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| Headley, Rana being probed for involvement in 26/11 attacks |
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Friday, November 20, 2009
By Sami Abraham
WASHINGTON: Two former students of Cadet College Hasan Abdal, currently living in Chicago, are being investigated for their possible involvement in Mumbai attacks last year in which more than 160 people were killed.
The case is one of the first criminal cases in which the US authorities claim to have directly linked terrorism suspects in the United States to a former Pakistani military officer. According to the US officials David Coleman Headley and Tahawwur Hussain Rana were arrested last month for allegedly planning an attack on a Danish newspaper, which published cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) in 2005.
However the investigation have been widened into a global terrorism inquiry that has led to arrests and implication of a former Pakistani military officer. US intelligence officials, in past, have repeatedly accused that some Pakistani military and intelligence officials encourage terrorists to attack what they see as Pakistan ‘s enemies, including targets in India.
John Theis, a lawyer for Headley, and Patrick W. Blegen, a lawyer for Rana, would not comment on who was suspected of being the co-conspirator or other matters in the case. Randall Samborn, a spokesman for the office of United States attorney in Chicago, also declined to comment. Headley and Rana are in custody pending further proceedings. Each is scheduled to appear at a detention hearing in early December.
A spokesman for the Pakistani Embassy here also declined to comment, citing the continuing inquiry. The US officials maintain that Headley, who changed his name from Daood Gilani in 2006, is a United States citizen who lived in Pakistan but recently was mainly a resident of Chicago. Rana is a Canadian citizen who has lived legally in Chicago, where he operated a travel agency and other businesses.
The government affidavits state that Headley and Rana are graduates of a military academy in the town of Hasan Abdal in Pakistan, and they maintained e-mail contact with other former students, including officers in Pakistan’s military. They belonged to a group of the school’s graduates who referred to themselves as the “abdalians” in Internet postings.
Both of the detainees have also been accused of reporting to Ilyas Kashmiri, a commander of al-Qaeda and Lashkar-e-Taiba who was killed in a drone attack few months back.
The officials declined to name the other former military officer in the case, who is suspected as a co-conspirator. He is said to have recently left the Pakistani Army and held the rank of colonel or brigadier.
Prosecution documents in the case said that the officer was arrested earlier this past summer in Pakistan on unspecified charges and later released. However, another official said that the officer was discharged only after his associates pressured the Pakistani authorities to free him.
One official who has been briefed on the investigation said that Pakistani authorities had arrested as many as five other people in connection with the plot in recent weeks, including some former or current Pakistani military officials. Those people remain in custody, but it was unclear what role they played in the expanding plot.
Indian officials in Mumbai claim that Headley and Rana visited the city and several others in India in the months before the assault on Mumbai last November, and may have visited some of the sites that were attacked. A senior Indian police official said that in 2007 Headley stayed at the Taj Mahal Palace and Tower Hotel, one of the main targets of the Mumbai attack.
AP adds: According to court papers, Rana had a discussion with a someone affiliated with Lashkar-e-Taiba in late 2008, who was identified only as Individual B. The discussion, conducted by e-mail, included a warning from Rana not to use student visas to get people into the country.
Federal prosecutors also have made it clear that they have intercepted numerous phone conversations and e-mails between Headley and a member of Lashkar-e-Taiba, whom they have identified in court papers as Individual A. The two men allegedly talked of the planned attack in Denmark, which they called “the Mickey Mouse Project” and “the northern project,” according to court papers.
The papers also cite e-mails between Headley and another figure identified only as Lashkar-e-Taiba Member A. In one communication, the court papers say, Lashkar-e-Taiba Member A told Headley he had “new investment plans,” which investigators say referred to a terrorist attack other than the Danish one.
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ISSN 1563-9479 
