14 Feb 2009,
NEW DELHI: Pakistan may demand for the custody of Ajmal Kasab, the lone survivor among the accused of the Mumbai terror attacks, from India,interior minister Rehman Malik said on Saturday.
“So far, we have not asked India for the custody of Kasab. But we may seek it if the investigation demands,” Rehman Malik said in the southern port city of Karachi, adding that at the moment, it would be premature to say anything else in the matter.
India was quick to react, saying there was no way this could happen.
"The crime was committed in India. There is no question of handing Kasab to them. In fact, Pakistan should hand over to India the other suspects they've arrested because they were responsible for this terror attack. It can't be the other way around," sources in the Indian external affairs ministry said in New Delhi.
"On what basis do we send Kasab out there? The crime was committed out here (in Mumbai), therefore logic and reasoning demands that the suspects who they've rounded up be sent here (to India)," the sources said.
Meanwhile, Pakistan's efforts to prosecute its nationals allegedly involved in the Mumbai attacks have been called into question with the lawyer of one of the six men arrested saying on Saturday he was yet to receive a copy of the charges.
"A copy of the FIR (first information report) has not been received," lawyer Shahbaz Rajput told reporters outside an Anti-Terrorism Court in Rawalpindi.
"This is very embarrassing as we don't know under what sections (of the Anti Terrorism Act) the charges are being made," Rajput said.
"How can we defend a case when we don't know what the charges are?" he wondered.
Earlier, Pakistan’s interior minister Rehman Malik Malik had said that Kasab was one of the eight suspects named in a FIR registered by the Federal Investigation Agency on the Mumbai strikes. Six of the suspects have been arrested while two are at large.
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