Quote:
Originally Posted by Ret10Echo
Pakistani Official: Terror Mastermind Caught
Monday, December 08, 2008
The official said Monday that Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi was among at least 12 people detained after a raid Sunday on a camp run by the banned militant group Laskhar-e-Taiba in Pakistan's part of Kashmir.
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But the same official later said that even though about a dozen people had been arrested in the raid at the camp, the suspect, Zaki ur-Rehman Lakhvi, had not been arrested.
Pakistan Raids Group Linked to Attacks
JANE PERLEZ and SALMAN MASOOD, NYT
8 Dec 2008
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — The authorities in Pakistan have raided a camp run by the Pakistani-based militant group suspected by Indian and American officials of conducting the Mumbai attacks, a Pakistani official and an American military official said.
In the first hours after news of the raid emerged on Pakistani television and in news agencies, a senior Pakistani security official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that a man suspected of being the mastermind of the Mumbai attacks had been arrested.
But the same official later said that even though about a dozen people had been arrested in the raid at the camp, the suspect, Zaki ur-Rehman Lakhvi, had not been arrested.
The Pakistani military acknowledged that the raid had taken place, saying in a statement that an operation was under way against a “banned” militant organization, and that there had been a number of arrests. The operation appeared to be Pakistan’s first concrete response to demands by India and the United States that it take action against the militants suspected of orchestrating the Mumbai attacks.
Mr. Lakhvi has been accused by India of being in control of the attackers in Mumbai as they terrorized the city during a three-day siege last month in which 163 people were killed.
Indian and Western investigators said he commanded the attack and then kept in communication with the gunmen by mobile and satellite phone as they rounded up guests in two hotels, killing some of them.
Mr. Lakhvi is an operational leader of Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistani militant group that long focused on the disputed territory of Kashmir.
A spokesman for Lashkar-e-Taiba said Monday that Pakistani security forces had launched a crackdown on his group in Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistani-administered Kashmir, but did not say anything specific about who or how many people had been detained.
“Pakistani troops have unleashed the attack under pressure from India and the United States,” the spokesman, Abdullah Gaznabi, said by phone from an undisclosed location. “We have already made it clear that the Lashkar has nothing to do with the recent attacks in Mumbai and by constantly trying to drag our organization’s name into these is nothing but to malign it."
He also cautioned the Pakistani government against sacrificing the Kashmir cause under pressure from abroad. “Being Kashmiris, it is our right to use any part of the territory of Jammu and Kashmir for our just freedom struggle,” he said.
The Pakistani government on Monday issued a statement saying it wanted to be part of a joint investigation into the Mumbai assault with India, a suggestion the Pakistanis made last week.
The Pakistani authorities offered to send a “high level” delegation to India to join such an investigation, the foreign secretary, Salman Bashir, said.
The offer to dispatch the delegation came after a meeting Monday of the Defense Council of the Cabinet, a civilian body that includes the army chief of staff, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani. The council is a longstanding body that had not been used during the rule of the former president, Pervez Musharraf. But it convened after the National Security Council, a military body, was abolished last week by the country’s new civilian government.
And so it goes...
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