Barack Obama asks Pakistan to book 26/11 perpetrators, holds LeT guilty

Internal security and strategic experts have hailed the joint statement signed by prime minister Manmohan Singh and US president Barack Obama that urged Pakistan to work towards bringing the perpetrators of the November 2008 Mumbai attacks to justice.

Experts have called this a ‘very positive move’ in the fight against terrorism and particularly the Pakistan based Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT), that has been responsible for several heinous acts of terror, including the 26/11 Mumbai carnage.

By comparing the LeT to global terror outfit al Qaeda while taking into account the recent LeT attack in Samba, Jammu, the two countries reaffirmed their commitment to eliminating terrorist safe havens, its infrastructure and network.

The two leaders also decided to significantly expand information sharing and intelligence cooperation to address threats to their nations and strengthen bilateral relationship to exchange information on known and suspected terrorists.

“These are positive, significant developments and vindicate India’s long standing position. The US has made a public commitment at the highest level to help India,” said former union home secretary, R K Singh.

Reflecting positively on the statement, former chief of Research and Analysis (R&AW) A S Dulat said the statement sounds good and shows strengthening of Indo-US ties. He, however, cautioned that one will have to see if the USA is really serious about intelligence sharing on equal footing. “It is easier said than done and only time will tell how serious US is,” Dulat said.