ISLAMABAD – Pakistani authorities yesterday arrested an alleged planner of the 2008 Mumbai attacks over a separate case of terrorism financing, said officials.
Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, a leader of the banned militant organisation Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), was nabbed in the eastern city of Lahore, where he was running a medical dispensary, said Punjab’s counterterrorism department in a statement.
He used the dispensary to collect funds for militant activities, said the department, without providing details.
LeT, including Lakhvi, is accused by India of plotting the four-day assault that left 166 people dead.
India has long seethed at Pakistan’s failure to hand over or prosecute those accused of planning and organising the Mumbai attacks.
Lakhvi was detained in 2015 over the attacks, but released months later. The government slapped him with a series of detention orders, but judges repeatedly cancelled them.
Earlier this year, Pakistan arrested firebrand cleric and alleged mastermind of the seige Hafiz Saeed, who heads Jamaat-ud-Dawa, a wing of LeT, for terrorism financing.
Saaed has denied involvement in the attacks.
Lakhvi will be presented before an antiterrorism court in Lahore. – AFP, January 3, 2021
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