New Delhi, November 30: US FBI officials will visit India to share information on two men being held in Chicago for alleged links to last year’s Mumbai attacks, reports said Monday.
India claims David Headley and Tahawwur Hussain Rana, both in US custody, were associated with the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba militant outfit, blamed for the deadly attacks in India’s financial capital which left 166 people dead.
The Indian Express newspaper quoted Indian National Security Adviser M.K. Narayanan as saying US President Barack Obama had taken an interest in the case and “a high-level team will be in Delhi soon with all the data collected and share it with us.”
Narayanan said the Federal Bureau of Investigation team could arrive in India within a week.
Headley, a Pakistani-born American, and Rana, a Canadian citizen of Pakistani origin, were arrested in October, accused of plotting attacks in India and Denmark.
Indian media, citing officials, recently said Headley intended to strike two elite boarding schools and a military academy in India and that he had befriended prominent people from Bollywood.
The Times of India quoted Indian Home Secretary G.K. Pillai as saying: “We hope to have access once both (Headley and Rana) are indicted,” after investigations into their activities are completed within a month.
Indian investigators have already visited the US but were not allowed to interview the suspects.
—Agencies