New Delhi: India has expressed its
"disappointment" over Pakistan's delay in bringing the
perpetrators of Mumbai terror attack to justice, saying "real
investigation" has not taken place in that country.
Home Secretary Gopal K Pillai said the prosecution
attempt in Pakistan to bring the 26/11 guilty to justice "has
not moved an inch" and India's request for providing the voice
samples of the handlers of the attackers has fallen on deaf
ears.
When Home Minister P Chidambaram asked for action
against the 26/11 perpetrators and voice samples of handlers
of the attackers during his Islamabad visit last year, his
Pakistani counterpart Rehman Malik told him that "you would
not be disappointed by our response".
But, Pillai said that "seven months down the line,
there is no Pakistani response. We are disappointed."
No key person, who was actually involved in the 2008
Mumbai terror strikes or giving directions to the attackers,
has been arrested. Only second or third-level conspirators
were put behind the bars.
"That is not the real investigation. From the steps so far taken by Pakistan, we would say
we are quite pessimistic because when the Home Minister was in
Islamabad, the Interior Minister actually told him that he
would respond," he said.
Indian investigators have transcripts of the recorded
conversations between the terrorists at each of the sites of
the attacks and their handlers based in Pakistan.
India has given the names, photographs and addresses
of the handlers and Pakistan just need to check out their
voices.
"If they give voice samples to us and if these match
with what we have, then we would know that this guy was
sitting in Pakistan and directing the operations in Mumbai.”
"You don't need any further proof," Pillai said.
On the eve of the second anniversary of the Mumbai
terror attacks in November last year, India had conveyed to
Pakistan that "substantive and verifiable" progress has not
been made in the probe into Mumbai attacks case in that
country.
Asking Islamabad to fulfill its "obligation and
commitment" to bring to justice the perpetrators of the 26/11
carnage, India had regretted that no feedback has been
received on several issues raised by New Delhi.
This included voice samples of Pakistan-based
"handlers" of the 10 terrorists who attacked Mumbai and
information about seven persons involved in the attacks whose
names were given by Chidambaram during his meeting with Malik
in June in Islamabad.
The names of seven "handlers" involved in terror
attacks included that of two officers in the Pakistani Army.
New Delhi had also conveyed to Islamabad that it wants
to send a commission to Pakistan to question jailed LeT
terrorists, including Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, and to get voice
samples of the masterminds who were present in the control
room directing the attackers.
PTI
First Published: Sunday, January 16, 2011, 17:28