Indian police name 'Mumbai attackers'

10 Dec 2008, 6:30 am   -   Source: AFP
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Indian police have released the names of nine suspected gunmen killed in the Mumbai attacks, all of them from Pakistan.

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Indian police have released the names of nine suspected gunmen killed in their deadly attacks on Mumbai, reiterating that all of them came from Pakistan.

Police also released passport pictures and shots of attackers after they were killed. One gunman's photograph was not released as his body was badly damaged.
  
Senior police official Rakesh Maria also released the names of the places the attackers came from.

The information about the gunmen was obtained from the only attacker who was captured alive and is now in police custody.

"All of them were given aliases during training to prevent them from knowing each others original names," Maria told reporters.

The surviving gunman learnt of the names and districts of other militants during the three days when they sailed from Pakistan to India.

LeT behind attacks: India

India says the hardline Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) group, which is based in Pakistan despite being banned by the government, is behind last month's bloodshed in which 163 people were killed during a 60-hour siege.

Relations between the nuclear-armed rivals have soured and India has said it was keeping all options open.

Pakistan won't hand suspects to India

Pakistan has arrested 16 people since Saturday but has said it would nothand over any suspects in the Mumbai attacks to India.   

Pakistan has also detained LeT's operations director, Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, and the head of another Islamic group fighting Indian rule in Kashmir, its Defence Minister Ahmad Mukhtar said on Tuesday.

Pakistan 'ready for war'

"We do not want to impose war but we are fully prepared in case war is imposed on us," Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said.

"We are not oblivious to our responsibilities to defend our homeland. But it is our desire that there should be no war."

Qureshi said he was sending "a very clear message" that his country did not want conflict with India.

"We want friendship, we want peace and we want stability -- but our desire for peace should not be considered Pakistan's weakness."

Extradition 'out of the question'

The minister said India's demands for the extradition of suspects in the Mumbai attacks were out of the question and that Pakistan, which has arrested 16 people since Saturday, would keep them on home soil.

"The arrests are being made for our own investigations. Even if allegations are proved against any suspect, he will not be handed over to India," Qureshi said. "We will proceed against those arrested under Pakistani laws."

India and Pakistan have fought three wars since independence from Britain and nearly came to a fourth in 2001 after an attack on the Indian parliament that was blamed on Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), which means Army of the Pious.

US steps in

US President George W Bush vowed to help Pakistan fight extremists in its remote tribal areas but said he would also "do what is necessary" to blunt any threats from the region.

Under international pressure to act, Pakistan on Sunday raided a camp run by a charity, Jamaat-ud-Dawa, that many believe has close links to Lashkar-e-Taiba, and arrested 15 people.

Jamaat-ud-Dawa is headed by LeT's founder Hafiz Saeed.

Pakistan has also detained LeT's operations director, Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, and the head of another Islamic group fighting Indian rule in Kashmir,  Defence Minister Ahmad Mukhtar said Tuesday.

Lakhvi 'a key planner'

Indian media say the lone surviving attacker named Lakhvi as a key planner behind the Mumbai attacks.

"Lakhvi was picked up yesterday (Monday). Azhar has also been picked up," Mukhtar told India's CNN-IBN channel, referring to Maulana Masood Azhar, head of the Jaish-e-Mohammed rebel group. Security officials had earlier suggested Lakhvi was arrested on Saturday.

Azhar was captured by Indian security forces in Indian Kashmir in 1995 but freed by New Delhi in 1999 in return for the safe release of more than 160 passengers on board a hijacked Indian Airlines plane.

He is reported to be on a list of people India last week asked Pakistan to extradite in the wake of the Mumbai attacks.

Pakistan 'committed to fighting terrorism'

In a commentary published Tuesday in the New York Times, Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari said the arrests were proof that his country was committed to fighting terrorism.

The LeT has been banned by Pakistan, but India accuses Islamabad of not cracking down on the group, which was established to fight Indian rule in Kashmir and has past links to Pakistani intelligence services and Al-Qaeda.

Two of the three India-Pakistan wars were fought over disputed Kashmir, which is controlled in part but claimed in whole by both nations, and the United States in particular has urged calm after the bloodshed in Mumbai.

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