Zaki-ur Rehman Lakhvi is chief of Lashkar-e-Taiba which carried out the 26/11 Mumbai attacks. (File Photo)
Highlights
- Zaki-ur-Rahman Lakhvi should be tried for abeting deaths: Pakistan court
- Lakhvi was freed from jail in Rawalpindi last year
- Pakistan has blamed delay in case on India for not sending witnesses
Zaki-ur-Rahman Lakhvi, who masterminded the
2008 terror attacks on Mumbai, will be tried for aiding the murders of each of the 166 people who were killed, a Pakistan court said today.
Lakhvi is chief of the Lashkar-e-Taiba, which has planned and executed some of the deadliest recent terror attacks in India.
Last year,
he was freed from a jail in Rawalpindi, provoking a strong rebuke from India, which said the move proved Pakistan goes easy on terrorists who target India.
Lakhvi was arrested months after the 26/11 attacks in 2008, which saw Pakistani terrorists laying siege to some of Mumbai's best-known landmarks including its main train station, CST (Chhattrapati Shivaji Terminus), used by lakhs of commuters every day.
File photo: The Taj hotel in Mumbai was one of the targets of the deadly attacks. (AFP photo)
The inordinately slow trial of Lakhvi and six others arrested for the Mumbai strike has been a recurrent point of tension between India and Pakistan.
"The seven suspects will be charged individually for the abetment to murder of each victim of Mumbai attack case," a senior court official said, quoting the verdict of the trial court, according to news agency Press Trust of India.
However, the court does not permit the cross-examination of suspects on these charges, the official was quoted as saying.
While India has said the frequent adjournments by the Pakistani court have ensured the case against Lakhvi does not progress, Pakistani officials have blamed India for refusing to send over witnesses whose testimony they describe as crucial.
The foreign ministry of Pakistan had written to the Indian government about three months ago asking it to send all 24 Indian witnesses to Pakistan.