Pakistan unaware of Interpol notice against its citizens

ISLAMABAD - Pakistan’s interior ministry has denied any knowledge of the Red Corner notices issued against five Pakistanis, including two serving Majors of the country’s armed forces, in connection with the 26/11 Mumbai attacks.

A ministry spokesman said that “no official confirmation has been received in this regard”. “We’ll only be able to give an official reaction after we hear from the Interpol officially,” he said. There has also been no reaction so far on these reports by the inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) of the armed forces.

According to media reports, the Interpol has issued Red Corner notices against five Pakistani nationals for their alleged role in the 2008 terror strike in Mumbai that left over 165 people dead.

The Interpol issued notices after securing a non-bailable warrant from the court of an additional sessions judge. The warrants were issued on the basis of disclosures made by Pakistani-American terrorist David Headley, who was extensively questioned by security officials in June this year.

Notices have been issued against Major Sameer Ali and Major Iqbal, both serving in the Pakistani Army, besides Illyas Kashmiri (a Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorist), Sajid Majid and Syed Abdur Rehman Hashim, reports said.

Security agencies have already secured Red Corner notice against Lashker’s founder Hafiz Saeed and his close aide Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi in connection with the 26/11 attacks. These people, according to authorities concerned, had worked in close coordination with Headley for carrying out terror strikes in Mumbai.

Political analyst Hassan Saeed said that the “media is reading too much into these notices”. “The spokesman of the Interpol has already clarified that these are not international arrest warrants and the purpose was only to assist the authorities in the probe.”

“Interpol summoned and questioned a lot of people during the probe regarding former premier Benazir Bhutto’s assassination,” he said.

“It did not mean that they were culprits,” he insisted, adding that “it is highly unlikely that a serving military officer could be directly involved in such an activity.”