Pakistan envoy suggests India faked Mumbai transcripts

Pakistan’s investigation into the Mumbai attacks has found that they were not planned from Pakistani territory, the country’s high commissioner to London said today in an interview that is certain to infuriate India.

Wajid Shamsul Hasan, Pakistan’s high commissioner in Britain, also suggested that India had fabricated transcripts of telephone calls between the Mumbai attackers and their handlers in Pakistan.

His comments gave the first indication of the results of Pakistan’s investigation into the attack, which were supposed to be announced on Tuesday, but now appear to have been indefinitely delayed.

“Pakistani territory was not used so far as the investigators have made their conclusions,” Mr Hasan told India’s NDTV channel in an interview.

“They categorically informed me that [the] UK was not involved. Pak [Pakistan] was not involved. Its territories were not used for planning this operation,” he said.

“We are not doing any whitewashing business. We believe in going about facts. Our findings will be acceptable to the world.”

His remarks are bound to anger India, which blames the attacks on Pakistani militants who it says must have had support from Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency.

India this month presented Pakistan with a dossier of evidence, including details from the interrogation of the sole surviving gunman and information gleaned from satellite phones used by the attackers.

Asked about that evidence, Mr Hasan said: “Well, it could be fabricated. You took 45 days to give that sort of evidence although you started blaming Pakistan from day one.”

Pakistan has denied any state involvement in the attacks and promised on January 17 that the Pakistani commission investigating the attacks would publish their findings within 10 days.

That did not happen, however, and Yousaf Raza Gilani, Pakistan’s Prime Minister, said on Wednesday that Pakistan would release details of its investigation into the attack “very soon”.

There was no immediate response from the Indian foreign ministry.

Indian officials say that they are considering suspending all business, transport and tourists ties with Pakistan if it continues to drag its feet on the investigation and its pledge to crack down on Pakistani militant groups.

* Nine Pakistanis accused over a series of attacks that killed dozens of people and damaged the Danish embassy were remanded in custody by an anti-terror court. The suspects were arrested in the garrison city of Rawalpindi this week and confessed to involvement in bombings at the embassy in Islamabad, an Italian restaurant and against Pakistani security forces. (AFP)