Chicago:
As the arguments in the trial of 26/11 co-accused Tahawwur Hussain Rana concluded in a Chicago court, the prosecution, for the first time, screened a video of Rana's interrogation by the FBI in October 2009.
In the footage, released for the first time, Rana talks about David Coleman Headley's links with Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) as well as the Lashkar-e-Taiba.
The video shows a tired-looking and unkempt Rana, with his hair and beard grown out and graying, sitting at a table in the corner of a dimly-lit room. The audio of two FBI officials who are questioning him can be heard but they can't be seen on camera.
During the six-hour long interrogation, Rana tells special agent Parsons that David Headley had spent some time with the Lashkar and Jamaat-Ud-Dawa. He also says that Headley told him that he had been in contact with them for five or six years and received some training from them. Rana also confirmed that Headley told him that he was affiliated with the ISI and that it gave him some weapons. When asked who his contact person was in the ISI, Rana said Major Iqbal. He also admitted to speaking to Major Iqbal, saying Headley introduced him to the Major.
Rana's lawyer Charles Swift says he is innocent as he did not know of Headley's terror plots.
"The government interrogated him for six hours and put up only three minutes of it as evidence. In which what did he say? 'I knew that he (Headley) talked about those people.' Did he say I knew about those plots? No. Did he say I knew what David Headley was doing? No.
He said he said he (Headley) worked for the ISI and the LeT. That's all he talked about and that is all Dr Rana knew," he said.
After two weeks of testimony, the prosecution and defence have put their case to rest. Closing arguments will take place today and the jury will have to decide after everything they have seen and heard over the past two weeks whether Tahawwur Rana knew about Headley's terrorist agenda or whether he genuinely believed that the man who he thought was his childhood friend was working to expand his immigration business in India. What the jury decides will determine if Rana will spend the rest of his life in prison.