Author: PTI
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: January 1, 2011
URL: http://www.dailypioneer.com/307706/Headley-was-a-Pakistani-spy-working-for-ISI-Report.html
LeT operative David Headley, who scouted targets
in Mumbai for 26/11 attacks, was a Pakistani spy working for ISI, whose chief
Lt Gen Ahmed Shuja Pasha was possibly aware of the plot to strike India's
financial hub, claims an investigative news report.
"In essence, US and Indian officials
say, Headley was more than a terrorist: he served as a Pakistani spy,"
investigative American journalist Sebastian Rotella wrote in 'ProPublica.Com'.
Investigation into the Mumbai terrorist attacks
by the US and Indian agencies, the news report said, has for the first time
given a detailed account of how Pakistan's powerful ISI has been playing the
"double game": acting as a front-line US ally in the fight against
terror while supporting selected terrorist groups which serve Pakistani interests.
Documents about Mumbai attacks investigation
in possession with ProPublica.Com, have built a strong case that officers
in Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Directorate collaborated with
the Lashkar-e-Toiba terrorist group in the plot that killed 166 people, six
of them Americans, Sebastian wrote.
"Officials from both countries (India
and the US) say they are persuaded that ISI officers recruited and trained
Headley in spying techniques and gave him money and instructions to scout
targets in Mumbai and elsewhere.
"Headley has told investigators that
a Pakistani Navy frogman helped plan the maritime attack on Mumbai,"
the news report said citing a 119-page report recounting his interrogation
this year by Indian authorities.
The report, which was obtained by ProPublica,
quoted Headley as saying his Pakistani intelligence handler took part in a
discussion about a subsequent Lashkar plot to attack a Danish newspaper --
information that Pakistan did not share with Danish authorities, it said.
While the allegations have been denied by
Pakistani authorities, according to ProPublica, US investigators see much
of Headley's account as credible.
In a potentially significant revelation, ProPublica
reports that Headley said Lt Gen Pasha, the director general of the ISI, went
to see Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, the LeT military chief, in custody after he was
arrested post-26/11.
"Pasha had visited him to understand
the Mumbai attack conspiracy," the report quoted Headley as saying, without
further elaboration.
"Pakistani officials deny that the spymaster
made the jailhouse visit. US and Indian officials and experts are more willing
to believe the story," it said.
"I think Pasha was aware of the plot
beforehand, or he is not chief of the ISI," an Indian counter-terror
official was quoted as saying.
