| Editor’s Pick |
On the basis of the evidence gathered by the Indian investigators and shared by the intelligence agencies of other countries with India, the Government of India demanded three things from Pakistan: firstly, the arrest and handing over to India for interrogation and prosecution of the Pakistan-based ring leaders of the conspiracy as named by Ajmal Amir Kasab, the only surviving perpetrator, who was caught by the Mumbai police; secondly, the arrest and handing over to India of 20 other accused in terrorism related cases pending before Indian courts who have been given shelter in Pakistan; and thirdly, the dismantling of the Pakistan-based terrorist infrastructure of the LeT.
India has failed to convince large sections of the international community that the ISI had orchestrated the 26/11 Mumbai terrorist strike.
As other Pakistani Governments had done in the past, the present Government headed by President Asif Ali Zardari too has refused to extend mutual legal assistance to India as required by the conventions followed by the Interpol and by the UN Resolution No.1373 adopted unanimously by the UN General Assembly after the 9/11 terrorist strikes in the US. It first even denied that the terrorist captured by the Mumbai Police is a Pakistani national despite Kasab’s father identifying him as his son in an interview to the Dawn, the prestigious daily of Karachi. Under pressure from the US, it reluctantly admitted that he is a Pakistani national, but continued to question the credibility of the evidence collected by India. It made clear that there was no question of handing over any Pakistani national to India for trial.
Since Pakistan became independent in 1947, it has never handed over to India any Muslim — Pakistani or Indian — who had committed an offence in Indian territory — whether the offence is terrorism or theft or robbery or rape or child sex or narcotics smuggling or any other. The attitude of non-cooperation adopted by the present Government should not, therefore, be a matter of surprise. The international community should not allow Pakistan to get away with its brazen defiance of all international conventions relating to action against terrorists. If it manages to do so due to the reluctance of the international community to act against Pakistan, this won’t bode well for the success of the war against terrorism.
India has to use three yard-sticks to decide on the genuiness and adequacy of any Pakistani co-operation. These are:
Western experts were surprised that neither the Mumbai Police nor the central intelligence agencies showed interest in detaining the surviving foreign hostages in India in order to debrief them thoroughly.
- Does its co-operation help in bringing to justice the operatives of the LeT in Pakistan and any others, who were involved in the planning and execution of the terrorist strike?
- Does its co-operation help in a better reconstruction and understanding of the terrorist strike in order to find out answers to some important questions such as why the terrorists targeted Israeli and other foreign nationals, for example? The answers to such questions will be available only with the master-minds of the LeT in Pakistan. Ajmal Amir Kasab, the surviving Pakistani perpetrator, now in the custody of the Mumbai Police, may not be privy to the objectives of the LeT.
- Does the Pakistani co-operation help India in preventing any more terrorist strike mounted from Pakistani territory — by the LeT, the other anti-India terrorist organizations and Al Qaeda by eradicating their terrorist infrastructure in Pakistani territory and destroying their capabilities?
There was some forward movement with regard to the first question on February 12, 2009, when Rehman Malik, Pakistan’s Minister for Internal Security, who is known to be closer to President Asif Ali Zardari than to Prime Minister Yousef Raza Gilani,, handed over to the Indian High Commissioner in Islamabad the salient points of the Pakistani investigation and action taken till then with a list of 30 questions for India to answer to enable them to take the investigation further. These salient points were revealed by him to the media at a special press conference held the same day.
A careful study of the Pakistani media reports showed that Pakistan seemed to be more forthcoming than it was since 26/11 and was keen to demonstrate to the international community that in investigating the case “Pakistan means business” as Malik repeatedly emphasized. There was a seeming shift from a position of total denial of the involvement of anyone in Pakistani territory to a partial acceptance of the conclusion of Indian and Western investigators that the conspiracy for the terrorist attack originated in Pakistani territory and that the key answers to many questions which arose during the investigation were to be found in Pakistan, which only Pakistani investigators can do.At the same time, there was an undisguised attempt by Malik to project the conspiracy as trans-national and not uni-national only in Pakistan. He repeatedly said that only a part of the conspiracy took place in Pakistani territory. To underline the trans-national dimensions of the conspiracy he referred to the role played by some members of the Pakistani Diaspora in Spain and Italy and to Pakistan’s suspicion of a role by some elements in India as seen, according to him, from the fact that the perpetrators had used SIM cards procured in India.
Pakistan’s attempt was to project the conspiracy as mounted by non-State elements of which the Pakistani intelligence agencies had no inkling till after the attack. There was a reluctance on the part of Indian analysts to accept that all the recruitment, planning and training could have been carried out by the LeT in Pakistani territory without the Pakistani intelligence agencies becoming aware of it. Malik seemed to have prepared the ground for meeting this argument if and when it acquired force by pointing out that if the intelligence agencies of India, Italy and Spain had missed noticing the preparations being made in their territory, how can one blame the Pakistani agencies for similarly missing them.
“¦there was an undisguised attempt by Malik to project the conspiracy as trans-national and not uni-national only in Pakistan.
There were two significant points in the press briefing of Malik. The first was the absence of any reference to Indian allegations that a group of 32 potential perpetrators was trained by the LeT initially in Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir (PoK) and subsequently in Karachi before 10 of them were finally selected and sent to Mumbai by sea.
The second was his repeated use of the word “alleged” while referring to the role of the LeT operatives, who had been detained and against whom investigations had been launched in pursuance of the two First Information Reports (FIRs) registered by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA). He did not use the word “alleged” while referring to those whose involvement Pakistan claimed to have unearthed through its own investigation. This would indicate a possible attempt by them to show their investigation against some LeT operatives as warranted by the Indian “allegations” against them and not by any evidence so far uncovered by the FIA.
Thus, while registering two FIRs against the LeT operatives named by India, they kept open the possibility of giving a clean chit to the LeT after the international pressure and interest subsided and releasing the LeT operatives on the ground that the investigation did not bring out any credible evidence against them.
Please wait...
