Info on Headley: Chidambaram upset with US

New Delhi, Nov 29: Home Minister P Chidambaram on Tuesday said that India had asked US about David Coleman Headley 's links to US State Agencies but it denied to provide any information.

Chidambaram is in full accord with former Home Secretary GK Pillai's statement that US knew more about 26/11 attacks than what was told to India by them.

“That Headley was working for one or more US agencies is not in doubt. The question is how long was he working (for the US agencies) and when did he switch sides and become a double agent? ...Question is he was an agent, when did he become a double agent? When did he switch to the ISI side? That"s not clear. And secondly, when was he terminated by the US agencies? This is also not clear.

"I think they know more. But they are not going to share everything with us. Because Headley was an agent of one of their agencies for a considerable period of time," said Chidambaram.

Chidambaram claimed that he didn't think US was informed beforehand about the 26/11 attack. And added, “But even after the attack, they didn"t tell us about Headley for almost a year. It was only in October 2009 that Headley was arrested."

Still US hasn't admitted whether Headley had worked for its Intelligence Agencies. Last week, Pro Publica had published the detailed account of Headley's long association with the US Drug Enforcement Agency.

Pro Publica, a non-profit newsroom had given detailed information about the US agencies' failure to act on warnings given to it for the last seven years “that could have stopped his lethal odyssey sooner — and perhaps prevented the Mumbai attack".

"Unless a civilian government in Pakistan asserts its authority and puts pressure to counter the pressure of the ISI, I don"t think realistically you can expect progress in the investigation or prosecution of the real perpetrators of 26/11.

“See, as long as (Headley"s Lashkar handler) Sajid Mir and (Headley"s ISI handler) Major Iqbal and five others (involved in the planning of the attacks) have not even been apprehended, what kind of prosecution is this?" asked Chidambaram.

OneIndia News