Islamabad/New Delhi, May 25 (IANS) Saying that evidence against him was insufficient, Pakistan’s Supreme Court Tuesday dismissed two appeals challenging the release from house arrest of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) founder Hafiz Saeed, who India says masterminded the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack.
The court dismissed the appeals by the federal and Punjab provincial governments against a Lahore High Court order freeing Saeed from house arrest on grounds of insufficient evidence.
Saeed, who had declared a jehad against India in February, had been placed under house arrest in December 2008 after the UN, acting under US and Indian pressure in the wake of the Mumbai carnage, proscribed the Jamaat-ud Dawa (JD) charity that the LeT had morphed into.
That happened after the LeT was banned in the wake of the Dec 13, 2001 attack on the Indian parliament that India blamed on the terror group.
The Lahore High Court had overturned Saeed’s arrest in June 2009, saying the evidence against him was insufficient.
The federal and Punjab provincial governments had appealed against this but the Supreme Court had indefinitely put off hearing them.
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, at a meeting with his Pakistani counterpart Yousuf Raza Gilani April on the sidelines of the SAARC summit at Thimphu, had conveyed his ‘deep concern’ about the lack of action against Saeed. Pakistan, in turn, referred to legal difficulties in prosecuting him.
‘PM (Manmohan Singh) mentioned deep concern about Hafiz Saeed and the way he is allowed to roam free and engage in communication not conducive (to the relationship between India and Pakistan),’ Indian Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao said after the meeting.
Rao said the Pakistan prime minister on his part ‘did mention that they have difficulties in their legal system’ to prosecute Saeed.
India had on Aug 21, 2009 handed over yet another dossier to Pakistan with new information on Saeed.
Official sources said the dossier was handed over at a meeting in New Delhi between Indian Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao and Pakistani High Commissioner Shahid Malik. The meeting was held at the request of the Pakistani envoy.
The new information pertains specifically to Saeed. Pakistan earlier said it does not have enough information from India to prosecute Saeed. This was the fifth dossier that India has handed over to Pakistan on the Mumbai carnage.
Before this, India had given a dossier on Saeed on Aug 1, 2009, which included transcripts of conversations between the Mumbai attackers and their handlers in Pakistan, with Home Minister P Chidambaram saying: ‘There is enough evidence to proceed against Saeed.’
