Indian agencies write to Twitter; want Islamic State tweet location

New Delhi, Jan 23: Indian agencies have written to Twitter seeking the location from where threatening tweets were issued by alleged Islamic State (IS) terrorists, calling for a car bomb attack on US President Barack Obama during his India visit.

The security agencies looking into the attacks have found that IP addresses of the computers used to issue the tweets have been "masked" by the alleged terrorists, the sources said.

The sources said Twitter has been asked to provide the location of the computer as soon as possible to check the authenticity and gravity of the threat in the wake of US President's visit starting from January 25.

The agencies believe that the tweet could be the handiwork of one of the three terrorists from Mumbai suburban Kalyan who had gone to Iraq to join the IS. Four boys from the area --Areeb Majeed, Saheem Tanki, Amaan Tandel and Fahad Shaikh--had left their home to join IS operations in Iraq.

One of them, Areeb Majeed, purportedly sustained injuries and returned after which he was taken into custody by the National Investigation Agency. The sources said the tweet issued on Monday from one of the handles is believed to be of the banned group IS.

It had said, "Heard that enemy of Allah, Obama is coming to India soon. And Indian Muslims are good in chemicals, so a chemical car bomb will be a good idea."

During the probe, the agency found that since location of the IP address was "masked", it was difficult to decipher where the alleged IS sympathiser was based in India or abroad.

Several images of one of the youths 'Tanki' were circulated on the internet showing his "suicide mission" in Syria's al-haska which were released on Facebook, Twitter and other platforms on which IS runs its propaganda.

The security agencies in the meanwhile have taken all the measures to ensure unassailable security ring around Obama who will be the first even American President to grace the Republic Day celebration as the Chief Guest.

PTI