FBI legal team to visit India on 26/11 attacks

With the trial in the Mumbai terror attacks scheduled to commence from Monday, a legal team from the FBI will be arriving in New Delhi soon to look into certain aspects of the evidence relating to the 26/11 strikes.

With the trial in the Mumbai terror attacks scheduled to commence from Monday, a legal team from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) will be arriving in New Delhi soon to look into certain aspects of the evidence relating to the 26/11 strikes.

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Official sources said a team of legal experts from the FBI would be arriving in New Delhi in the next two to three days to hold discussions with officials from the Law Ministry before flying to Mumbai, where they will also meet with lawyers appearing on behalf of the government.

The FBI team would also finalise its own chargesheet in the case, which it will submit before the US courts.

As per the US laws, the FBI has to probe the death or torture of any American citizen outside the US and submit a chargesheet.

In the Mumbai case, they had interrogated Mohammad Ajmal Amir Iman Kasab, the lone terrorist arrested for the audacious terror attacks.

Six US nationals and a British national lost their lives in the Mumbai attacks.

The US experts would go into the chargesheet filed by the Mumbai Police and examine the statements of witnesses besides working out a schedule for its sleuths to appear before the Special Court in connection with the electronic evidence gathered during the 26/11 probe.

The FBI has already extended support to the Indian investigators that its sleuths, who probed the terror strikes, would be recording their statements through video conferencing.

India and the US share a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) which came into effect on December 3, 2005.

The Mumbai police had earlier obtained "crucial evidence" from the FBI that points that the plot to execute the 26/11 terror attack was hatched in Pakistan.

This evidence, ranging from details of Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP), satellite phones used by terrorists, exchange of emails, intercepts and forensic examination of bullets used by attackers and others, substantiates the links between the terrorists and their handlers in Pakistan.

FBI's help had been sought in sharing the proofs like call details made through VoIP and from the satellite phone besides getting the documents related to Global Positioning System used by the terrorists while sailing from Karachi.

Backed up by its state of the art technological equipments, the FBI is believed to have got minute details of the voice over Internet protocol services and satellite phones, which the terrorists used to call their bosses in Pakistan.

The forensic examination of the bullets used by the terrorists in Mumbai was also a part of the evidence gathered from FBI by Mumbai Police.