involvement in the attacks on the very same day of the attacks, How come your expert intelligence agencies were sleeping and failed to detect these infiltrators? And why are you still sleeping over the Samjhota Express probe - Pakistan has demanded probe on those attacks too! We ourselves are victims of terror. So while we sort our own mess, how about your focus on your own?
@CommonSense: This is also your problem as it affects your credibility world wide.
@CommonSense:
Yawning means that you are sleeping over you own problems?
A futile exercise which will end up with the statement from Pakistan that no actionable evidence was found.
@vasan Yup its going to be a big time pass because India as usual has its usual pocket list of ready-made accusations against Pakistan. So thanks, no thanks we'll pass up on the offer to cooperate.
Yawn..Get in line we have our own problems to solve first!
AFter the Judicial commission visits India, I am sure these guys will get a "friendly" phone call or SMS. Then you know what will happen, they will all run to Saudi seeking asylum. Ask the Judge who delivered the judgement against Qadri. It is going to be a big time pass.
First show us the Kasab's family, is Faridkot not in Pakistan ?
"Three years after" , what a quicky from Pakistan
Interesting ...development ... Do you think it will come to logical conclusions ??? a big NO is in waiting...
"Three years after the siege that rocked Mumbai, the probe to investigate the attacks has seen sluggish progress due to a lack of cooperation between Pakistan and India."
Sorry sir. It is not because of lack cooperation from Indian side. It is because of lack of will from Pakistan side.