LeT responsible for Mumbai terror attacks: Janet Napolitano

The US today ranked Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), responsible for Mumbai terror attacks, in the same league of al-Qaeda.

"I think in my judgement, the LeT ranks right up there in the al-Qaeda and related groups as terrorist organisations, one that seeks to harm people and takes innocent lives," US Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano said here.

"Our perspective, the US perspective, is LeT, I do not want to say important as that gives it too much credibility, but an organisation that is of the same ranking as the al Qaeda related groups," she said at a joint press conference with home minister P Chidambaram.

India believes the LeT and the Pakistani spy agency ISI hatched the conspiracy for the 2008 Mumbai attacks, which claimed 166 lives, including six Americans.

David Coleman Headley, a Pakistani-American giving evidence in a Chicago court in connection with the Mumbai attacks, has admitted to his links with the LeT and ISI.

Napolitano said the US had worked with India on investigations into the Mumbai attacks and would grant Indian investigators further access to Headley.

 "The United States has given India full access to the witness and once the case is over more access will be given. It is an example of how our two countries cooperate," she said.