Pathankot airbase attack case registered in Pakistan

LAHORE: The Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) Punjab Police have lodged Indian airbase Pathankot attack case in Gujranwala.

Sources said the case has been lodged against unknown terrorists on the plea of deputy home secretary Aitzaz-ud-Din.

Murder, attempt to murder and terror charges have been included in the case.

Militants launched a deadly attack on an Indian Air Force base near the Pakistan border on January 02.

In the assault by gunmen disguised as soldiers, all six attackers and seven Indian soldiers were killed.

The special investigation team formed by Pakistan to investigate the Pathankot incident has formally recommended to the federal government to lodge an FIR on the basis of the information provided to the National Security Adviser Lt-Gen (retd) Nasser Khan Janjua by his Indian counterpart Ajit Doval, background interviews and documents available with The News revealed here on Thursday.

The interior ministry, on its notification issued on January 13, 2016, had constituted a six-member team. The team was headed by a convener named Rai Tahir, a reputed chief of the Counter Terrorism Department (CTD), Punjab Police.

According to a document, the team held its three meetings in which the information provided by the Indian side was evaluated and partially confirmed the Indian version of the incident.

The sources claimed that the team has yet not interrogated the Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Maulana Masood Azhar, who was taken into informal “protective custody” without any legal formality.

It claimed that Nasser Khan Janjua is constantly in contact with his Indian counterpart on the developments regarding the ongoing investigations. However, it is yet not clear if the Indian side has been communicated about the possibility of the registration of an FIR.

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On Friday, Pakistani officials said a new joint investigation team of military and civil intelligence agencies would look into the freshly lodged case, and that any non-state actor found to be involved would be brought to justice.

"The registration of this case shows that there is full commitment and earnestness," Punjab's law minister Rana Sanaullah told reporters.

"If you want to make your image before the world better, and to dispel the propaganda of other countries that our commitment is questionable, then we have to do things like this," he said.