Hafiz Saeed's Islamofascist office in Chicago

Lashkar-e-Taiba threat revived after Chicago arrest
Friday, 20 Nov, 2009

LONDON: The arrest of two men in Chicago on terrorism charges linked to Lashkar-e-Taiba has revived fears about the Pakistani militant group's global reach and its ability to plot attacks in India and around the world.

A major attack in India - still angry over an assault on Mumbai one year ago - could trigger Indian retaliation in Pakistan and draw the nuclear-armed neighbours into a conflict that would also torpedo US hopes of stabilising Afghanistan.

David Headley and Tahawwur Hussain Rana were arrested last month and accused of plotting an attack on Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten, which ran cartoons of the prophet Mohammad in 2005, US authorities said in court documents.

According to the court documents, they discussed their plans with members of Lashkar-e-Taiba and al-Qaeda linked Pakistan-based militant Ilyas Kashmiri. Lashkar also talked to them about possible attacks in India and suggested these should be given priority over the alleged plot in Denmark.

Neither Headley, a US citizen who had spent time in Pakistan, nor Rana, a Canadian citizen born in Pakistan, have yet entered pleas. Rana's lawyer said he would deny the charges.

Officials have long worried that Lashkar-e-Taiba, blamed for the attacks on Mumbai, could use its big network of support in the Pakistani diaspora to hit Western targets.

The Chicago case showed quite how powerful that network could be. And it suggested the group was still actively planning attacks in India and raised fears it could use Western nationals who might escape police attention to strike there.

Indian Home Minister P. Chidambaram told the Washington Post police in India also were investigating whether the two men had links to the Mumbai attack, which killed at least 166 people.

'Chicago really exemplifies the group's capabilities and the leadership's priorities,' said Washington-based analyst Stephen Tankel, who is writing a book on the group.

Lashkar 'remains committed to an India-first approach, but also poses a real threat to the west.'

INDIAN RETALIATION
Lashkar-e-Taiba shares al Qaeda's concept of global jihad, as underscored by its alleged willingness to support the planned attack in Denmark.

'Lashkar-e-Taiba is no longer a Pakistani movement with only a Kashmir political or military agenda. Lashkar-e-Taiba is a member of al Qaeda,' former French investigating magistrate Jean-Louis Bruguiere told Reuters in an interview last week.
The group's Jamaat ud-Dawa charitable wing wins support and funding worldwide for its humanitarian work in Pakistan, giving it a powerful network which police say has been used to plot attacks in countries from Britain to Australia to Bangladesh.
But it is Lashkar's ability to wreak havoc in India and to raise tensions with Pakistan that makes it most dangerous.

India broke off formal peace talks with Pakistan after the assault on Mumbai and is still pressing Pakistan to dismantle Lashkar's infrastructure and training camps.
Indian Home Minister P. Chidambaram said this month India would retaliate if hit by another attack from Pakistan.

Gurmeet Kanwal, at the Indian Army's Centre for Land Warfare Studies, said this could even include attacks by the Indian Air Force (IAF) across the Line of Control (LoC) dividing Kashmir.

'If the next big strike can be credibly attributed to Pakistan Army/ISI planning and support, the IAF and the Indian Army are likely to be ordered to strike across the LoC at purely military targets and known terrorist infrastructure because the government will be forced to bow to public pressure,' he said.

Such a move would force the Pakistan Army to rush troops from its western border with Afghanistan to its eastern border with India, and run a serious risk of escalation.

Untangling that Gordian knot is likely to come up during a visit to Washington next week by Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who has personally led efforts to improve relations with Pakistan in the face of domestic criticism.

But with peace between India and Pakistan a long way off, the immediate risk is both that Lashkar might stage attacks in India, or provide its global network to support other militants, including al Qaeda, in targeting the west.

'The interesting thing it (the Chicago case) points to is how fluid these networks are,' said Praveen Swami, a Kashmir specialist at India's The Hindu newspaper.
It could even try to combine the double objective of striking India as well as Westerners by attacking western targets within India itself.

'This does not mean every attack inside India ... will target Western interests,' said Tankel in an article to be published next week in the CTC Sentinel, produced by the Combating Terrorism Center at US military academy West Point.

'But the threat of such attacks must now be included within its wider targeting options,' he said. – Reuters
http://www.dawn.com.pk/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/world/03-lashkar-e-taiba-threat-revived-after-chicago-arrest-ss-09

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The need to develop an apt legal response to terrorism

An inept response
Legal eye

Saturday, November 21, 2009 (The News)
Babar Sattar

The writer is a lawyer based in Islamabad.

The Pakistan-based Taliban's indiscriminate religion-inspired war against the state in concert with other terror groups poses a threat that no one really knows how to deal with. The war raging in our tribal areas as well as our cities is multi-pronged and has ideological, strategic, political, socio-economic and legal dimensions.

The declared strategy of the Pakistani government toward this war is to take the security operation underway to its logical end with complete resolve and, once the physical control of the Taliban country is reclaimed, consolidate military gains with economic investment and political reforms. The military is essentially involved in a fire brigade operation struggling to put out the fire where it is raging the most. The proposed but missing political and economic tiers of the strategy are meant to win the hearts and minds of people, and prevent futurerecruitment of the youth by the Taliban and other terror groups.

But given that the Taliban and other terrorist outfits functional in Pakistan comprise our own citizens, what will we do about those who survive this military operation including the operational and sleeper cells that are already spread across the country? While an effective military operation can limit the ability to spread violence and terror across Pakistan with impunity and an effective socio-economic and political rejuvenation process can diminish the appeal of ideologically inspired terrorism, we cannot underestimate the need for effective traditional law enforcement to prevent and address acts of terror being carried out across Pakistan. And it is this necessary dimension of fighting terror within Pakistan through traditional policing and law enforcement where our response has not just been deficient but completely non-existent.

As anchor Dr Moeed Pirzada emphasised in a recent discussion, countries that are able to control the movement of men, material and money within their territories and across their borders are better placed to fight the threat posed by terror groups. Pakistan is not just lagging behind on this count but seems completely oblivious to the urgent need to put in place the legal framework and implementation mechanisms to control the movement of men, material and money within Pakistan. Furthermore, the government has made no effort to evaluate the multiple contours of our criminal justice system to ensure that it can effectively take cognizance of the crime of terrorism. Pakistan has been infested with extreme violence and terror for more than five years now and we have yet to hear about terrorists being caught, tried and convicted by our courts of law.

If our criminal justice system lacks the ability to punish terrorists, insurgents and criminals, are we not rendering the concept of rule of law meaningless? We have seen Maulvi Abdul Aziz of Lal Masjid walk free despite public knowledge that under his supervision the mosque was turned into an armed fortress, and the Lal-Masjid brigade not only harassed residents and shopkeepers in the neighbourhood but also killed at least five soldiers. Similarly, we continue to hear the demand from India and the US to prosecute Hafiz Saeed, and while the government seems willing to do so, it is unable to bring any formal charges that stick. If Hafiz Saeed is mixed-up in terror plots, he must be prosecuted and convicted. If he is not, his name should be cleared and he should not repeatedly be put under preventive detention merely due to allegations and pressure by foreign countries.

The idea is not to initiate a witch-hunt in the name of law enforcement and eradication of terror, but to make due process of law meaningful and our penal justice system functional. If our justice system does not work, it will either encourage security forces to circumvent due process and indulge in extra-judicial killings or allow criminals and terrorists to go scot-free and remain a menace to society. Given that the terrorists we are fighting are our own people -- even if partly supported and financed by our external enemies -- it is crucial that the state's response to this threat be framed within the realm of law. We are presently failing to apprehend and convict terrorists and criminals because (i) much of our law-enforcement activities and security operations are undertaken beyond the zone of law as our legal framework is deficient in fundamental ways, and (ii) to the extent that laws exist they are not being effectively implemented.

Our legal framework does not adequately cater for the army undertaken security operations within the country. Article 245 of the constitution authorises the armed forces to "act in aid of civil power when called upon to do so". But there is no detailed legislation that delineates the mechanics of how the armed forces will function while acting in aid of civil power, how the forces will arrest and detain people, and how they will gather evidence and facilitate prosecution when the accused are presented before a court.

Sections 4 and 5 of the Anti-Terrorism Act 1997 also provide for armed forces acting in aid of civil power and contemplate that any such operation will be subject to the Code of Criminal Procedure1898. But the armed forces are not trained to carry out internal security operations with a view to apprehending and convicting citizens. For example, during the Swat operation, did the soldiers document recovery of weapons in a manner that would be admissible as evidence in a court of law? Will officers appear before courts as prosecution witnesses? If not, will suspected terrorists not be able to walk free merely because due process formalities have not been followed?

Another huge component of our security infrastructure that functions beyond the realm of law is intelligence agencies. There is no legislation or legal framework that clearly defines the scope of work of our intelligence agencies, the authority that each agency has and effective mechanisms of supervision to ensure that authority vested in the agencies is properly regulated and not abused. This creates a two-tier problem. One is the fear that intelligence agencies have the ability to function as uncontrolled monstrosities and abuse the vast powers not supported by law that they have assumed as a matter of practice.

The second is the limited ability to effectively use the extremely crucial information gathered by these agencies to prosecute criminals because the process through which such information is gathered does not have the backing of law. For example, if there is no legal mechanism to seek permission to wire-tap citizens and record conversations, the utility of such recordings in a court of law remains dubious. The problem needs to be resolved by fixing the structure rather than getting into territory wars over who controls a deformed structure.

Then there are laws such as the Anti-Terrorist Act and the Security of Pakistan Act 1952 that conceive the idea of controlling and suspending activities of proscribed and subversive organisations, but do not take the concept to its logical conclusion. The law does not automatically produce any serious penal consequences for an organization that is declared subversive or proscribed. The state is not obliged to identify the members of such an organisation, prevent them from reorganising themselves under a new banner, prohibit them from purchasing property, renting houses and vehicles, etc.

The deficient legal framework thus makes the exercise of declaring an organisation proscribed or subversive largely meaningless. And finally there are laws that exist on statute books but are just not being enforced. The Explosives Act 1884 is one such law that mandates that the manufacture, possession, use, sale, transport and importation will be subject to government license. If this law was being properly implemented, terrorists would not get their hands on hundreds of kilograms of explosive material at will.

If we intend to control the menace of terror wreaking havoc across Pakistan, we will need to resuscitate traditional law enforcement mechanisms, bring all its components within the realm of law and ensure that our criminal justice system is functional. Without acquiring the ability to exercise effective control over men, material and money within Pakistan, our fire-fighting operations will only have limited utility.

Email: sattar@post.harvard.edu
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ICG Report: 'Radical Deobandi groups source of Pakistan terror'

"The international community, particularly the U.S., must ... help strengthen civilian control over all areas of governance, including counter-terrorism, and the capacity of the federal government to override the military's appeasement policies," ICG president Gareth Evans said in a report obtained on Saturday.


'Radical Deobandi groups source of Pak terror'

March 15: A prominent global thinktank has termed the radical Sunni-Deobandi groups as the "primary source" of terror in Pakistan and said their continued patronage by the Army has influenced Islamabad's relations with India and Afghanistan.

The "expanding influence" of the Pakistani Taliban was "due to support from long-established Sunni extremist networks, based primarily in Punjab, which have served as the (Pakistan) Army’s jihadi proxies in Afghanistan and India since the 1980s," the International Crisis Group (ICG) said in its latest report.

"Their continued patronage by the military, and their ability to hijack major policy areas, including Pakistan’s relations with India, Afghanistan and the international community, impedes the civilian government’s ongoing efforts to consolidate control over governance and pursue peace with its neighbours," the Brussels-based body said in the report titled 'Pakistan - The Militant Jihadi Challenge'.

It warned that "the expanding influence of radical Sunni groups remained the primary source of terrorism in Pakistan" and maintained that their links with terror outfits like al Qaeda made them "even more dangerous".

The ICG said the fresh attacks in the Pakistani provinces of Punjab, the Northwest Frontier Province (NWFP), the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) and Balochistan’s provincial capital Quetta "demonstrate the threat posed (by them) to the Pakistani citizen and state".

Asserting that dismantling of the Sunni extremist groups "must become the core of the government’s counter-terrorism policy", it said these extremist outfits were "simultaneously fighting internal sectarian jihads, regional jihads in Afghanistan and India, and a global jihad against the West. Their links to international networks like al Qaeda make them even more dangerous than before."

The ICG said the aftermath of the Mumbai terror attack presented Pakistan with an opportunity to reshape its response to terrorism, "which should rely not on the application of indiscriminate force, including military action and arbitrary detentions, but on police investigations, arrests, fair trials and convictions. This must be civilian-led to be effective."

The current political crisis in Punjab "will provide a decisive test for the Pakistan Peoples Party and Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League to resolve their differences through the political process", said ICG's Asia Program Director Robert Templer.

"If the democratic transition falters, the military and the militants will be the sole winners. Genuine democratic governance, in FATA as well as the rest of the country is the best defence against the spread of extremism in Pakistan," he added.



ICG urges Pakistan to avoid deals with militants

Saturday, March 14, 2009 By our correspondent ISLAMABAD: The International Crises Group (ICG), a Brussels-based think-tank, has recommended to Pakistan to take robust action against militant groups and their Madrassa networks and acknowledge that political reform is integral to stabilising the NWFP and Fata, refusing to sign the Nizam-e-Adl Regulation Order 2009, and refrain from entering into similar peace deals with militants elsewhere. These recommendations have come in the latest report on Pakistan by the ICG titled Pakistan: The Militant Jihadi Challenge. In its recommendations to the Government of Pakistan the ICG says that the government should acknowledge that a credible crackdown on Jihadi militants will ultimately require convictions in fair trials and take steps to vest significantly greater authority in civilian law enforcement agencies, including access to mobile phone records and other data, without having to obtain approval from the military and the Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI). It asked to establish through an act of parliament a clear hierarchy of civilian intelligence agencies, including the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), the provincial criminal investigation departments and the Intelligence Bureau (IB), with the IB as the primary authority in anti-terrorism investigations. It calls for strengthening links between the law enforcement agencies and prosecutors to build strong cases in court against religious extremists. It also seeks to enhance the capacity of federal and provincial civilian law enforcement agencies, with a particular focus on forensics capabilities and crime scene investigations; establish national and provincial crime labs with modern equipment and internationally trained scientists, under control of the federal interior ministry and provincial home departments.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/top_story_detail.asp?Id=20914

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ICG RECOMMENDATIONS

To the Government of Pakistan:

1. Acknowledge that a credible crackdown on jihadi militants will ultimately require convictions in fair trials and take steps to:

a) vest significantly greater authority in civilian law enforcement agencies, including access to mobile phone records and other data, without having to obtain approval from the military and the Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI);

b) establish through an act of parliament a clear hierarchy of civilian intelligence agencies, including the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), the provincial Criminal Investigation Departments and the Intelligence Bureau (IB), with the IB as the primary authority in anti-terrorism investigations;

c) strengthen links between law enforcement agencies and prosecutors to build strong cases in court against religious extremists;

d) enhance the capacity of federal and provincial civilian law enforcement agencies, with a particular focus on forensics capabilities and crime scene investigations; establish national and provincial crime labs with modern equipment and internationally trained scientists, under control of the federal interior ministry and provincial home departments;

e) amend the Criminal Procedure Act to establish a witness protection program, and ensure the highest level of security for anyone agreeing to provide valuable testimony against extremists; and

f) enhance the role and guarantee the autonomy of Community Police Liaison Committees to enlist the public in the fight against militancy.

2. Take robust action against jihadi militant groups and their madrasa networks, including:

a) disbanding private militias, pursuant to Article 256 of the constitution;

b) disrupting communications and supply lines, and closing base camps of jihadi groups in the tribal belt and the political heartland of Punjab; and

c) enhancing oversight over the madrasa sector, including finances and enrolment, and conducting regular inquiries into the sector by provincial authorities, as recently conducted by the Punjab government, with a view to:

i. identifying seminaries with clear links to jihadi groups, closing them and taking action against their clerics and, where appropriate, students;

ii. keeping any seminaries suspected of links with jihadi groups under close surveillance;

iii. taking legal action where seminaries encroach on state or private land; and

iv. ensuring that accommodation and facilities meet proper safety and building standards.

3. Prosecute anyone encouraging or glorifying violence and jihad, including through hate speech against religious and sectarian minorities, and the spread of jihadi literature.

4. Acknowledge that political reform is integral to stabilising FATA and NWFP by:

a) invoking Article 8 of the constitution that voids any customs inconsistent with constitutionally guaranteed fundamental rights, refusing to sign the Nizam-e-Adl Regulation Order 2009 for the imposition of Sharia (Islamic law) in the Malakand region, and refrain from entering into similar peace deals with religious militants elsewhere;

b) carrying through on its commitment to repeal the Frontier Crimes Regulations (1901), extending the writ of the state, the rule of law, including the courts and police, and ensuring FATA’s representation in the state legislature;

c) integrating FATA into the federal framework by incorporating it into the Northwest Frontier Province, with the seven agencies falling under the executive control of the province and jurisdiction of the regular provincial and national court system and with representation in the provincial assembly;

d) extending the Political Parties Act to FATA, thus removing restrictions on political parties, and introducing party-based elections for the provincial and national legislatures;

e) refraining from arming and supporting any insurgent group or tribal militia, and preventing the army from doing the same; and

f) relying on civilian law enforcement and intelligence as the primary tool to deal with extremism in FATA, limiting the army’s role to its proper task of defending the country’s borders.

5. Repeal all religious laws that discriminate on the basis of religion, sect and gender.

6. Resolve the political crisis between the PPP and the PML-N by ending governor’s rule and respecting the PML-N’s elected mandate in Punjab, and agreeing on a political and legal solution to allow for Nawaz and Shahbaz Sharif to participate in electoral politics, either through an act of parliament, or an executive order.

7. Carry through on its commitment to repeal the 17th Amendment to the constitution, and any constitutional provisions, executive orders and laws that contravene the principles of parliamentary democracy.

To the International Community, in particular the U.S. and the European Union:

8. Provide financial and logistic support to civilian law enforcement agencies to expand their capacity, including in forensics and crime scene investigations, through provision of modern equipment and training of Pakistani scientists.

9. Condition military assistance on demonstrable steps by the Pakistani armed forces to support civilian efforts in preventing the borderlands from being used by al-Qaeda, Afghan insurgents and Pakistani extremists to launch attacks within Pakistan and from Pakistani territory to its region and beyond; if the Pakistani military does not respond positively, as a last resort, consider targeted and incremental sanctions, including travel and visa bans and the freezing of financial assets of key military leaders and military-controlled intelligence agencies.

10. Expand assistance to the hundreds of thousands of civilians displaced by the conflict in FATA and Swat.

http://www.crisisgroup.org/home/index.cfm?id=6010&l=1

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Terrorist Attack on Sri Lankan Cricket Team in Lahore: Is Lashkar-e-Taiba/Taliban alliance involved?

The attack had echoes of one on the Indian city of Mumbai last November, which led to the Indian cricket team cancelling its planned tour of Pakistan. According to a high ranking government official in Pakistan, the attack has "the same pattern, the same terrorists who attacked Mumbai might be involved in the current attack".

By Kamran Haider

Five members of the Sri Lankan cricket team were wounded when around a dozen gunmen attacked their bus as it drove under police escort on Tuesday to a stadium in the Pakistani city of Lahore, officials said.

Lahore Police chief Habib-ur-Rehman said five police were killed in the attack by unidentified gunmen who fired AK 47s and rockets and hurled grenades at the bus as it slowed at a traffic circle near the 60,000-seater Gaddafi stadium.

"Police are chasing the terrorists," he said. "They appeared to be trained men."

Punjab Governor Salman Taseer told reporters the assailants had been surrounded after being chased into a nearby commercial and shopping area.

"We were very fortunate to escape serious injury," a Sri Lankan player, who did not want to be identified, told Reuters by telephone.

Sri Lanka's sports minister said five players and an assistant coach were wounded, two of whom were being treated in hospital.

It was unclear whether injuries were caused by bullets, shrapnel or flying shards of glass.

The attack had echoes of one on the Indian city of Mumbai last November, which led to the Indian cricket team cancelling its planned tour of Pakistan.

"One thing I want to say it's the same pattern, the same terrorists who attacked Mumbai," said Governor Taseer.

India blamed that attack on Pakistan-trained militants and the incident sharply raised tension between the two nuclear-armed neighbours.

The group blamed by India, Lashkar-e-Taiba, came from Pakistan's Punjab province, whose capital is Lahore.

Pakistani stocks were down over 2.47 percent in early trade on Tuesday following the attack on the cricket team bus.

The Karachi Stock Exchange benchmark 100-share index was 2.47 percent, or 140.22 points, lower at 5,541.022 on turnover of 16.8 million shares by 10:40 a.m. (5:40 a.m. British time).

"This is not only an attack on the Sri Lankan team but on Pakistan as Pakistan is being put in isolation due to these attacks," said Shuja Rizvi, director broking at Capital One Equities. "Who would want to invest then in Pakistan?"

GUNMEN RUNNING THROUGH THE STREETS

Sri Lanka, which had been invited to Pakistan after India pulled out, immediately cancelled the rest of the tour.

"We are trying to bring the team back as quickly as possible," a Sri Lankan cricket official said.

Pakistan TV showed footage of gunmen with rifles and backpacks running through the streets and firing on unidentified vehicles.

"I saw them from the window of my office firing at the police escort first. When the police dispersed after the shooting, they started firing at the bus of Sri Lankan team," Mohammad Luqman told Reuters.

The driver of the Sri Lankan team coach said one of the attackers had thrown a grenade under the bus, but it did not detonate.

Another witness told Reuters he believed two police commandos were killed along with a regular policeman and a traffic warden.

Shopkeeper Ahmed Ali said the two police commandos had been driving behind the team bus when they were hit.

"It was a very heavy firing and I heard at least two explosions at the time," said a Reuters witness who had been on his way to cover the match between Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

Sri Lankan and Pakistan media said Thilan Samaraweera seemed to be the worst hit, suffering a thigh injury. The other Sri player admitted to hospital was Tharanga Paranavithana.

It was the second day of their second test match and being played at the venue where Sri Lanka won cricket's world cup in 1996, beating Australia in the final

Until this series Pakistan had gone without test cricket for more then a year because of security issues.

In 2002, a bomb exploded in Karachi while the New Zealand cricket team were touring, killing 13 people including 11 French navy experts.

The tourists, based at the Pearl Continental Hotel, were preparing to depart for the National Stadium for the start of a match when a car exploded outside the nearby Karachi Sheraton. New Zealand called off the tour within hours of the attack.

(Writing by Simon Cameron-Moore; Editing by David Fox)

http://www.iht.com/articles/reuters/2009/03/03/asia/OUKWD-UK-PAKISTAN-SRILANKA-SHOOTING.php

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سری لنکا کی کرکٹ ٹیم پر فائرنگ، 6 کھلاڑی زخمی، 5 پولیس اہلکار ہلاک

منا رانا اور علی سلمان بی بی سی اردو ڈاٹ کام، لاہور

لاہور میں سری لنکا کی کرکٹ ٹیم کو سٹیڈیم لے جانے والی بس پر منگل کی صبح نقاب پوش حملہ آوروں کی فائرنگ میں سری لنکا کے چھ کھلاڑی زخمی اور پنجاب پولیس کے پانچ اہلکار ہلاک ہو گئے ہیں۔

سری لنکا کے کرکٹ حکام کے مطابق چھ کھلاڑی زخمی ہوئے ہیں جن میں سمیرا ویرا، اجنتا مینڈس، کمارا سنگاکارا اورتھرنگا پرانا وتھانا شامل ہیں۔ تاہم زخمی ہونے والوں میں دو کھلاڑیوں کو ہسپتال منتقل کرنا پڑا

فائرنگ کے بعد گورنر پنجاب سلمان تاثیر جائے واردات پر پہنچ گئے اور انہوں نے کہا کہ اس حملے وہی عناصر ملوث ہیں جنہوں نے بھارت کے شہر ممبئی پر گزشتہ سال حملہ کیا تھا۔

انہوں نے کہا کہ یہ انتہائی تربیت یافتہ دہشت گرد معلوم ہوتے تھے جنہوں نے بڑے سکون کے ساتھ یہ کارروائی کی ہے۔

http://www.bbc.co.uk/urdu/pakistan/story/2009/03/090303_lahore_lanka_firing_fz.shtml


Must read: Imran Khan's interview

Imran Khan's interview in Australia: Terrorists will never attack cricketers because public will just turn against them...

Compare it with what the ICC chairman said today:

پاکستان میں کرکٹ اب ’انتہائی مشکل‘

	’بین الاقوامی کرکٹ سے قبل پاکستان میں بہت کچھ تبدیل ہونا ضروری ہے‘

بین الاقوامی کرکٹ کونسل کے صدر ڈیوڈ مورگن کا کہنا ہے کہ لاہور میں سری لنکن ٹیم پر حملے کے بعد مستقبل قریب میں پاکستان میں بین الاقوامی کرکٹ کا انعقاد انتہائی مشکل ہوگا
بی بی سی ریڈیو فور سے بات کرتے ہوئے ان کا کہنا تھا کہ ’یہ ایک تباہ کن اور افسوسناک خبر ہے۔ بہت سے لوگوں کا کہنا تھا کہ پاکستان میں کرکٹز کو نشانہ بنایا جانا ممکن نہیں لیکن اب یہ بات واضح طور پر غلط ثابت ہوگئی ہے‘۔

http://www.bbc.co.uk/urdu/sport/story/2009/03/090303_cric_boards_reract_zs.shtml

Also read:

The attack on Sri Lankan cricket team has all the hallmarks of the Taliban/Al Qaeda and ISI alliance: An analysis

Some relevant comments:

Owais said:

This is what happens when you negotiate with terrorists. What happens in Swat now bleeds into all cities and with this inept government, there is no stopping this madness.

Rest assured, no international sport will ever be played in Pakistan for a decade. Whoever carried out this attack has succeeded in portraying Pakistan as an extremely inhospitable place. Infuriating considering Lahore is always known for its hospitality and now innocents are dead and sport diplomats are injured.

rehan_s said:

What I dont understand is that why the fuck did PCB guarantee full security to Sri Lanka at a time when the whole country is burning…and how come these security ppl didnt even kill one single terrorist…and then the CCPO says Police has been great in performance…

Riddle 792 said:

CCPO Lahore (the beard police officer) said that the attackers guys in teens with fair complexion who look like pathans…… ” >> on AAJ TV…

ataraxis6 said:

Imran Khan once said in Capital Talk that terrorist will never attack cricket players. Unfortunately, has been proven wrong (again). These deshatgards have no religion, sense of morality or a shred of humanity.

ALAS……

yesterday the ICC cricket general manager who is on his official visit to Pakistanhad just issued a positive statement regarding cricket security situation in Pakistan and today this happened……..:(

http://www.bbc.co.uk/urdu/sport/story/2009/03/090302_icc_dave_lhr_zs.shtml

Friend said:

what we doing, as usual blaming CIA/RAW/MOSAD without accepting our own responsibility to curb terrorism within our own boundaries

lota6177 said:

molvies (Mullahs) gone wild. We need to take care of this menace. Enough already.

Thankgod for the police officers in the security detail otherwise these terrorist would have killed the whole sri lankan cricket team.

lota6177 said:

from nytimes
Mr. Rehman said the gunmen were in their early 20s and were bearded. He described them as resembling Pathans, an ethnic group that dominates North West Frontier Province and tribal areas, an apparent suggestion that assailants were Taliban militants from the tribal areas.

lota6177 said:

bithullah masud is giving IT education in his camps and it is raw agents doing everything in pakistan. Case solved.

yes these peace loving mullahs can never do anything like this. They dont brainwash young kids to do evil acts and butcher innocent people. They have a lot of camps where they train people in IT education or computers. It is all raw and mosad agents who give these peace loving molvies a bad name. Shame on them. We should have a day of national solidarity to celebrate over peace loving educated molvies.

Source: pk politics

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Mumbai terrorist attacks partially planned in Pakistan

Islamabad hands over Mumbai probe report to New Delhi

Mumbai attacks partially planned in Pakistan: Malik

* Interior adviser claims arrest of main operator in attacks, five others
* Says Pakistan needs more information from India
* System of several countries used to launch attacks

By Sajjad Malik/Tahir Niaz

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has formally handed over the details of its investigation into the Mumbai terror attacks to India, the Foreign Office said on Thursday as Adviser to the Prime Minister on Interior Rehman Malik admitted that the attacks were ‘partially planned’ in Pakistan.

“The Indian high commissioner was ... [on Thursday given] material pertaining to the Mumbai terror attacks probe by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), by the foreign secretary,” said Foreign Office spokesman Abdul Basit.

Arrests: Meanwhile at a press conference, Rehman Malik announced ‘breakthrough’ arrests in the Mumbai probe, and admitted that the Mumbai attacks were partially planned in Pakistan. He said some of the suspects were linked to Lashkar-e-Tayyaba (LT). Rehman said a case was registered on Thursday under the Anti-Terrorism Act against eight suspects – including LT’s Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, Hammad Amin and Zarar Shah – on charges of “abetting, directing, conspiring and facilitating a terrorist act”. Six of these suspects are in the custody of intelligence agencies, and all will be tried under Pakistani law.

“Some funds for the attacks were transferred from Spain and Italy,” he said.

Karachi: Rehman said the suspects used three boats, all of which have been seized, to sail from Karachi to Mumbai between November 26 and 28, 2008.

More information: Rehman, however, said these findings were not final and Pakistan needed more information from India. He said the Indian authorities had been asked to answer 30 questions raised by the Pakistani investigators.

Other countries: The adviser said “the system of various other countries” was also used to plan the attacks. Rehman said two more men were being held, and identified them only as Khan and Riaz. Other leads pointed to Europe and the US, and Malik said Pakistan would ask the FBI for help. (Daily Times)

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Editorial: India should appreciate Pakistan’s efforts

The press statement by Rehman Malik, the prime minister’s advisor on interior, on the Mumbai attacks and Pakistan’s investigative follow-up is significant. It proves, without doubt, that Islamabad has been pursuing the case diligently and in line with its promise to do so. It also indicates, if such proof were ever required, that the government was sincere in condemning the Mumbai attack and was not complicit in it, a wild allegation made by India as part of its diplomatic offensive to isolate Pakistan and paint it as a sponsor of terrorism.

Mr Malik told the press Thursday that it was an extensive plan and some part of the conspiracy was hatched in Pakistan. He said that Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, the alleged mastermind, is already in custody while six other accused have been arrested. Two other wanted men are still at large. One of those in custody, according to Malik, was “lured back to Pakistan from the Spanish city of Barcelona”. He also revealed that the attackers and their handlers used Austrian SIM cards for communication and there was also a link to Houston, Texas. The bit about the Austrian SIM cards dovetails with some detail in the Indian dossier about the communication mode of the attackers. Meanwhile, Pakistani authorities have still not been able to determine the identities of the nine attackers killed in the 3-day shoot-out, though the one captured alive has been accepted as a Pakistani national.

This is good work and, as we have said earlier in our editorials, concerned agencies in Pakistan have been on this case even before India officially sent in its dossier. Let it also be said that this work did not stop even when Indian officials began to threaten Pakistan with a military response. Pakistan kept its cool in the face of aggression by the Indian media and the government but obviously enhanced its air and ground vigilance against any possible Indian adventurism. Now, with Mr Malik’s statement, it should be obvious that India needed to have shown more patience because putting together the links of such an extensive and sophisticated plan needs time.

There are two other important factors that we have to keep in mind. One, without doubt, Mr Malik has disclosed less than what the investigators know at this stage and for sound reasons too. There are likely to be more strands that need to be identified. Investigators cannot, in most such cases, put everything on the table because it can compromise their work. Even now, Mr Malik has probably had to come on record on these disclosures because India has made this into a political game of blaming Pakistan. Something needed to be revealed to relieve the pressure on Pakistan by India. Two, even at this stage, there may not be enough evidence to stand in a court of law. Pakistan has been rightly pointing to this problem. Whenever this case goes to court, it being a criminal case, the onus of responsibility for proving it will lie on the prosecution, not the defence. Trial lawyers know how difficult that can be. There are innumerable cases where culprits have walked out despite pieces of incriminating but circumstantial evidence against them. Hence the evidence, even if circumstantial, must add up to become conclusive, or at least largely so. This is another aspect that makes the job of putting together a watertight case so tedious and difficult.

At this stage, however, it is evident that Pakistan has covered impressive distance in unearthing the broad strands of this plan. Given its efforts, we should expect more disclosures in the near future. There is also a requirement for India to cooperate with Pakistan, a fact that Islamabad has long stressed. The dossier itself is not enough.

So, the questions we have to ask are: What more does India know? When and how will it share this with Pakistan? Interestingly, an Indian team has gone to the US to share evidence with the FBI. That’s fine, but how about doing the same with Pakistan? Surely, India cannot continue to blame Pakistan and press for results without being fully cooperative. This is where politics comes in. New Delhi has already pressed the pause button on the normalisation process, depriving itself and Pakistan of the one mechanism for cooperation that could have helped matters. It now makes eminent sense that it should press the play button again so things can move forward. That’s what we are hoping for because there is no alternative to a dialogue framework. (Daily Times)

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Derailed de-radicalisation

Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Zeenia Satti

Just like the Afghan war was allowed to turn into Pakistan's civil war, similarly, the Mumbai attacks are likely to usher in civil unrest in Punjab. While events in neighbouring countries adversely impact Pakistan's domestic politics, the same are cited internationally as the manifestations of Pakistan failing as a state. Both Musharraf and Zardari have allowed their country's political milieu to be defined by outside powers. When a state allows its domestic political relations to be determined by outside powers, it brings upon itself the misfortune of losing control over its polity and becoming thus a failed state. The Pakistani incumbents have hurled their country down this slope lock stock and barrel.

Counter terrorism is an evolutionary process. All over the world, governments try to de-radicalise radical groups through facilitating disengagement from radicalism and promoting involvement with peaceful activities. Political discourse on de-radicalisation and counter terrorism is occupied with developing mechanisms for "disengagement" from radicalism through an "integrated" approach.

It would be to Pakistan's long term advantage if radical groups could be disengaged from cross border military pursuits and engaged instead in peaceful activities inside Pakistan. The eradication of poverty and hunger, the professionalization of down trodden youth, provision of health care, education, and shelter for the homeless are all fit subjects for jihad in Islam. If a radical organization has already established such activities in Pakistan, the state should lend it hearty support and protection while continuing to monitor its activities.

Demobilization and disengagement, as defined in political science, are the best antidote to terrorism. At present, many countries in the world are strategizing "disengagement from radicalism" at different levels, including Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, India, Algeria, Indonesia, Colombia, and Malaysia.

Unfortunately, while governments beset with terrorism elsewhere are painfully striving to set up disengagement programs, the Zardari government has just shut down such a program in Pakistan. The post Mumbai clamp down on JUD and the closure of its schools is a political blunder. The LeT's transformation into JUD is a model of disengagement countries faced with radical groups dream of achieving. Islamabad could have utilized the Mumbai attacks to demobilize the LeT by standing up for JUD and rendering it open to international scrutiny. It could have used its media to provide extensive coverage to JUD's civic activities and should have lent it whole hearted praise. This would not only have instilled in the JUD and its followers a heightened sense of patriotism, it would also have helped it purge those elements that are given to violence. To de-radicalise, one has to facilitate cooperative relations and capacity development. Mumbai could have been utilized to promote a change in JUD syllabus.

Mumbai challenged the political world view of jihadi groups that seek a solution to the Kashmir problem through terrorism. The fact that the Mumbai attacks had a severely negative bearing on the Kashmiri struggle should have been the "cognitive opening" used by Pakistan to divide a wedge between the LeT and the JUD, to the detriment of the former so as to completely dehydrate its military life line. Islamabad could then tackle the LeT leadership to New Delhi's satisfaction but without a negative fall out on itself. Through erudite policy, Islamabad could promote a fundamental change within all its militarized groups' political understanding of the Kashmir problem, facilitating the abandonment of their cross border ventures.

Ever since the CIA had Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto and his secular, progressive politics eliminated through Pakistan's military, Pakistan has been steadily infiltrated with religious groups who are funded by petro dollars and adhere to a reactionary version of Islam espoused by Saudi Arabia. The Islamisation of Pakistan has thus gone on imperceptibly for almost thirty years during which time reactionary groups have dotted the entire landscape of Pakistan. Yet, Pakistanis have never empowered religious parties in any of their general elections. It is now well established that the sole exception of the MMA victory in the 2002 election was a fraud perpetrated by the Musharraf regime.

Militarily, in the past the Islamist groups were never a threat to Pakistan as the focus of their activities remained Indian occupied Kashmir and Soviet Occupied Afghanistan. Since 9/11, both India and the U.S have launched a policy towards Pakistan that has not only intensified the militarization of radical groups within Pakistan but has also cleverly shifted their target to Islamabad. Islamabad is unwittingly abetting this policy.

The Pakistani Islamist groups have come into being over a long period of time and were sustained by regional developments. The same developments can be used to dismantle these groups but Pakistan needs time for this. Those who show no patience in this task are averse to Pakistan's internal cohesion.

Zardari is providing even more incentive then Musharraf to the radical groups to swell their ranks and shift the target of their militarism to Islamabad. Disillusionment, after much hope has been shattered, makes people turn away from democracy to other means. The longing for a leadership that addresses the emotional grievances of people is making the Pakistani youth vulnerable to extremism. Zardari has refused to fulfil a single hope of the anti Musharraf movement. When such a government launches punitive action against any group, it not only reinforces the group's clandestine camaraderie but even promotes camaraderie where none already exists. Islamabad could have used the Mumbai attacks to promote de-radicalisation in an erudite manner; instead, it has pursued policies that are more likely to radicalise and destabilise Punjab. (The News)


The writer is a consultant and analyst of energy geopolitics based in Washington DC. Email: zeenia.satti@yahoo.com
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Acting on the Mumbai dossier - By Praful Bidwai

Saturday, January 10, 2009 (The News)

Six weeks after the Mumbai attacks, the Indian government is still groping for a strategy to get Pakistan to crack down on Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and other extremists. The Pakistani government has finally admitted that Amir Ajmal is a Pakistani national--but only after unfairly sacking National Security Adviser Mahmud Ali Durrani for saying just that. Yet, important sections of Pakistan's establishment continue to deny that the attacks were masterminded from Pakistan, which must bring their perpetrators to justice. And while the likelihood of a military conflict has receded, it has certainly not disappeared. South Asia still stands close to the precipice. The irony of India's strategic confusion is that it's playing its diplomatic cards badly vis-à-vis Pakistan, just when it has collected high-quality evidence of the LeT's role in the Mumbai attacks. Its 69-page dossier contains vital details of real-time Nov 26-29 conversations between the assailants and Pakistan-based top-level LeT operators. Thus, a day after India officially presented the dossier to Pakistan, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh repeatedly accused it of using "terrorism as an instrument of state policy." He treated Pakistan as a homogeneous entity, charged it with "whipping up war hysteria" and blamed its "fragile" government, presumably including the civilian government, for the neighbourhood's "uncertain security environment": the "more fragile a government, the more it tends to act in an irresponsible fashion." This runs counter to the rationale of the India-Pakistan peace process and the Joint Anti-Terrorism Mechanism active since March 2007. It also makes nonsense of New Delhi's considered view, expressed in many briefings, that Pakistan's civilian government is keen on friendly relations with India and on acting against jihadi terrorists, and needs to be supported. Singh adduced no evidence to prove the Pakistani government's active involvement in the Mumbai attacks. His charges were based on a general political assessment, surmise or inference, similar to that drawn by Home Minister P Chidambaram--namely, "in a crime of this size and scale, I will presume that it was state-assisted, until the contrary is proved. I will draw an adverse inference…" Such inference fits past patterns in which the ISI diabolically instigated terrorist violence in Kashmir and Afghanistan while practising "plausible deniability." It may well hold true of Mumbai too, although there are persuasive hypotheses that suggest that the ISI's role may be confined to logistical support. However, the assessment must be specifically established in Mumbai's case. Singh levelled a serious charge based on a surmise unsupported by solid proof. This speaks of serious policy incoherence. If India's objective, as Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon put it, is to get Pakistan to further investigate the LeT's role in planning and executing the operation, then it's counterproductive to point fingers at Pakistan in ways which would put up even the civilian government back. If the goal is to discredit Pakistan, then it's pointless to share the dossier with it. This incoherence is partly explained by New Delhi's frustration with Pakistan's stonewalling tactics and attempt to divert international attention from Mumbai to the dangers of an India-Pakistan war. But this response isn't mature. The world still remains focused on Mumbai, not least because of the terrorists' ruthlessness and use of guns in public places. Again, India has publicly made demands upon Pakistan to surrender between 25 and 42 extremists, including recent fugitives and Khalistani terrorists of the 1980s--without having a legal forum enforce these, for instance through an extradition treaty. The Mumbai attacks are an ideal case for the International Criminal Court. But India and Pakistan have refused to sign the ICC's Rome Treaty on narrowly nationalist grounds. India can also evoke the 1987 SAARC Anti-Terrorism Convention, but hasn't. Pakistani leaders obtusely deny that the Mumbai attacks were directed from Pakistan and, more broadly, that the country bears responsibility for India's security. Even a cursory look at the dossier should reveal rich, unimpeachable evidence, including Global Positioning System and satellite-telephone signatures; transcripts of conversations between the attackers and their handlers; arms with Pakistani markings; virtual phone numbers generated over the Internet; and the associated money trails. This evidence is strong enough to bear legal scrutiny in any civilised country. The whole world knows that it's the LeT's self-proclaimed goal to attack civilians in countries like India and undermine their governments. Indeed, that's the purpose for which it was created. But how does India convince/pressure Pakistan to act against the LeT and dismantle the jihadi/secret agency infrastructure? Theoretically, there are four ways: armed coercion, mediation through the United States, persuasive bilateral diplomacy, and multilateral intervention through the United Nations Security Council. The first option must be ruled out altogether: it's fraught with the danger of a Nuclear Holocaust. India's conventional superiority over Pakistan isn't great enough for Islamabad to want to avert war, leave alone yield to India's demands. Besides, it would play straight into the hands of Al-Qaeda-Taliban, which wants an India-Pakistan conflict so that Pakistani troops can be moved away from the Afghanistan border, relieving pressure on them and allowing them to overrun a region that has become the epicentre of global terrorism. India is investing heavily, but unwisely, into the second option--virtually outsourcing to the US its own responsibility to engage with Pakistan, in the belief that Washington would somehow persuade/force Islamabad to act against jihadi extremists. This assumes that Washington has such exceptional strategic proximity with India that it'll turn against or discipline Pakistan. However, going by experience, Washington can act in ways that breed/promote terrorism, as it did in Afghanistan in the 1980s. The US may not even be an honest broker between India and Pakistan. Apart from the imbalance and myopia typical of US policy, there's a huge risk in greater US involvement in this region. President-elect Barrack Obama plans to intensify the Afghanistan war by doubling the number of US troops. This will increase the United States' dependence on the Pakistani Army, and downgrade India's anti-terrorist concerns. The wisest approach for India is bilateral diplomacy combined with a Security Council-centred multilateral strategy. Post-Mumbai, India and Pakistan have only conducted "megaphone diplomacy." India should have used Track-II approaches and quietly engaged Pakistani officials, sharing with them, and confronting them with, evidence against the LeT. But the Singh government has behaved as if Track-II can only work in peacetime, not during crises. Various crises, including the Vietnam War and the US-USSR détente of the 1970s, show that Track-II is useful in emergencies too. Many of our senior officials, including the just-sacked National Security Adviser Durrani, and India's special envoy on Kashmir, Satinder Lambah, are Track-II veterans, who can still be drafted to produce results. India should approach the Security Council under a slew of resolutions, from 1373 to 1566, which cast a duty on all states to act against terrorists, refuse to harbour them, and inform one another about their activities. Failure to do so can invite sanctions. If Pakistan fails to act, India can demand "smart sanctions" which don't hurt the masses, such as suspension of military aid, travel bans on state functionaries, and monitoring of progress of actions against terrorist groups. Creative diplomacy is the need of the hour. Indian and Pakistani civil-society groups have taken welcome initiatives to show it's both possible and necessary. The least our governments can do is to follow them. The writer, a former newspaper editor, is a researcher and peace and human-rights activist based in Delhi. Email: prafulbidwai1@yahoo.co.in

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India provides evidence of the Mumbai terrorist attacks to Pakistan....

A page from the dossier given to Pakistan

Dossier: handlers used virtual number to contact a mobile with one of the terrorists

Siddharth Varadarajan (The Hindu, Wednesday, Jan 07, 2009)


New Delhi: Amidst the clutter of telephone calls the Indian intelligence agencies were monitoring into and out of the Taj Mahal hotel on the night of the November 26 terrorist attack was one from a ‘virtual number’ – 12012531824 — generated by a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) telephony service based in the United States.

According to the dossier prepared by the Indian government outlining select details of what investigators have uncovered so far about last November’s Mumbai attacks, Pakistan-based “controllers/handlers used the virtual number to contact a mobile telephone with one of the terrorists. This conversation was intercepted and, thereafter, all calls made through the virtual number were also intercepted and recorded.”

Providing the first-ever details of the investigations into the VoIP account, the dossier says the virtual number was initially set up with a U.S. company, Callphonex, by an individual who identified himself as Kharak Singh from India.

The account was activated by a money gram transferred in the name of Mohammed Ashfaq. “Kharak Singh also requested Callphonex to assign five Austrian Direct Inward Dialling (DID) numbers because his clients called from different countries, including India,” the dossier says. The account was paid for by a money transfer of $238.78 through Western Union by one Javaid Iqbal who provided, as a form of identification, a Pakistani passport (No. KC 092481).

The dossier adds: “Investigations have revealed that Callphonex asked Kharak Singh if he was from India why the Western Union Transfer was coming from Pakistan.
No reply

Apparently, Callphonex received no reply. The VoIP interceptions yielded more evidence to Indian agencies as they revealed the use of three Austrian numbers “which were given to the terrorists by the controllers/handlers and conversations with these numbers by the terrorists were also intercepted and recorded,” the dossier notes.

These Austrian numbers, in turn, correspond to the DID numbers assigned by Callphonex to ‘Kharak Singh.’ The details of the VoIP account are one of multiple pieces of evidence the Indian government has laid out before Pakistan and all Delhi-based foreign envoys to prove its claim that the attacks on Mumbai were staged by elements from Pakistan.

Several ambassadors who were present at the region-wise briefings at the Ministry of External Affairs on Monday and Tuesday told The Hindu that they found the Indian dossier compelling. “It is fully in line with our own belief of how this incident was planned,” said one of the envoys from the group of 14 countries who lost citizens in the attacks.

In their oral presentations, Indian officials told the envoys of their belief that the ISI was indeed involved in the incident. Though this claim was not contested, at least one nation, the United States, has told India it is still not in a position to share this perception.

One of the transcripts contained in the dossier provides the answer to why the terrorists left their satellite phone behind on the Kuber with potentially incriminating data. “Did you open the locks for the water below,” a caller from Pakistan asked one of the terrorists at the Taj Hotel at 0126 hours on November 27, presumably in a reference to a pre-arranged plan to sink the trawler. “No, they did not open the locks. We left it like that because of being in a hurry. We made a big mistake,” the receiver of the phone call answered. “What big mistake?,” he was asked. “When we were getting into the boat, the waves were quite high. Another boat came. Everyone raised an alarm that the Navy had come. Everyone jumped quickly. In this confusion, the satellite phone of Ismail got left behind,” the terrorist replied. The dossier also notes in passing that the GPS set contained trackback points which “were the RV for their intended return after the attack.”

At Monday’s briefing for the 14 nations who lost citizens in the attack, one of the ambassadors asked Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon whether this meant the attack was perhaps not a suicide mission after all. Mr. Menon reportedly said that this was one of the issues which still needed to be probed.

The dossier also contains a second section in which India has attempted to draw attention to the contradictory nature of Pakistan’s response to the Mumbai attacks, Pakistan’s failure to respond appropriately to Indian requests for cooperation when evidence was provided to it about terrorist acts in the past, and an outline of Pakistan’s bilateral and international commitments and obligations.

The last section of the dossier contains an outline of what India expects Pakistan to do in the wake of the Mumbai attacks. “This was a conspiracy launched from Pakistan. Gaps in knowledge can be filled by investigation and interrogation of conspirators there,” the dossier states, adding, “Some of the actions that India expects Pakistan to undertake in extending cooperation to bring the terrorists to justice are: Hand over conspirators to face justice in India, hand over fugitives from Indian law based in Pakistan, Dismantle infrastructure of terrorism, Prevent terrorist acts from Pakistan, Adhere to and implement bilateral, multilateral and international obligations.”

The dossier notes that on the basis of the interrogation of Mohammed Ajmal Amir ‘Kasab,’ the lone terrorist to be captured alive, the role of Lashkar commander Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi in the training of the crew had been established. The terrorist group initially consisted of 32 persons but the team chosen for the operation was eventually whittled down to 10.

Other LeT commanders involved were Abu Hamza, ‘Kaahfa,’ and Yousuf alias Muzammil, the dossier says. Among the material evidence India has in its possession is the 11-seater inflatable dinghy the terrorists used to move from the hijacked trawler, Kuber, to Mumbai.

“An attempt was made by the terrorists to erase the engine number but it has been retrieved by investigators. The outboard motor number is 67 CL-1020015, manufactured by Yamaha Motor Corporation and imported into Pakistan and distributed by a company named ‘Business & Engineering Trends’ in Lahore.” Several items including toiletries, food articles, drums containing diesel and clothes “bear clear evidence of having been manufactured in Pakistan.” Photographs of all these items are provided in an annexure.

The transcripts in the dossier make it apparent that the six handlers were closely monitoring events in Mumbai through the live TV coverage which went on non-stop for 60 hours. “There are three ministers and one secretary of the cabinet in your hotel. We don’t know in which room,” a Pakistan-based caller tells a terrorist at the Taj at 0310 hrs on November 27. “Oh! That is good news” It is the icing on the cake!,” he replies. “Find those 3-4 persons and then get whatever you want from India,” he is instructed. “Pray that we find them,” he answers.

At the Oberoi at 0353 hrs on November 27, a handler phones and says:

“Brother Abdul. The media is comparing your action to 9/11. One senior police official has been killed.”

Abdul Rehman: “We are on the10th/11th floor. We have five hostages.”

Caller 2 (Kafa): Everything is being recorded by the media. Inflict the maximum damage. Keep fighting. Don’t be taken alive.

Caller: Kill all hostages, except the two Muslims. Keep your phone switched on so that we can hear the gunfire.

Fahadullah: We have three foreigners, including women. From Singapore and China.

Caller: Kill them. The dossier then notes that the telephone intercept records the “voices of Fahadullah and Abdul Rehman directing hostages to stand in a line, and telling two Muslims to stand aside. Sound of gunfire. Cheering voices in background. Kafa hands telephone to Zarar,” who says, “Fahad, find the way to go downstairs.”

In another call, to the Taj this time, a handler says, “The ATS chief has been killed. Your work is very important. Allah is helping you. The Vazir (minister) should not escape. Try and set the place on fire.”

At Nariman House at 1945 hrs on November 27, the handler ‘Wassi’ tells a terrorist: “Keep in mind that hostages are of use only as long as you do not come under fire because of their safety. If you are still threatened, then don’t saddle yourself with the burden of the hostages. Immediately kill them.” He then adds, “The Army claims to have done the work without any hostage being harmed. Another thing: Israel has made a request through diplomatic channels to save the hostages. If the hostages are killed, it will spoil relations between India and Israel.”

“So be it, God willing,” the terrorist replies.

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Telephone trail key part of evidence shared with Pakistan

Siddharth Varadarajan (The Hindu, Jan 07, 2009)

Indian dossier blames Lashkar, makes no mention of ISI



EVIDENCE: Among images included in the dossier on Pakistani links to the Mumbai terror attacks are those of (clockwise from top left) GPS equipment recovered from the Taj Mahal Palace; a 9-mm pistol with Peshawar markings found at one of the scenes of crime; and a packet of Pakistan-made milk powder found in the vessel Kuber.

New Delhi: The evidentiary dossier given to Pakistan on Monday marks the first systematic Indian presentation of what ongoing investigations into the Mumbai terrorist attacks have revealed so far.

Though many of the facts about how the attacks were staged have been known for some time now, the 69-page document — a copy of which is with The Hindu — provides crucial details about the telephone links between the attackers and Lashkar-e-Taiba operatives and identifies for the first time the names of six “Pakistan-based handlers” who were constantly in touch with the gunmen even as they wreaked havoc in the city during the November 26-29, 2008 incidents.

According to the dossier, the handlers who provided real-time commando-style advice to the terrorists holed up at the Taj Mahal and Oberoi hotels and Nariman House were ‘Wassi,’ ‘Zarar,’ ‘Jundal,’ ‘Buzurg, ‘Major General’ and ‘Kafa.’ Though the dossier does not identify any of the six as a functionary or operative of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence, Indian officials say the links and affiliations of some of the aliases used by the handlers in their intercepted phone conversations with the terrorists have left New Delhi in no doubt about the involvement of the ISI in the attacks.

The government has prepared two versions of the dossier, one for the 14 countries which lost citizens in the attacks and a slightly redacted edition for Pakistan and the rest of the world. Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon handed over the dossier to ambassadors from the 14 countries on Monday. And on Tuesday, senior officials from the Ministry of External Affairs briefed envoys from other countries with diplomatic representation in India, including European, Middle Eastern and Latin American nations.

The dossier consists of a 13-page presentation of the main facts of the case and an outline of the evidence generated by the investigation to date. This evidence is then laid out further in a set of annexures.

The evidence includes eight partial transcripts of selected intercepted conversations between the terrorists and their handlers, data from the GPS equipment recovered from the fishing trawler, Kuber, photographs of ordnance used in the attack and items of daily use recovered from the Kuber, all with clearly identified Pakistani markings, and, most crucially, an account of the money trail linking Pakistan-based operatives to the purchase of the Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) calling platform used by the handlers to try and mask their physical location.

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A scanned copy of the 69-page dossier

This is a scanned copy of the 69-page dossier of material stemming from the ongoing investigation into the Mumbai terrorist attacks of November 26-29, 2008 that was handed over by India to Pakistan on January 5, 2009.

Evidence 1

Evidence 2

Evidence 3

Evidence 4

http://www.hindu.com/nic/dossier.htm

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Indian military retaliation would play straight into LeT’s hands. - Praful Bidwai

There is no military option

by Praful Bidwai

Ultimately, it wasn’t superior firepower, sophisticated interception methods or commando training that explains how one of the Mumbai attackers was arrested alive. The key to that feat lies in the great courage shown by the city’s policemen in overpowering Mohammed Ajmal Amir Iman (Kasab) with nothing more than lathis after his accomplice Abu Ismail was killed.

Assistant sub-Inspector Tukaram Ombale held on to the barrel of Kasab’s gun even as he took a burst of fire and pounced on the man, allowing his colleagues to arrest him. Ombale died, but his bravery ensured that a key participant in the attack would live to tell the tale.

Kasab’s arrest is unique in the annals of anti-terrorist operations anywhere. His interrogation has produced invaluable evidence about the preparation for and execution of the attack.

Kasab must be tried scrupulously fairly and with full respect for his right to legal defence. A lawyer of unimpeachable competence must be drafted to defend him. His conviction cannot be a foregone conclusion merely because of the attack’s barbarity. His guilt must be proved on the highest norms of criminal law.

After Kasab’s disclosures to the police, there can be little doubt that Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba carried out the attack after putting recruits through rigorous training and ideological-political indoctrination for almost a year. The Pakistani media has since verified Kasab’s home address, and interviewed his father in Faridkot village in Punjab’s Okara district. The international community has confirmed the LeT’s involvement through the ban imposed on its sister organisation, Jamaat-ud-Daawa, by the United Nations Security Council under Resolution 1267.

The LeT isn’t just another jehadi group. It has had a special relationship with Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency. Unlike other groups such as Jaish-e-Mohammed, which are Deobandi, the LeT is Salafist and doesn’t believe in fighting governments in Islamic countries. The LeT doesn’t actively oppose the army’s anti-Taliban-Al-Qaeda operations at the Afghanistan border.

It’s not clear if the ISI or its “rogue” elements logistically supported the Mumbai attack. But it’s reasonably plain that the attackers’ main motive was to provoke a military response from India, which would cause a troops build-up at Pakistan’s eastern border. This would create a rationale for redeploying Pakistani troops from the western border—where they face considerable pressure from US-Pakistan operations—to the Indian border. This would allow Al Qaeda-Taliban fighters to regroup and overrun large swathes of Afghanistan and Pakistan

Secondarily, the attackers’ motive was to increase disaffection among Indian Muslims and provoke a backlash—to further help extremism. Mercifully, this hasn’t happened—despite the Sangh Parivar. The attacks have triggered unprecedented Hindu-Muslim unity and a spirited condemnation of terrorism by an overwhelming majority of India’s Muslim organisations.

Indian military retaliation would play straight into LeT’s hands. This would further destabilise Pakistan, which is already in a precarious condition, to the point of unravelling its state—with disastrous consequences for the whole region. The Indian government has acted with restraint and used diplomatic, not military, means to deal with the crisis. On December 11, Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee underscored this approach. In response to a demand for attacking Pakistan, he said: “That is not the point….I am making it quite clear that that is not the solution. Let us be very clear and frank that that is no solution.”

The meaning of the military option, advocated stridently by hawkish “strategic experts” and by Bharatiya Janata Party MPs like Arun Shourie should be plain. Shourie wants India to target Pakistan’s vital installations and keep Pakistan “preoccupied”, presumably through covert action, with its “own problems in Balochistan, in Gilgit, Baltistan”, etc. He said: “Not an eye for an eye; but for an eye, both eyes. For a tooth, (the) whole jaw.”

This is an insane prescription. Any India-Pakistan conflict is liable to escalate into nuclear war. In Nuclear Armageddon, there are no winners—only mega-deaths.

Even a limited nuclear exchange will kill millions of civilians in both countries. The economic and environmental damage will set us back by decades. A single Hiroshima/Nagasaki-type bomb will kill 8 to 20 lakh people in a big city. India and Pakistan both have scores of such bombs, indeed even more powerful ones.

In every conceivable war-gaming scenario—and many credible ones exist —, an India-Pakistan conflict has one inevitable outcome: full-scale war, in which Pakistan won’t hesitate to use nuclear weapons if it fears loss of territory. This will invite nuclear retaliation from India, with consequences too horrifying even to contemplate.

No leader has the moral right or political mandate to sacrifice millions of civilians. Only extremists with apocalyptic visions like RSS chief KS Sudarshan believe nuclear war is acceptable.

He recently told an interviewer: “Whenever the demons (Asuri powers) start dominating this planet, there is no way other than war…I know it will not stop there. It will be a nuclear war and a large number of people will perish. But … let me say with confidence that after this destruction, a new world will emerge, which will be very good, free from evil and terrorism.”

It’s dangerous to imagine that the threat of war can compel Pakistan into acting decisively against extremist groups. Indeed, Pakistan will respond with even greater bellicosity.

The idea of “surgical strikes” against terrorist training camps is equally harebrained. LeT camps are makeshift affairs, and poor candidate-targets for strikes. Any strike, however “limited”, will invite armed conflict. Pakistan isn’t Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, which the US could attack without fear of resistance because it crippled all military communications. Even covert action, which will require the creation of a new monster—”India’s own ISI”—will trigger escalation.

But there are alternatives. Manmohan Singh outlined a two-pronged approach: galvanising international opinion for effective action against terrorism, and persisting with diplomatic pressure on Pakistan. Domestically, he promised reform of internal security arrangements. US and UK pressure has already led to a ban on JuD. But India must develop a broader multilateral approach to avert getting drawn into Washington’s parochial plans for the region.

The best strategy would be to press Pakistan through UN Security Council Resolution 1373, under which sanctions can be imposed on a state that fails to “deny safe haven to those who finance, plan, support, or commit terrorist acts…” and violates its duty to “refrain from providing … support… to entities or persons involved in terrorist acts…”.

Bilaterally, India can achieve much by sharing evidence of the LeT’s role in the Mumbai attacks with Pakistan, and acting demonstrably to defuse suspicions about its covert operations in Balochistan and Afghanistan.

While revamping India’s internal security system, the Singh government should have followed the advice of Chief Justice KG Balakrishnan against using “questionable methods such as permitting indefinite detention of terror suspects…coercive interrogation techniques and the denial of the right to fair trial”, and his plea for “substantive due process”.

Regrettably, it has done the very opposite by having a law passed which replicates all the obnoxious provisions, including detention without charges for 180 days, of the discredited Prevention of Terrorism Act—except for making police confessions admissible as evidence. The National Investigative Agency Act too has flaws, including overcentralisation of powers, and their illegitimate extension to areas affected by insurgency and Left-wing extremism. These Acts must be undone.

The writer, a former newspaper editor, is a researcher and peace and human-rights activist based in Delhi. Email: prafulbidwai1@yahoo.co.in

Friday, December 26, 2008 (The News)
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Media war and India-Pakistan tension

As the world worries about India and Pakistan going to war over the Mumbai attack of November 26, 2008, Pakistan is all set to take on India if it attacks. Defence ministry officials in Islamabad, responding to an intelligence report saying India had prepared for a war with Pakistan, were quoted by the press Saturday as saying “Pakistan is not afraid of India’s preparations for war” and that “the Pakistan Army has been making its own preparations for a possible war”.

Anyone outside South Asia would be shocked at this kind of news. Both India and Pakistan are nuclear powers and any conflict between them is bound to escalate into a holocaust for the region. Then why are the two sides hyping up a conflict neither can afford? What is pushing them to the edge, if it cannot be reason and good sense?

It is clear that the Indian media is setting the stage for the Indian Congress-UPA government to put on the warpaint or take a defeat in the coming elections to a more jingoist BJP. The Nepalese journal Himal (December 2008) wrote: “There is an attempt on to generate mass hysteria in India as television channels compete for ratings. The channels are using the Bombay attacks of last week in a dangerous game of TRP-upmanship [TV’s target-rating point] which can well derail the political process and set back the India-Pakistan peace train. Going far beyond what is required of them even in times of crisis, some media houses are leading campaigns to get citizens to take pledges of patriotism. They are pushing a brittle, monochromatic vision of the resilient country we know as India”.

Sane voices in India are also worried. Shekhar Gupta, editor of Indian Express, noting the way the TV anchors in India were getting savagely emotional, wrote to advise the two sides to bring down the temperature of the media war: “This hostility must end and senior media people on both sides, particularly editors, need to intervene before this great professional bond starts to fray. Journalists are of course loyal to their countries, but are never to be held accountable for their governments’ policies. They can neither be framing state policies, nor be their spokesmen, and certainly not be waging wars...It is time media institutions and senior editors from both sides intervened and ensured it does not get out of control”.

In Pakistan the “reactive” assault by the media has brought out the dark side of the Pakistani state, oblivious of any strategy of restraint and more worried about how bad the government will appear in the eyes of the people overwhelmed by the anti-Indian fury of key TV anchors and newspapers columnists. One senior columnist laid down the terrain on which the war of the anchors and columnists is being fought when he said there were only two kinds of journalism, one for the country and the other for one’s self. But what about the facts?

Daily Jang (December 13, 2008) reported that its team went to Faridkot in Okara to inquire whether the terrorist caught in Mumbai Ajmal Amir Kasab was an inhabitant of the village. According to the report it was greeted at first with cover-up stories. Then a villager disclosed that Ajmal had disappeared but when he came back he showed off his physical prowess and taught karate to village children. More and more people reportedly started complaining that intelligence agencies were actively discouraging people from telling the truth. The president of the local press club said if Ajmal was not from the village, why were the secret agencies putting pressure on the village? People said the terrorists were not only bothering India but had made life hell for Pakistanis too.

This report seemed to substantiate the contents of an earlier report about Faridkot in London’s Observer. But then some TV channels went to Faridkot and reported that Ajmal Kasab had not lived there. Other reports told us how the villagers of Faridkot were out in processions saying no Ajmal Kasab had actually existed. What then are the facts? India initially said it was in the process of putting the evidence together. Now, its external affairs minister says his country has given evidence to Pakistan but Islamabad is not acting against the culprits on the basis of that information. The Interior secretary, Kamal Shah, was quoted by Nawa-e-Waqt (December 14, 2008) as saying that the captured terrorist Kasab was not on the record of NADRA and he did not possess a Pakistani ID card.

The entire issue has got mired in politics and nationalistic sparring. The “pause” in normalisation means the only framework in and through which India and Pakistan were moving forward and could, under the circumstances, is now in abeyance. And just when the two sides needed it the most to not only tackle the Mumbai episode but by agreeing to contextualise the problem of “terrorism” move towards a lasting solution of the problem. Now sane voices in India are asking their media to cool off; in Pakistan too sane voices must start speaking up so the issue can be put in the proper perspective. * (Daily Times, 22 Dec 2008)
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The most damaging aspect of the jihadi infrastructure has been at the domestic level, as we have been transformed into a violence-prone society...

In our own interest — Talat Masood

Strategies and policies have to change in accordance with current realities. It may have been expedient to pursue foreign and defence policy through the use of proxies in the 1980s and 1990s, but not any more

The Mumbai attacks, if not handled properly, could shake the very foundations of the Indo-Pak peace process, and shatter once again hopes of normalisation between the two countries. In fact, with voices calling for a strong Indian response to Pakistan’s alleged involvement get louder, a serious crisis has emerged. The greatest challenge for the leaders of the two countries is to manage this growing crisis so that it does not escalate into a full-blown conflict, because then all that has been gained the last five years through the peace process would be lost. Every effort should be made to de-escalate tensions and ensure that we are not guided by a false sense of nationalism that invariably leads to confrontation.

To begin with, New Delhi and Islamabad have to fully cooperate, by sharing information and assisting each other, to track down the perpetrators of terrorism. Pakistan has a serious predicament in that it cannot appear to be ‘dictated’ by India, and yet would like to cooperate. It is for this reason that Islamabad keeps insisting on authentic evidence.

New Delhi has its own reasons for refusing to share evidence, fearing its sources would be compromised. New Delhi also claims that it provided sufficient information about the bombing of its embassy in Kabul earlier this year, but Pakistan failed to respond. Pakistan, of course, rejects these allegations.

Charges and counter-charges have become a part of the unfortunate relationship between India and Pakistan. Essentially, it is a question of trust, which regrettably is lacking between the two. But both countries have to disentangle themselves from the stereotypical thought processes and develop consensus on getting to the bottom of the Mumbai terrorist attacks as well as the larger problem of terrorism in the region, as terrorism is clearly a common enemy.

With advances in forensics and other investigation technologies, it should not be difficult to track down the assailants. In the event that there are linkages to elements in Pakistan, as alleged by India and seemingly confirmed by international sources, it is as much in our interest that they are brought to justice. And if it turns out that the crime was committed by homegrown terrorists in India, or in collaboration with them, which is likely, then both countries should cooperate to bring them to justice.

There is not a place in the world where Pakistan is not in the news, and not for good reasons. Pakistan’s credibility has sunk extremely low in the eyes of the international community, and only genuine and transparent cooperation along with multiple measures in other areas will rehabilitate our image.

In India, opinion is divided as to what line of action should be taken against Pakistan. Those favouring caution are of the view that it is in India’s long-term interest to have a democratic stable Pakistan. Only a democratically elected government can eventually defeat the forces of radicalism in Pakistan. They also realise that the current democratic dispensation is extremely fragile and a conflict will India will destabilise it, paving the way for a return to military rule. The counter-view is that for India, it is immaterial whether there is authoritarian or democratic rule in Pakistan, and Indian security interests are best served by launching a military operation and destroying the jihadi infrastructure.

Lessons from the 2001-02 escalation and the current political and economic realities, in all likelihood, will prevent the two sides from going to war. The United States, of course, is a major player, and is using its influence to defuse tensions as it fears that in the event of escalation, Pakistan will divert troops from the western front to the eastern border, which may adversely affect the fight against the Taliban and Al Qaeda in the tribal areas.

Meanwhile, there is mounting pressure from India and the international community on Pakistan to destroy or disable jihadi infrastructure — training camps, indoctrination cells, leading cadres and sources of funding. There has been a stream of high profile visitors to Islamabad to maintain this pressure. There are doubts as to whether Pakistan is unwilling or incapable of taking such action. Moreover, this is scepticism as to whether or not President Asif Zardari has the authority and power to shut down these militant outfits; this scepticism relates to our skewed civil-military relationship. As long as these training camps exist, and non-state entities operate freely in Pakistan, developing trust with India and gaining international credibility is not possible.

In any case, the civilian and military leadership has to do some serious introspection about the cost-benefit ratio of these outdated and failed policies. Has Pakistan come any closer to achieving its objectives in Jammu & Kashmir by supporting militancy and proxies? On the contrary, the recent indigenous and autonomous uprising in the Valley served Kashmiri interests far better by arousing the Indian conscience and attracting international attention. The best option for Pakistan is to strictly confine its support to the Kashmir cause to the political and diplomatic domain.

The most damaging aspect of the jihadi infrastructure has been at the domestic level, as we have been transformed into a violence-prone society, and have become the object of international disrepute. This policy needs to be reviewed irrespective of the findings and outcome of the current crisis.

Demobilisation of these groups is a huge challenge, and will require adroit handling. Merely banning these militant organisations will not make them disappear. In fact, they would simply go underground and pose an even greater threat. The Jama’at-ud Dawa ostensibly has an extensive social services network whose tasks the government and other benign NGOs will have to take up. Most importantly, the militants will have to be demotivated and rehabilitated by providing them alternate means of livelihood.

We cannot afford to ignore world pressure and remain oblivious to our national interests any more. Strategies and policies have to change in accordance with current realities. It may have been expedient to pursue foreign and defence policy through the use of proxies in the 1980s and 1990s, but not any more. In case we fail to act, international powers in collusion with regional forces will continue to pressurise and destabilise us.

The writer is a retired Lieutenant General of the Pakistan Army. He can be reached at talat@comsats.net.pk
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