INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM MONITOR—PAPER NO.591
B.RAMAN
Q: There is a growing demand in India that the Indian investigators should be allowed independent access to David Coleman Headley, the Chicago-based American member of the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET), who had visited India five times before 26/11 to collect pre-attack operational information for the LET. Will the FBI continue to resist this demand?
A: Any professional intelligence or investigation agency will, if it is worth its salt. Deniability is an important operational principle followed by all intelligence agencies. Once an intelligence agency grants free access to another agency to one of its sensitive sources, deniability is gone. The Intelligence Bureau will not grant the Research & Analysis Wing free access to any of its sensitive sources and vice versa. It is unrealistic to expect that any US agency---whether the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) or the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) or the FBI --- will grant to their Indian counterparts free access to Headley, since it has clearly come out that he was a conscious agent of the DEA at least since 1998.
Q: How about Tahawwur Hussain Rana, the other member of the LET’s Chicago cell?
A: His case seems to be qualitatively different. Firstly, whereas Rana’s lawyers have been fighting for a bail for him, Headley’s lawyers have not sought bail for him. Headley and his lawyers seem to have reconciled themselves to his being in custody till January 12 when a decision on the “status of his trial” is expected to be taken by the court. Secondly, the latest report on the various charges against Headley filed by the FBI before the court on December 7 is called the Criminal Information Report. In that report, there is no reference to any pending or proposed trial against him. As against this, the latest report filed before the court by the FBI on December 14 opposing the grant of bail to Rana says “ further support of the motion to detain defendant Rana pending trial.” From this, it is evident that while a decision has been taken to have a formal trial against Rana, no such decision has yet been taken against Headley.
Q: What does this indicate?
A: While the FBI has been handling Headley’s case cautiously since he was an agent of the DEA, it does not feel the need for such caution in the case of Rana. This is probably because Rana was not an agent of any US agency. It is also interesting to note that while the FBI had details of Headley’s pre-26/11 visits to India, it has not so far given any indication in the documents produced before the court that it was aware of Rana’s visits to India. Whatever details have appeared in the Indian media about Rana’s visits to India, have come from Indian and not US sources. This would indicate that since Headley was a source of the DEA, the FBI, through the DEA, was aware of his visits to India. Since Rana was probably not a source of any agency, no US agency was aware of his travels to India.
Q: Since Rana does not appear to have been an agent of any US agency, will the FBI allow Indian interrogators to question him?
A: Possibly, provided he is questioned in the presence of FBI officers and the questions are vetted by them and the court allows it.
Q: Is a similar procedure possible in the case of Headley?
A: Seems difficult.
Q: The US intelligence was reported to have alerted the Indian intelligence in September,2008, about the likelihood of a sea-borne terrorist attack by the LET on the hotels. Could this information have come from Headley?
A: Difficult to say. If Headley had conveyed this information to the US intelligence, he should have also told them that the LET had also targeted the Nariman House. Neither the Indian intelligence nor the Israeli agencies would appear to have been warned by the US intelligence about a likely attack on the Nariman House. At that time, George Bush was still in office. His administration had close relations with Israel. Israel would have been immediately alerted. It was apparently not. How would one explain the fact that the US intelligence was aware of the intended attack on the hotels but not of the planned attack on the Nariman House? My own suspicion is that the US warning of September 2008, came from technical intercepts or other sources in Pakistan and not from Headley.
Q: What is the most interesting part of the report filed by the FBI in the court on December 14 opposing bail to Rana?
A: Even in the earlier affidavit filed by the FBI against Rana, it was somewhat evident that the first incriminating conversation between Headley and Rana regarding future operations of the LET in India took place during a joint car drive by the two on September 7,2009. The latest report confirms it. It says: “On September 7, 2009, Headley and Rana took a long car ride and discussed several topics. This conversation was recorded. During their conversation, Headley and Rana discussed the attacks that occurred in November 2008 in Mumbai, India, in which approximately 170 people were killed. It is clear from the conversation and extrinsic corroboration that Rana was told just days before the Mumbai attacks that the attacks were about to happen.” This conversation while moving in a car could not have been recorded through telephonic or E-mail intercepts. This could have been recorded only by planting a secret recording device in the car without the knowledge of either Headley or Rana or by the FBI using Headley to pose leading questions to Rana and recording his replies without Rana’s knowledge. Neither in the affidavit filed against Headley nor in that filed against Rana after their arrest in October, was their any reference to their role in respect of 26/11. The only reference was to their agreed role in a future strike. The FBI knew about their role in 26/11 at least since September 7,2009, if not earlier. Why this was kept out of the affidavits filed initially? ( 15-12-09)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
Monday, December 14, 2009
HEADLEY'S CASE FIGURES IN SENATE COMMITTEE
B.RAMAN
On December 9,2009, the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee of the US Senate held a hearing on the subject "Five Years After the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act (IRTPA): Stopping Terrorist Travel". Though the hearing was not specifically related to the frequent travels of David Coleman Headley of the Chicago cell of the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) to India before the 26/11 terrorist strikes in Mumbai and his role in allegedly collecting operational information about the various targets which the LET intended attacking, there was a reference in passing to his travels to India before 26/11 and his role.
2. In his prepared introductory remarks, Joseph Lieberman, the co-Chairman of the Committee, said: "In the months leading up to 9/11, we know that the system was “blinking red,” as then CIA Director George Tenet famously put it. The system, however, was not set up to share that information among the different federal agencies involved in a timely manner. We now have the ability to leverage the terrorist watchlist and its integrated connections with other government databases to block the accidental entry into the country of anybody suspected of participating in terrorism. We must also share information on terrorists and other criminals with our partners overseas. This is why I insisted that information-sharing agreements be mandatory for participation in the Visa Waiver Program. I am told that 13 of the 35 visa waiver nations have entered into agreements to share biometric law enforcement and terrorist watch list data with us – and the United States will be sharing the same types of information on a reciprocal basis to these nations. As a stark reminder of the urgency of these international agreements, this week an American citizen, David Headley, was charged in federal court with six counts of conspiracy to bomb public places in India, to murder and maim persons in India and Denmark, to provide material support to foreign terrorist plots, and to provide material support to Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), and six counts of aiding and abetting the murder of U.S. citizens in India. Headley is alleged to have made five trips to Mumbai from 2006 to 2008 to conduct pre-attack planning and surveillance for LeT of many of the targets that were struck in the November 2008 Mumbai attacks. Because Headley was an U.S. citizen, his travel likely did not raise suspicions, and he was able to use the United States as a base of operations while helping to plan one of the most significant terrorist attacks in Indian history. Although it is not clear at this point whether Mr. Headley’s travel raised flags within the U.S. government, this case underscores the need to implement these international agreements as quickly as possible and make sure that all 35 visa waiver nations and other nations with a common interest in preventing acts of terrorism eventually participate in similar agreements."
3.David Heyman, Assistant Secretary For Homeland Security, who testified before the committee on various measures taken by his Department to monitor travels by terrorist suspects, said the circumstances surrounding the Headley investigation were changing the way authorities were looking at potential suspects. He added: "We can no longer assume that Americans are not involved in terrorism.As indicated by the recent indictments, we also see the nexus of travel in those who may get further indoctrinated abroad. This is a challenge.Those who are seeking to do harm are constantly hearing what we are doing, watching what we are doing, and adapting to that. So changing names may be one thing. Changing secure documents. Changing even biometrics."
4. Beyond these cursory remarks, there was no detailed discussion on the ease with which Headley was travelling to Pakistan and India and whether any of the US agencies had noticed this and raised an alarm over it. There was also no reference to reports carried by sections of the US media alleging that Headley was working as an informant of the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) since at least 1998.
5. There were also no questions during the hearing as to whether there were any arrangements between the Governments of India and the US for the exchange of information regarding travels of terrorist suspects between the two countries. (14-12-09)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com)
On December 9,2009, the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee of the US Senate held a hearing on the subject "Five Years After the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act (IRTPA): Stopping Terrorist Travel". Though the hearing was not specifically related to the frequent travels of David Coleman Headley of the Chicago cell of the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) to India before the 26/11 terrorist strikes in Mumbai and his role in allegedly collecting operational information about the various targets which the LET intended attacking, there was a reference in passing to his travels to India before 26/11 and his role.
2. In his prepared introductory remarks, Joseph Lieberman, the co-Chairman of the Committee, said: "In the months leading up to 9/11, we know that the system was “blinking red,” as then CIA Director George Tenet famously put it. The system, however, was not set up to share that information among the different federal agencies involved in a timely manner. We now have the ability to leverage the terrorist watchlist and its integrated connections with other government databases to block the accidental entry into the country of anybody suspected of participating in terrorism. We must also share information on terrorists and other criminals with our partners overseas. This is why I insisted that information-sharing agreements be mandatory for participation in the Visa Waiver Program. I am told that 13 of the 35 visa waiver nations have entered into agreements to share biometric law enforcement and terrorist watch list data with us – and the United States will be sharing the same types of information on a reciprocal basis to these nations. As a stark reminder of the urgency of these international agreements, this week an American citizen, David Headley, was charged in federal court with six counts of conspiracy to bomb public places in India, to murder and maim persons in India and Denmark, to provide material support to foreign terrorist plots, and to provide material support to Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), and six counts of aiding and abetting the murder of U.S. citizens in India. Headley is alleged to have made five trips to Mumbai from 2006 to 2008 to conduct pre-attack planning and surveillance for LeT of many of the targets that were struck in the November 2008 Mumbai attacks. Because Headley was an U.S. citizen, his travel likely did not raise suspicions, and he was able to use the United States as a base of operations while helping to plan one of the most significant terrorist attacks in Indian history. Although it is not clear at this point whether Mr. Headley’s travel raised flags within the U.S. government, this case underscores the need to implement these international agreements as quickly as possible and make sure that all 35 visa waiver nations and other nations with a common interest in preventing acts of terrorism eventually participate in similar agreements."
3.David Heyman, Assistant Secretary For Homeland Security, who testified before the committee on various measures taken by his Department to monitor travels by terrorist suspects, said the circumstances surrounding the Headley investigation were changing the way authorities were looking at potential suspects. He added: "We can no longer assume that Americans are not involved in terrorism.As indicated by the recent indictments, we also see the nexus of travel in those who may get further indoctrinated abroad. This is a challenge.Those who are seeking to do harm are constantly hearing what we are doing, watching what we are doing, and adapting to that. So changing names may be one thing. Changing secure documents. Changing even biometrics."
4. Beyond these cursory remarks, there was no detailed discussion on the ease with which Headley was travelling to Pakistan and India and whether any of the US agencies had noticed this and raised an alarm over it. There was also no reference to reports carried by sections of the US media alleging that Headley was working as an informant of the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) since at least 1998.
5. There were also no questions during the hearing as to whether there were any arrangements between the Governments of India and the US for the exchange of information regarding travels of terrorist suspects between the two countries. (14-12-09)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com)
Friday, December 11, 2009
FBI AVOIDS FOCUS ON HEADLEY'S LINKS WITH NARCOTICS CONTROL AGENCY
INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM MONITOR—PAPER NO. 590
B.RAMAN
In what appears to be a carefully scripted prosecution process, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) of the US has been trying to have the prosecution of David Coleman Headley, the Chicago-based US citizen of Pakistani origin, who allegedly helped the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) in carrying out the 26/11 terrorist strikes in Mumbai last year, conducted in such a manner as to avoid any focus on his alleged links with the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).
2. These links were recently alleged by “The New York Times” in a profile on Headley. It alleged that in 1998, Headley (then known as Daood Gilani) was convicted of conspiring to smuggle heroin into the US from Pakistan. It added: “Court records show that after his arrest, he provided so much information about his own involvement with drug trafficking which stretched back more than a decade and about his Pakistani suppliers that he was sentenced to less than two years in jail and later went to Pakistan to conduct undercover surveillance operations for the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA)".
3. Surprisingly, neither the initial affidavit nor the subsequent Criminal Information Report against him filed by the FBI in a Chicago federal court referred to his criminal record of 1998. Nor was there any reference to the fact that he was known to one of the agencies of the US Government since 1998 and had been co-operating with it in its anti-narcotics operations in the Af-Pak region. The ease with which he was getting visas for traveling frequently to Pakistan and India is attributable to the interest taken by the DEA in facilitating his travels on its behalf.
4. Indian media has reported that when he was produced before the federal judge for the first time since his arrest on December 9,2009, he pleaded not guilty to the charges against him. It has missed two other significant points to which a reference has been made by sections of the US media. Firstly, “Headley told U.S. District Judge Harry D. Leinenweber that he understood the charges and was waiving any indictment in the case.” Secondly, he waived his right to a trial by a grand jury.
5. Sections of the US media have pointed out that the fact that the report filed against him by the FBI in the court on December 7 was called a Criminal Information Report and not an indictment indicates that the FBI has already reached a plea bargain deal with him under which as a quid pro quo for his admitting some charges when the trial formally commences next month, the FBI will not press other charges against him. His admitting some charges and the FBI dropping other charges will obviate the need for an elaborate trial with the introduction of detailed evidence.
6. This would prevent any deliberate or inadvertent disclosure by him of his work in the Af-Pak region for the DEA, which works in close co-operation with its Pakistani counterpart. The two have many joint operations.
7. It is very likely that the US will not allow his independent interrogation by Indian investigators and that it will not agree to his extradition to India as that might result in the Indian authorities coming to know not only of his contacts with Pakistani agencies, but also with the DEA.
8. Senior officials of the White House and the FBI have been taking close and unusual interest in the investigation and prosecution. The Director of the FBI himself was reported to have visited Chicago before Headley was produced before the court. Many in India have analysed this as indicative of the close interest taken by President Obama in counter-terrorism co-operation with India. A more plausible explanation is that this is indicative of the concerns in the White House and the FBI that if the prosecution is not properly handled, the case could result in a bombshell if it emerges that one of the active conspirators of 26/11 was an agent of a US agency. This could lead to suits for heavy damages against the US Government from the relatives of the Americans, Israelis and other foreigners killed.( 12-12-09)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
B.RAMAN
In what appears to be a carefully scripted prosecution process, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) of the US has been trying to have the prosecution of David Coleman Headley, the Chicago-based US citizen of Pakistani origin, who allegedly helped the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) in carrying out the 26/11 terrorist strikes in Mumbai last year, conducted in such a manner as to avoid any focus on his alleged links with the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).
2. These links were recently alleged by “The New York Times” in a profile on Headley. It alleged that in 1998, Headley (then known as Daood Gilani) was convicted of conspiring to smuggle heroin into the US from Pakistan. It added: “Court records show that after his arrest, he provided so much information about his own involvement with drug trafficking which stretched back more than a decade and about his Pakistani suppliers that he was sentenced to less than two years in jail and later went to Pakistan to conduct undercover surveillance operations for the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA)".
3. Surprisingly, neither the initial affidavit nor the subsequent Criminal Information Report against him filed by the FBI in a Chicago federal court referred to his criminal record of 1998. Nor was there any reference to the fact that he was known to one of the agencies of the US Government since 1998 and had been co-operating with it in its anti-narcotics operations in the Af-Pak region. The ease with which he was getting visas for traveling frequently to Pakistan and India is attributable to the interest taken by the DEA in facilitating his travels on its behalf.
4. Indian media has reported that when he was produced before the federal judge for the first time since his arrest on December 9,2009, he pleaded not guilty to the charges against him. It has missed two other significant points to which a reference has been made by sections of the US media. Firstly, “Headley told U.S. District Judge Harry D. Leinenweber that he understood the charges and was waiving any indictment in the case.” Secondly, he waived his right to a trial by a grand jury.
5. Sections of the US media have pointed out that the fact that the report filed against him by the FBI in the court on December 7 was called a Criminal Information Report and not an indictment indicates that the FBI has already reached a plea bargain deal with him under which as a quid pro quo for his admitting some charges when the trial formally commences next month, the FBI will not press other charges against him. His admitting some charges and the FBI dropping other charges will obviate the need for an elaborate trial with the introduction of detailed evidence.
6. This would prevent any deliberate or inadvertent disclosure by him of his work in the Af-Pak region for the DEA, which works in close co-operation with its Pakistani counterpart. The two have many joint operations.
7. It is very likely that the US will not allow his independent interrogation by Indian investigators and that it will not agree to his extradition to India as that might result in the Indian authorities coming to know not only of his contacts with Pakistani agencies, but also with the DEA.
8. Senior officials of the White House and the FBI have been taking close and unusual interest in the investigation and prosecution. The Director of the FBI himself was reported to have visited Chicago before Headley was produced before the court. Many in India have analysed this as indicative of the close interest taken by President Obama in counter-terrorism co-operation with India. A more plausible explanation is that this is indicative of the concerns in the White House and the FBI that if the prosecution is not properly handled, the case could result in a bombshell if it emerges that one of the active conspirators of 26/11 was an agent of a US agency. This could lead to suits for heavy damages against the US Government from the relatives of the Americans, Israelis and other foreigners killed.( 12-12-09)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
Thursday, December 10, 2009
VOLUNTEERS FROM US TO JOIN THE TALIBAN?
INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM MONITOR---PAPER NO.589
B.RAMAN
Reports of volunteers from the Muslim community in the West secretly traveling to Pakistan to join the on-going jihad in the Af-Pak region are not infrequent. The British citizens/residents of Pakistani origin, who carried out the suicide attacks in London in July 2005, belonged to one such group from the UK, which had traveled to Pakistan, got trained by Al Qaeda or pro-Al Qaeda elements, returned to the UK and carried out the suicide attacks. The British intelligence failed to question them after they returned from Pakistan or even to keep them under watch. It became aware of the details of their visits to Pakistan only after they had carried out the suicide attacks.
2. The Intelligence and Security Committee of the British Prime Minister, which enquired into the explosions, said, inter alia, in its report submitted to the local Parliament in May,2006, as follows: " We remain concerned that across the whole of the counter-terrorism community, the development of the home-grown threat and the radicalisation of British citizens were not fully understood or applied to strategic thinking. A common and better level of understanding of these things among all those closely involved in identifying and countering the threat against the UK, whether that be the Security Service or the police or other parts of Government, is critical in order to be able to counter the threat effectively and prevent attacks. Lessons that have been learned about the potential diversity of those who can become radicalised and the extent to which they can become radicalised ---including to the point of suicide--- must be taken into account as new initiatives are taken forward."
3. There have also been instances of members of the local Muslim community in Germany and Denmark going to the Federally-Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan to join the on-going jihad of the two Talibans of Pakistan and Afghanistan. Adam Gadahn, an American convert to Islam, who is in charge of As Sahab, the publicity wing of Al Qaeda , which produces and disseminates the recorded messages of Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, is another example of this Af-Pak-bound jihadis.
4. Till a few years ago, the majority of foreign Muslims studying in the Pakistani madrasas used to come from Asia and Africa, but a recent trend has been for Muslim families in the US and West Europe to send their children, including girls, to Pakistan for a short attachment to the madrasas in order to make them true Muslims. Since many of these madrasas maintain close links with jihadi organizations such as the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET), the Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HUJI), the Jaish-e-Mohammad (JEM) and the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HUM) these students come under their influence and are brain-washed before they return home.
5. The jihad of the Afghan Mujahideen against the Soviet troops in Afghanistan in the 1980s attracted nearly about 6000 foreign volunteers, almost all of them from the Arab countries and some from other parts of Asia. But, there was hardly any from the West.
6. The Al Qaeda-supported jihad of the two Talibans in the Af-Pak region has not been attracting many Arabs and volunteers from South-East Asia. The Arabs, who are with Al Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban today in the Af-Pak region, are the remnants of the past volunteers. There has not been much of a fresh flow. However, the jihad of the two Talibans has started attracting young Muslims from the communities in the West, who want to express their Islamic solidarity with their co-religionists in the Af-Pak region by either fighting with them shoulder to shoulder or through other means such as placing their technical expertise in Information Technology and other modern innovations at the disposal of the jihadis.
7. It is still a small trickle from the West. It is estimated that the number of young Muslims from the West, who have come to Pakistan either for studying in the madrasas or for assisting the Talibans and Al Qaeda, must be around a hundred. As these jihadis go back to their countries from the Af-Pak region, they are likely to carry with them the radical jihadi virus to their communities back home. Their activities in Pakistan and after they return home would, therefore, need close watch.
8. The five young Muslim residents from the Virginia area of the US---- two of them of Pakistani origin and the remaining three of Egyptian, Ethiopian and Eritrean origin---- who were arrested by the Pakistani police at Sargodha on December 9,2009, in response to an alert from the USA’s Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) seem to have been self-motivated by a desire to assist the Talibans. Reports from Pakistan indicate that they were self-motivated volunteers and not externally-induced recruits. They had traveled to Pakistan on their own towards the end of November and allegedly contacted the JEM as well as the Jamaat-ud-Dawa, the political wing of the LET. Since they were located and arrested within a few days of their arrival, they could not have undergone any training.
9.The prompt action to trace and round them up became possible because one of the Pakistani origin volunteers had left a recorded message back home indicating the purpose of their travel to Pakistan. His family alerted a local Muslim community group. The FBI would seem to have come to know of their sudden disappearance from their homes in the US and alerted the Pakistani authorities to look for them.
10. The claims made by the Sargodha Police after their arrest that they seemed to be having links with Al Qaeda and had offered their services for committing acts of terrorism in Pakistan have not been corroborated. All that has been established so far is that since August they were in touch with acquaintances in Pakistan through the Internet in order to prepare themselves for the visit to Pakistan to join the jihad in the FATA area. It has been alleged that the house in which they were found and arrested belonged to a member of the JEM and that the father (Khalid Farooq) of one of the Pakistani origin persons by name Umar Farooq is also being questioned by the Police in order to ascertain whether he had any role in their travel to Pakistan. Khalid Farooq reportedly runs a computer business in the US and Pakistan and spends part of the year in the US and part in Pakistan. The arrested persons are between 19 and 25 years of age.
11. While there is so far no evidence to show that they belonged to any jihadi organization, the five arrested persons seem to have had a common social background in the US which brought them together and induced them to plan together. This needs to be looked into carefully. (11-12-09)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
B.RAMAN
Reports of volunteers from the Muslim community in the West secretly traveling to Pakistan to join the on-going jihad in the Af-Pak region are not infrequent. The British citizens/residents of Pakistani origin, who carried out the suicide attacks in London in July 2005, belonged to one such group from the UK, which had traveled to Pakistan, got trained by Al Qaeda or pro-Al Qaeda elements, returned to the UK and carried out the suicide attacks. The British intelligence failed to question them after they returned from Pakistan or even to keep them under watch. It became aware of the details of their visits to Pakistan only after they had carried out the suicide attacks.
2. The Intelligence and Security Committee of the British Prime Minister, which enquired into the explosions, said, inter alia, in its report submitted to the local Parliament in May,2006, as follows: " We remain concerned that across the whole of the counter-terrorism community, the development of the home-grown threat and the radicalisation of British citizens were not fully understood or applied to strategic thinking. A common and better level of understanding of these things among all those closely involved in identifying and countering the threat against the UK, whether that be the Security Service or the police or other parts of Government, is critical in order to be able to counter the threat effectively and prevent attacks. Lessons that have been learned about the potential diversity of those who can become radicalised and the extent to which they can become radicalised ---including to the point of suicide--- must be taken into account as new initiatives are taken forward."
3. There have also been instances of members of the local Muslim community in Germany and Denmark going to the Federally-Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan to join the on-going jihad of the two Talibans of Pakistan and Afghanistan. Adam Gadahn, an American convert to Islam, who is in charge of As Sahab, the publicity wing of Al Qaeda , which produces and disseminates the recorded messages of Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, is another example of this Af-Pak-bound jihadis.
4. Till a few years ago, the majority of foreign Muslims studying in the Pakistani madrasas used to come from Asia and Africa, but a recent trend has been for Muslim families in the US and West Europe to send their children, including girls, to Pakistan for a short attachment to the madrasas in order to make them true Muslims. Since many of these madrasas maintain close links with jihadi organizations such as the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET), the Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HUJI), the Jaish-e-Mohammad (JEM) and the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HUM) these students come under their influence and are brain-washed before they return home.
5. The jihad of the Afghan Mujahideen against the Soviet troops in Afghanistan in the 1980s attracted nearly about 6000 foreign volunteers, almost all of them from the Arab countries and some from other parts of Asia. But, there was hardly any from the West.
6. The Al Qaeda-supported jihad of the two Talibans in the Af-Pak region has not been attracting many Arabs and volunteers from South-East Asia. The Arabs, who are with Al Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban today in the Af-Pak region, are the remnants of the past volunteers. There has not been much of a fresh flow. However, the jihad of the two Talibans has started attracting young Muslims from the communities in the West, who want to express their Islamic solidarity with their co-religionists in the Af-Pak region by either fighting with them shoulder to shoulder or through other means such as placing their technical expertise in Information Technology and other modern innovations at the disposal of the jihadis.
7. It is still a small trickle from the West. It is estimated that the number of young Muslims from the West, who have come to Pakistan either for studying in the madrasas or for assisting the Talibans and Al Qaeda, must be around a hundred. As these jihadis go back to their countries from the Af-Pak region, they are likely to carry with them the radical jihadi virus to their communities back home. Their activities in Pakistan and after they return home would, therefore, need close watch.
8. The five young Muslim residents from the Virginia area of the US---- two of them of Pakistani origin and the remaining three of Egyptian, Ethiopian and Eritrean origin---- who were arrested by the Pakistani police at Sargodha on December 9,2009, in response to an alert from the USA’s Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) seem to have been self-motivated by a desire to assist the Talibans. Reports from Pakistan indicate that they were self-motivated volunteers and not externally-induced recruits. They had traveled to Pakistan on their own towards the end of November and allegedly contacted the JEM as well as the Jamaat-ud-Dawa, the political wing of the LET. Since they were located and arrested within a few days of their arrival, they could not have undergone any training.
9.The prompt action to trace and round them up became possible because one of the Pakistani origin volunteers had left a recorded message back home indicating the purpose of their travel to Pakistan. His family alerted a local Muslim community group. The FBI would seem to have come to know of their sudden disappearance from their homes in the US and alerted the Pakistani authorities to look for them.
10. The claims made by the Sargodha Police after their arrest that they seemed to be having links with Al Qaeda and had offered their services for committing acts of terrorism in Pakistan have not been corroborated. All that has been established so far is that since August they were in touch with acquaintances in Pakistan through the Internet in order to prepare themselves for the visit to Pakistan to join the jihad in the FATA area. It has been alleged that the house in which they were found and arrested belonged to a member of the JEM and that the father (Khalid Farooq) of one of the Pakistani origin persons by name Umar Farooq is also being questioned by the Police in order to ascertain whether he had any role in their travel to Pakistan. Khalid Farooq reportedly runs a computer business in the US and Pakistan and spends part of the year in the US and part in Pakistan. The arrested persons are between 19 and 25 years of age.
11. While there is so far no evidence to show that they belonged to any jihadi organization, the five arrested persons seem to have had a common social background in the US which brought them together and induced them to plan together. This needs to be looked into carefully. (11-12-09)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
HEADLEY & MUMBAI 26/11---WHAT NEXT? : Q & A
INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM MONITOR---PAPER NO. 588
B.RAMAN
Q: US officials have been quoted in the media as saying that the further action against David Coleman Headley of Chicago, who was allegedly involved in the conspiracy of the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) relating to the Mumbai—26/11 terrorist strike, has to be “negotiated”. What do they mean by that?
A: There will be two kinds of “negotiations” ---between Headley and the FBI prosecutors and between Indian and US authorities. The objective of the “negotiations” with Headley will be to persuade him to admit before the court some of the charges leveled against him as a quid pro quo for the FBI not prosecuting him on the other charges which might be dropped. The advantage to him will be that the FBI could assure him that it will not press for a death penalty against him if he admitted some of the charges. Quid pro quo in criminal cases in order to expedite the trial is often followed in the US. The “negotiations” with the Indian authorities will be to decide where he will be prosecuted. He has committed offences against Indian and US laws. He cannot be prosecuted on the basis of the same facts or admissions in both the countries. That could attract the legal ban relating to double jeopardy.
Q: What are the chances of the US agreeing during the “negotiations” to his being prosecuted only in India and not in the US? That would not attract double jeopardy.
A: I am not hopeful that the US would agree to it. If they did, they will have to transfer Headley to Indian custody for interrogation and prosecution. Pakistan would oppose it. The US State Department would be afraid that if he is interrogated in Indian custody, he might make to Indian interrogators admissions or statements, which could be detrimental to the State of Pakistan. The US has always tried to protect the Pakistani military and intelligence establishment from possible adverse consequences of their involvement in terrorism in India. There is no reason to believe that they have changed that policy.
Q: What are the chances of India getting him extradited?
A: If the terrorist attack had not resulted in the death of US nationals, the US would have found it difficult to reject or avoid an Indian request for his extradition. Because of the death of the six US nationals, the US might have no other option but to prosecute him before a US court. The question of extradition would arise only after the case in the US has ended. If India intends prosecuting him for the same offence and on the basis of the same set of facts as in the US court, laws relating to double jeopardy could prevent his extradition. To make out a plausible case for his extradition, the Govt. of India has to show that he has to be prosecuted for certain other offences different from the offences for which he was prosecuted in the US--- like , for example, the death of Indian civilians and security forces officers as a result of the conspiracy or the death of Jewish persons and other foreign nationals.
Q: Will the FBI allow Indian investigators to interrogate him in the US if it is not prepared to transfer him to Indian custody?
A: I am again doubtful because of the expected US keenness to protect Pakistan from possible adverse consequences. The best they might do is to ask the Indian investigators to give them a set of questions which the FBI investigators will pose to Headley and communicate his replies to their Indian counterparts.
Q: Has India reasons to be satisfied with the co-operation extended by the FBI so far?
A: The FBI has been very helpful in certain matters. It seems to have shared with India many of the admissions made by Headley during the interrogation. One piece of material evidence which would be of tremendous interest to the Indian investigators is the voice recordings of Headley’s telephone conversations with his handlers in Pakistan identified in the original affidavit as Individual A and LET member A. Individual A has since been identified by the FBI on the basis of Headley’s admissions as retired Major Abdur Rehman Hashim Syed alias Pasha. The FBI does not seem to know as yet who exactly is he. Amir Mir, the Pakistani journalist, has reported in the “News” of December 9,2009, that the FBI is trying to find out whether he could be identical with a nephew of Qari Saifullah Akhtar of the HUJI, who has a similar name. The FBI has not yet named the LET member A. One possibility is that he is one of the LET conspirators presently in custody in Pakistan and facing trial in a case filed before an anti-terrorism court in connection with the Mumbai 26/11 conspiracy. If it turns out to be so, it will show that the Pakistani authorities have allowed those ostensibly in jail to continue to remain in touch with Headley in order to plan another terrorist strike in India. I am doubtful whether the US would want India to find this out. It will definitely pressure Pakistan to stop this, but would not share this information with India. If the US shares the voice recordings with the Indian investigators, they would be able to compare them with the recordings of the voices of the Pakistani masterminds, who were directing the 26/11 terrorists and see whether any of the voices are identical. I am not sure whether the US would share the voice recordings. If it doesn’t, that would show that the co-operation is even now not whole-hearted despite the improvement and that the keenness to protect the Pakistani State from adverse consequences still influences US decisions vis-à-vis counter-terrorism co-operation with India.. (10-12-09)
(The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
B.RAMAN
Q: US officials have been quoted in the media as saying that the further action against David Coleman Headley of Chicago, who was allegedly involved in the conspiracy of the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) relating to the Mumbai—26/11 terrorist strike, has to be “negotiated”. What do they mean by that?
A: There will be two kinds of “negotiations” ---between Headley and the FBI prosecutors and between Indian and US authorities. The objective of the “negotiations” with Headley will be to persuade him to admit before the court some of the charges leveled against him as a quid pro quo for the FBI not prosecuting him on the other charges which might be dropped. The advantage to him will be that the FBI could assure him that it will not press for a death penalty against him if he admitted some of the charges. Quid pro quo in criminal cases in order to expedite the trial is often followed in the US. The “negotiations” with the Indian authorities will be to decide where he will be prosecuted. He has committed offences against Indian and US laws. He cannot be prosecuted on the basis of the same facts or admissions in both the countries. That could attract the legal ban relating to double jeopardy.
Q: What are the chances of the US agreeing during the “negotiations” to his being prosecuted only in India and not in the US? That would not attract double jeopardy.
A: I am not hopeful that the US would agree to it. If they did, they will have to transfer Headley to Indian custody for interrogation and prosecution. Pakistan would oppose it. The US State Department would be afraid that if he is interrogated in Indian custody, he might make to Indian interrogators admissions or statements, which could be detrimental to the State of Pakistan. The US has always tried to protect the Pakistani military and intelligence establishment from possible adverse consequences of their involvement in terrorism in India. There is no reason to believe that they have changed that policy.
Q: What are the chances of India getting him extradited?
A: If the terrorist attack had not resulted in the death of US nationals, the US would have found it difficult to reject or avoid an Indian request for his extradition. Because of the death of the six US nationals, the US might have no other option but to prosecute him before a US court. The question of extradition would arise only after the case in the US has ended. If India intends prosecuting him for the same offence and on the basis of the same set of facts as in the US court, laws relating to double jeopardy could prevent his extradition. To make out a plausible case for his extradition, the Govt. of India has to show that he has to be prosecuted for certain other offences different from the offences for which he was prosecuted in the US--- like , for example, the death of Indian civilians and security forces officers as a result of the conspiracy or the death of Jewish persons and other foreign nationals.
Q: Will the FBI allow Indian investigators to interrogate him in the US if it is not prepared to transfer him to Indian custody?
A: I am again doubtful because of the expected US keenness to protect Pakistan from possible adverse consequences. The best they might do is to ask the Indian investigators to give them a set of questions which the FBI investigators will pose to Headley and communicate his replies to their Indian counterparts.
Q: Has India reasons to be satisfied with the co-operation extended by the FBI so far?
A: The FBI has been very helpful in certain matters. It seems to have shared with India many of the admissions made by Headley during the interrogation. One piece of material evidence which would be of tremendous interest to the Indian investigators is the voice recordings of Headley’s telephone conversations with his handlers in Pakistan identified in the original affidavit as Individual A and LET member A. Individual A has since been identified by the FBI on the basis of Headley’s admissions as retired Major Abdur Rehman Hashim Syed alias Pasha. The FBI does not seem to know as yet who exactly is he. Amir Mir, the Pakistani journalist, has reported in the “News” of December 9,2009, that the FBI is trying to find out whether he could be identical with a nephew of Qari Saifullah Akhtar of the HUJI, who has a similar name. The FBI has not yet named the LET member A. One possibility is that he is one of the LET conspirators presently in custody in Pakistan and facing trial in a case filed before an anti-terrorism court in connection with the Mumbai 26/11 conspiracy. If it turns out to be so, it will show that the Pakistani authorities have allowed those ostensibly in jail to continue to remain in touch with Headley in order to plan another terrorist strike in India. I am doubtful whether the US would want India to find this out. It will definitely pressure Pakistan to stop this, but would not share this information with India. If the US shares the voice recordings with the Indian investigators, they would be able to compare them with the recordings of the voices of the Pakistani masterminds, who were directing the 26/11 terrorists and see whether any of the voices are identical. I am not sure whether the US would share the voice recordings. If it doesn’t, that would show that the co-operation is even now not whole-hearted despite the improvement and that the keenness to protect the Pakistani State from adverse consequences still influences US decisions vis-à-vis counter-terrorism co-operation with India.. (10-12-09)
(The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
HEADLEY & DHIREN BAROT : THE JIHADI MOLES
INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM MONITOR--PAPER NO.587
B.RAMAN
David Coleman Headley, the middle-aged US citizen of Pakistani origin born to a former Pakistani public servant posted in the US and his American wife, who is facing investigation and prosecution before a Federal court in Chicago on charges relating to the Mumbai 26/11 terrorist attack of last year and a planned terrorist attack on a Danish newspaper in Copenhagen, is not a home-grown jihadi on the model of the British residents of Pakistani origin who carried out the suicide acts of terrorism in London in July,2005.
2.He was not an ill-integrated American like the Pakistani terrorists were ill-integrated British who hated the society in which they had grown up. He did not nurse any grievance or anger against the country of his adoption. There is so far no evidence to show even that he was a practising Muslim with a fundamentalist mindset. His original anger arose from the publication of some cartoons of the Holy Prophet by a Danish newspaper in 2005. He strongly felt the need for a Muslim retaliation against the paper.
3. It was this anger and the urge to retaliate, which seemed to have driven him first into the arms of the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) in 2005 and then into the fold of the so-called 313 Brigade based in the Federally-Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan and headed by Ilyas Kashmiri, a Pakistani of suspected Army links, who had initially served in the Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HUJI) and then gravitated towards Al Qaeda along with his organisation.
4. The British suicide bombers were not recruited by Al Qaeda or any of its affiliates. Driven by anger against the British role in Iraq and Afghanistan, they volunteered themselves for a suicide attack, got trained in Pakistan and carried out the attack in London. They targeted innocent British civilians and wanted them to die.
5. There is so far no evidence to show that Headley's anger had anything to do with the US role in Iraq or Afghanistan or with the militant movement in India's Jammu & Kashmir (J&K). His anger was triggered off by a perceived insult to the Holy Prophet and to Islam and a strongly-felt urge to avenge it.
6. He was not recruited by the LET and the 313 Brigade. He volunteered himself to help them --- not for personally carrying out an act of terrorism in US territory against US nationals, but for facilitating an act of terrorism in Copenhagen by undertaking reccee missions to Denmark under the cover of an employee of a Chicago-based immigration consultation company, which ostensibly wanted to open an office in Copenhagen.
7. The LET and the 313 Brigade welcomed him with open arms. The LET diverted his anger to India and used him as a mole with an assumed non-Pakistani Christian/Jewish identity for undertaking frequent visits to India of long duration to reccee targets and the Mumbai sea front for its planned sea-borne terrorist attack. He willingly became a facilitator of the conspiracy, which resulted in the death of 166 persons---- 25 of them foreign nationals, including six American nationals.
8. The LET's decision to use the willingness of Headley to conceal his Pakistani/Muslim identity and highlight his American/ Christian identity helped it in overcoming the suspicions of Indian immigration authorities against Muslims of Pakistani origin. In the wake of the growing closeness of India to the US, an American passport holder with a non-Muslim identity hardly created any suspicion in India. On the contrary, the features of a White American inherited by him from his mother helped him in ingratiacting himself with different sections of the urban Indian elite. He managed to create an image of himself as a "jolly good American", who wished well of India.
9.Headley knew that the LET was planning to target Jewish people and a Jewish religious-cultural centre in Mumbai because it had asked him to reccee the Nariman House in which the Jewish centre was located. But one does not know as yet whether he knew that the LET was also planning to target and kill non-Jewish foreigners, including Americans.
10. Headley willingly and painstakingly undertook the reccee missions for the LET in India, but his heart was in Copenhagen where he wanted to help the 313 Brigade in attacking the Danish paper. It was his enthusiasm for the planned attack in Copenhagen by Ilyas Kashmiri, which brought him to the notice of the FBI and ultimately led to his arrest along with the arrest of his associate Tahawwur Hussain Rana, a Canadian citizen of Pakistani origin. living and working in Chicago.
11. Headley was helping the LET since 2005 and the 313 Brigade since 2008, but his admiration for Ilyas Kashmiri and his poor opinion of the LET despite his association with it come out clearly from his intercepted communications produced by the FBI in the court. He looked upon the LET as lacking the courage to undertake a major terrorist strike in Copenhagen.
12. The LET's interest in recruiting US residents of Pakistani origin and White converts to Islam for terrorist attacks in India was known to the FBI since 2003. What must have come as a surprise to it was the first-time use by the LET of dissimulation as part of its modus operandi.
13. The question that US and Indian investigators would be asking themselves is---- is Headley a lone fish or are there other Headleys who remain undetected in the US and India?
14. Headley's case brings to mind the attempt of Al Qaeda to use Dhiren Barot also known as Esa-al-Hindi, a Hindu convert to Islam living in the UK, to undertake reccee missions to New York to collect operational intelligence about US financial institutions which could be used for another terrorist attack in US territory. Barot's Indian origin and British passport did not ring the same alarm bell in the minds of the US immigration as Arabs and Pakistanis did. Al Qaeda sought to exploit this.
15. Barot was not recruited by Al Qaeda. Angered by reports of the alleged suppression of Muslims in J&K and other parts of India and the anti-Muslim violence in Gujarat in 2002, he volunteered himself to help Al Qaeda and its affiliates. Al Qaeda welcomed him and turned his anti-India anger to the US and the UK and tried unsuccessfully to use him for its operations in those countries. He was detected by the joint efforts of the US and British intelligence, arrested and sentenced to a long term of imprisonment.
16. Home-grown jihadi moles, who act as facilitators of terrorist conspiracies, without personally participating in a terrorist attack, are going to be more difficult to detect than home-grown jihadi terrorists. The close co-operation of the FBI and the Indian intelligence in the Headley case should form the starting block for a joint drive to guard them against this phenomenon.(10-12-09)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
B.RAMAN
David Coleman Headley, the middle-aged US citizen of Pakistani origin born to a former Pakistani public servant posted in the US and his American wife, who is facing investigation and prosecution before a Federal court in Chicago on charges relating to the Mumbai 26/11 terrorist attack of last year and a planned terrorist attack on a Danish newspaper in Copenhagen, is not a home-grown jihadi on the model of the British residents of Pakistani origin who carried out the suicide acts of terrorism in London in July,2005.
2.He was not an ill-integrated American like the Pakistani terrorists were ill-integrated British who hated the society in which they had grown up. He did not nurse any grievance or anger against the country of his adoption. There is so far no evidence to show even that he was a practising Muslim with a fundamentalist mindset. His original anger arose from the publication of some cartoons of the Holy Prophet by a Danish newspaper in 2005. He strongly felt the need for a Muslim retaliation against the paper.
3. It was this anger and the urge to retaliate, which seemed to have driven him first into the arms of the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) in 2005 and then into the fold of the so-called 313 Brigade based in the Federally-Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan and headed by Ilyas Kashmiri, a Pakistani of suspected Army links, who had initially served in the Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HUJI) and then gravitated towards Al Qaeda along with his organisation.
4. The British suicide bombers were not recruited by Al Qaeda or any of its affiliates. Driven by anger against the British role in Iraq and Afghanistan, they volunteered themselves for a suicide attack, got trained in Pakistan and carried out the attack in London. They targeted innocent British civilians and wanted them to die.
5. There is so far no evidence to show that Headley's anger had anything to do with the US role in Iraq or Afghanistan or with the militant movement in India's Jammu & Kashmir (J&K). His anger was triggered off by a perceived insult to the Holy Prophet and to Islam and a strongly-felt urge to avenge it.
6. He was not recruited by the LET and the 313 Brigade. He volunteered himself to help them --- not for personally carrying out an act of terrorism in US territory against US nationals, but for facilitating an act of terrorism in Copenhagen by undertaking reccee missions to Denmark under the cover of an employee of a Chicago-based immigration consultation company, which ostensibly wanted to open an office in Copenhagen.
7. The LET and the 313 Brigade welcomed him with open arms. The LET diverted his anger to India and used him as a mole with an assumed non-Pakistani Christian/Jewish identity for undertaking frequent visits to India of long duration to reccee targets and the Mumbai sea front for its planned sea-borne terrorist attack. He willingly became a facilitator of the conspiracy, which resulted in the death of 166 persons---- 25 of them foreign nationals, including six American nationals.
8. The LET's decision to use the willingness of Headley to conceal his Pakistani/Muslim identity and highlight his American/ Christian identity helped it in overcoming the suspicions of Indian immigration authorities against Muslims of Pakistani origin. In the wake of the growing closeness of India to the US, an American passport holder with a non-Muslim identity hardly created any suspicion in India. On the contrary, the features of a White American inherited by him from his mother helped him in ingratiacting himself with different sections of the urban Indian elite. He managed to create an image of himself as a "jolly good American", who wished well of India.
9.Headley knew that the LET was planning to target Jewish people and a Jewish religious-cultural centre in Mumbai because it had asked him to reccee the Nariman House in which the Jewish centre was located. But one does not know as yet whether he knew that the LET was also planning to target and kill non-Jewish foreigners, including Americans.
10. Headley willingly and painstakingly undertook the reccee missions for the LET in India, but his heart was in Copenhagen where he wanted to help the 313 Brigade in attacking the Danish paper. It was his enthusiasm for the planned attack in Copenhagen by Ilyas Kashmiri, which brought him to the notice of the FBI and ultimately led to his arrest along with the arrest of his associate Tahawwur Hussain Rana, a Canadian citizen of Pakistani origin. living and working in Chicago.
11. Headley was helping the LET since 2005 and the 313 Brigade since 2008, but his admiration for Ilyas Kashmiri and his poor opinion of the LET despite his association with it come out clearly from his intercepted communications produced by the FBI in the court. He looked upon the LET as lacking the courage to undertake a major terrorist strike in Copenhagen.
12. The LET's interest in recruiting US residents of Pakistani origin and White converts to Islam for terrorist attacks in India was known to the FBI since 2003. What must have come as a surprise to it was the first-time use by the LET of dissimulation as part of its modus operandi.
13. The question that US and Indian investigators would be asking themselves is---- is Headley a lone fish or are there other Headleys who remain undetected in the US and India?
14. Headley's case brings to mind the attempt of Al Qaeda to use Dhiren Barot also known as Esa-al-Hindi, a Hindu convert to Islam living in the UK, to undertake reccee missions to New York to collect operational intelligence about US financial institutions which could be used for another terrorist attack in US territory. Barot's Indian origin and British passport did not ring the same alarm bell in the minds of the US immigration as Arabs and Pakistanis did. Al Qaeda sought to exploit this.
15. Barot was not recruited by Al Qaeda. Angered by reports of the alleged suppression of Muslims in J&K and other parts of India and the anti-Muslim violence in Gujarat in 2002, he volunteered himself to help Al Qaeda and its affiliates. Al Qaeda welcomed him and turned his anti-India anger to the US and the UK and tried unsuccessfully to use him for its operations in those countries. He was detected by the joint efforts of the US and British intelligence, arrested and sentenced to a long term of imprisonment.
16. Home-grown jihadi moles, who act as facilitators of terrorist conspiracies, without personally participating in a terrorist attack, are going to be more difficult to detect than home-grown jihadi terrorists. The close co-operation of the FBI and the Indian intelligence in the Headley case should form the starting block for a joint drive to guard them against this phenomenon.(10-12-09)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
Monday, December 7, 2009
HEADLEY'S ROLE IN MUMBAI 26/11 CONSPIRACY & HIS PAKISTANI HANDLERS
INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM MONITOR---PAPER NO 586
B.RAMAN
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) filed before a Federal court in Chicago on December 7,2009, a Criminal Information Report charging David Coleman Headley previously known as Daood Gilani, a US national of Pakistani origin normally resident in Chicago, on 12 counts. Six of these counts related to participating in a conspiracy to bomb public places in India, murder and maim persons in India and Denmark, providing material support to foreign terrorist plots and the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET). The remaining six counts related to participating in a conspiracy to aid and abet the murder of US citizens in India. This refers to the massacre of six US nationals by the LET in Mumbai during the terrorist strike of 26/11 last year.
2. It is learnt that it has been called a Criminal Information Report and not yet an indictment because the charges relating to India are largely based on voluntary admissions made by him during his interrogation after he was arrested by the FBI on October 3,2009, on a charge of conspiring with Pakistan-based elements to carry out a terrorist attack in Copenhagen against a Danish journal which had published caricatures of Prophet Mohammad in 2005. The FBI had originally filed a criminal affidavit giving details of evidence collected on the basis of technical intelligence which justified his arrest and interrogation. Subsequently, they submitted to the court in a sealed cover information obtained during his initial interrogation to justify his continued custody. This sealed cover has now been opened and its contents incorporated in the Criminal Information Report.
3. The FBI has described the investigation against Headley as still active. A formal indictment would follow after the investigations into his disclosures in India and Pakistan. The National Investigation Agency of the Government of India has already started an investigation into his activities in India during his periodic visits, but no arrests would appear to have been made as yet during this investigation. Rahul Bhatt, the film world personality and son of Mahesh Bhatt, film producer/director, who was the only Indian whose name had figured in the E-mails exchanged by Headley with his Pakistani handlers, could be a material witness during the investigation and prosecution in the US as well as India. The Criminal Information Report against Headley, however, does not refer to Rahul.
4. The FBI has also filed a separate Criminal Information Report on two counts in the same court on December 7,2009, against Major (retd) Abdur Rehman Hashim Syed, a Pakistani citizen based in Pakistan. The two counts relate to conspiring to attack the Danish newspaper and its employees. The Criminal Information Report against the retired Pakistani Major does not refer to Mumbai 26/11. In the affidavit filed earlier by the FBI against Headley, there were references to two handlers of Headley in Pakistan--- a person referred to as Individual A and an LET office-bearer referred to as LET member A. Headley was allegedly in touch with Individual A in connection with the Copenhagen conspiracy and with LET member A in connection with the Indian and Copenhagen conspiracies. Individual A appeared in the earlier affidavit as an associate of Ilyas Kashmiri of the 313 Brigade. He had introduced Headley to Ilyas Kashmiri and was acting as a cut-out between the two.
5. The earlier affidavits had not identified Individual A and the LET member A. The Criminal Information Report filed on December 7 has identified Individual A as Major (retd) Abdur Rehman. While the Report does not say anything about the arrest of the Major, media reports have said that he has been arrested by the Pakistani authorities at the request of the FBI. For reasons which are not clear, no Criminal Information Report has been filed against Ilyas, who seemed to have initiated the conspiracy relating to Copenhagen. The FBI has not yet named the LET handler of Headley called LET member A.
6.A careful reading of the earlier affidavits, the criminal information reports filed on December 7 and the media reports in the US and Canada would indicate that Headley played a role in two conspiracies unrelated to each other. The first conspiracy was initiated by the LET in 2006 for the terrorist strike in Mumbai. In this connection, he visited India five times spending long periods to reccee the targets ultimately attacked by the LET, including the two hotels, the railway terminus and the Jewish centre, took video photographs and then carried them to Pakistan. The details of his participation in the Mumbai 26/11 related conspiracy are as follows:2005:
The LET, of which he had become a member, asked him to "travel to India to perform surveillance."
Feb. 2006: He changed his name from his original "Daood Gilani" in order to "present himself in India as an American who was neither Muslim nor Pakistani."
June 2006: Obtained permission from friend and businessman, Tahawwur Hussain Rana, to open an ostensible consultancy franchise in India. Rana is a Canadian national of Pakistani origin living in Chicago, who was running an immigration consultancy service.
Sept. 2006: Visited India for several weeks, then Pakistan.
Feb. 2007: Visited India for several weeks, then Pakistan.
Sept. 2007: Visited India for several weeks, then Pakistan.
April 2008: Visited India for several week, making a surveillance video as he took a boat ride through the Mumbai harbour.
July 2008: Visited India for several weeks, then Pakistan.
7. The FBI's Criminal Information Report does not refer to any Indian visit by Headley in November,2008. There is also no reference to any role of his in connection with the July 2006 explosions in some suburban trains of Mumbai.
8. The second conspiracy related to the planned terrorist attack in Copenhagen for which Headley had visited Copenhagen earlier this year on behalf of Ilyas Kashmiri and Major Abdur Rehman. It is known that Ilyas heads the so-called 313 Brigade based in the Federally-Administered Tribal Areas. Maj.Abdur Rehman also probably belonged to the 313 Brigade.
9. The LET and the 313 Brigade were aware of each other's conspiracies relating to India and Denmark respectively and of the role of Headley in both the conspiracies, but their focus of interest was different. The LET was more interested in a spectacular operation in India than in Denmark. The 313 Brigade was more interested in a spectacular operation in Denmark than in India. It was the FBI's successful monitoring of the plans for an attack in Copenhagen which led to the arrest of Headley and the subsequent discovery of his role in India.
10. The FBI has not filed any Criminal Information Report against Rana in connection with Mumbai 26/11.
11.This may please be read in continuation of my earlier paper titled RE-VISITING MUMBAI 26/11 INVESTIGATION available at http://www.southasiaanalysis.org/papers36/paper3504.html (8-12-09)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
B.RAMAN
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) filed before a Federal court in Chicago on December 7,2009, a Criminal Information Report charging David Coleman Headley previously known as Daood Gilani, a US national of Pakistani origin normally resident in Chicago, on 12 counts. Six of these counts related to participating in a conspiracy to bomb public places in India, murder and maim persons in India and Denmark, providing material support to foreign terrorist plots and the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET). The remaining six counts related to participating in a conspiracy to aid and abet the murder of US citizens in India. This refers to the massacre of six US nationals by the LET in Mumbai during the terrorist strike of 26/11 last year.
2. It is learnt that it has been called a Criminal Information Report and not yet an indictment because the charges relating to India are largely based on voluntary admissions made by him during his interrogation after he was arrested by the FBI on October 3,2009, on a charge of conspiring with Pakistan-based elements to carry out a terrorist attack in Copenhagen against a Danish journal which had published caricatures of Prophet Mohammad in 2005. The FBI had originally filed a criminal affidavit giving details of evidence collected on the basis of technical intelligence which justified his arrest and interrogation. Subsequently, they submitted to the court in a sealed cover information obtained during his initial interrogation to justify his continued custody. This sealed cover has now been opened and its contents incorporated in the Criminal Information Report.
3. The FBI has described the investigation against Headley as still active. A formal indictment would follow after the investigations into his disclosures in India and Pakistan. The National Investigation Agency of the Government of India has already started an investigation into his activities in India during his periodic visits, but no arrests would appear to have been made as yet during this investigation. Rahul Bhatt, the film world personality and son of Mahesh Bhatt, film producer/director, who was the only Indian whose name had figured in the E-mails exchanged by Headley with his Pakistani handlers, could be a material witness during the investigation and prosecution in the US as well as India. The Criminal Information Report against Headley, however, does not refer to Rahul.
4. The FBI has also filed a separate Criminal Information Report on two counts in the same court on December 7,2009, against Major (retd) Abdur Rehman Hashim Syed, a Pakistani citizen based in Pakistan. The two counts relate to conspiring to attack the Danish newspaper and its employees. The Criminal Information Report against the retired Pakistani Major does not refer to Mumbai 26/11. In the affidavit filed earlier by the FBI against Headley, there were references to two handlers of Headley in Pakistan--- a person referred to as Individual A and an LET office-bearer referred to as LET member A. Headley was allegedly in touch with Individual A in connection with the Copenhagen conspiracy and with LET member A in connection with the Indian and Copenhagen conspiracies. Individual A appeared in the earlier affidavit as an associate of Ilyas Kashmiri of the 313 Brigade. He had introduced Headley to Ilyas Kashmiri and was acting as a cut-out between the two.
5. The earlier affidavits had not identified Individual A and the LET member A. The Criminal Information Report filed on December 7 has identified Individual A as Major (retd) Abdur Rehman. While the Report does not say anything about the arrest of the Major, media reports have said that he has been arrested by the Pakistani authorities at the request of the FBI. For reasons which are not clear, no Criminal Information Report has been filed against Ilyas, who seemed to have initiated the conspiracy relating to Copenhagen. The FBI has not yet named the LET handler of Headley called LET member A.
6.A careful reading of the earlier affidavits, the criminal information reports filed on December 7 and the media reports in the US and Canada would indicate that Headley played a role in two conspiracies unrelated to each other. The first conspiracy was initiated by the LET in 2006 for the terrorist strike in Mumbai. In this connection, he visited India five times spending long periods to reccee the targets ultimately attacked by the LET, including the two hotels, the railway terminus and the Jewish centre, took video photographs and then carried them to Pakistan. The details of his participation in the Mumbai 26/11 related conspiracy are as follows:2005:
The LET, of which he had become a member, asked him to "travel to India to perform surveillance."
Feb. 2006: He changed his name from his original "Daood Gilani" in order to "present himself in India as an American who was neither Muslim nor Pakistani."
June 2006: Obtained permission from friend and businessman, Tahawwur Hussain Rana, to open an ostensible consultancy franchise in India. Rana is a Canadian national of Pakistani origin living in Chicago, who was running an immigration consultancy service.
Sept. 2006: Visited India for several weeks, then Pakistan.
Feb. 2007: Visited India for several weeks, then Pakistan.
Sept. 2007: Visited India for several weeks, then Pakistan.
April 2008: Visited India for several week, making a surveillance video as he took a boat ride through the Mumbai harbour.
July 2008: Visited India for several weeks, then Pakistan.
7. The FBI's Criminal Information Report does not refer to any Indian visit by Headley in November,2008. There is also no reference to any role of his in connection with the July 2006 explosions in some suburban trains of Mumbai.
8. The second conspiracy related to the planned terrorist attack in Copenhagen for which Headley had visited Copenhagen earlier this year on behalf of Ilyas Kashmiri and Major Abdur Rehman. It is known that Ilyas heads the so-called 313 Brigade based in the Federally-Administered Tribal Areas. Maj.Abdur Rehman also probably belonged to the 313 Brigade.
9. The LET and the 313 Brigade were aware of each other's conspiracies relating to India and Denmark respectively and of the role of Headley in both the conspiracies, but their focus of interest was different. The LET was more interested in a spectacular operation in India than in Denmark. The 313 Brigade was more interested in a spectacular operation in Denmark than in India. It was the FBI's successful monitoring of the plans for an attack in Copenhagen which led to the arrest of Headley and the subsequent discovery of his role in India.
10. The FBI has not filed any Criminal Information Report against Rana in connection with Mumbai 26/11.
11.This may please be read in continuation of my earlier paper titled RE-VISITING MUMBAI 26/11 INVESTIGATION available at http://www.southasiaanalysis.org/papers36/paper3504.html (8-12-09)
( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )
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