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| India-Pakistan |
| New facts emerge on Mumbai blasts |
| 2008-04-15 |
| A Lashkar-e-Taiba operative, arrested by the Uttar Pradesh police in February, has provided investigators with new insights into the command-level architecture of the 2006 Mumbai serial bombings that claimed 209 lives. Sabahuddin Ahmed told the interrogators that the bombings were executed under the command of Mohammad Yusuf, code-named “Muzammil,” who controls the Lashkar’s military operations outside Jammu and Kashmir. Lashkar’s overall military chief Mohammad Azam Cheema supervised the operation. Ahmed’s testimony corroborates the findings of the Mumbai Police, which said the bombings were executed by Pakistani Lashkar operatives with assistance from members of the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI). By Ahmed’s account, the Lashkar saw the Mumbai attacks as a model operation, since Indian investigators were unable to link its perpetrators to Pakistan. While several Indians — including Mumbai residents Mohammad Faisal Sheikh, his brother Muzammil Rehman Sheikh and former SIMI Maharashtra general-secretary Ehtesham Siddiqui — are now being tried for their alleged role in the city’s suburban train system, none of the Pakistani perpetrators could be arrested or conclusively identified. Sabahuddin, who allegedly commanded the Lashkar cell that attacked the Indian Institute of Science and a Central Reserve Police Force camp in 2007, worked at the Lashkar’s central offices during 2006-2007. He later became the first—and so far, only—Indian known to have commanded a Lashkar cell involving Pakistani nationals. Mumbai’s Anti-Terrorism Squad is also investigating the possible role of the SIMI’s former general-secretary, Safdar Nagori, in the Mumbai bombings. He was held at Indore last month along with 13 other SIMI leaders who, police allege, were involved in recruiting and training new cadre for the Lashkar-led jihad at camps across southern, central and western India. Questioned after being administered hypnosis-inducing drugs, Nagori said he was present in Mumbai at the time of the bombings—suggesting a possible link between the SIMI’s leadership and the terror strikes. He was known to have participated in a meeting at Ujjain a week before the bombings, where the SIMI discussed plans to escalate the jihad. However, police sources familiar with the investigation said Nagori’s statement has not, so far, been corroborated by material evidence or the confessional statements of close associates, including the Sheikh brothers and Siddiqui. While narco-analysis was a key tool in the bombings investigation, it is known that it elicited fantasies and false statements from several suspects. |
| Posted by:Fred |