INDIAN HOME MINISTER CHIDABARAM ON INVESTIGATION OF MUMBAI ATTACKS

S E C R E T NEW DELHI 003268

SIPDIS

FOR THE SECRETARY FROM AMBASSADOR MULFORD

E.O. 12958: DECL: 12/31/2018
TAGS: PREL, PTER, CJAN, PK, IN
SUBJECT: INDIAN HOME MINISTER CHIDABARAM ON INVESTIGATION
OF MUMBAI ATTACKS

REF: NEW DELHI 3267 AND PREVIOUS

Classified By: Ambassador David C. Mulford. Reasons: 1.4(B, D).

1. (S) Summary: The Ambassador in a December 31 meeting
reiterated to Indian Home Minister Chidambaram that the
investigation of the Mumbai attacks could be furthered if
India concurred in sharing the information obtained by the
FBI with Pakistan. While Chidambaram did not indicate
whether the Indian government had yet decided whether and how
much information from the investigations could be shared with
Pakistan and other countries, he said India would take
another look at how serious Pakistani intentions were in
investigating the Mumbai attacks if they provided the FBI
with access to detained Mumbai attacker Muhammad Ajmal's
father or/or to the Pakistani dealer of the outboard motor
used in the attacks. End Summary.

No Decision On Sharing Information
--------------

2. (S) After the Ambassador reiterated his message about
the usefulness to the investigation of sharing information,
Chidambaram noted that Pakistan may be "opening the door a
little" regarding the involvement of Pakistani elements in
the Mumbai terror attacks. He pointed to press reports
quoting GOP National Security Advisor Durrani as not ruling
out that detained attacker Muhammad Ajmal Amir Kasab could be
Pakistani and a report in today's Wall Street Journal citing
unnamed Pakistani security officials saying that
Lashkar-e-Taiba was involved in the attacks. Minister
Chidambaram did not acknowledge whether the Cabinet had yet
decided on whether and how India would share investigatory
information with Pakistan or other countries. (Note: In
December 31 reftel, Foreign Secretary Menon indicated that a
decision would be made today on this matter. End Note.)

How Serious is Pakistan?
--------------

3. (S) Without explicitly stating there was a condition on
information exchange, Chidambaram indicated that one sign of
how serious Pakistan was about investigating the attacks
would be whether GOP authorities "let your people talk" to
Kasab's father or/or whether they allowed access to the
dealer of the Yamaha outboard motor recovered from a boat
used by the attackers. Chidambaram noted that the GOI and
the U.S. knew the serial number of the motor and knew the
name of the dealer in Pakistan who had imported the motor
from Japan. He said that if this type of access was provided
by the GOP ("getting your foot in the door"),then India was
confident that the U.S. would be able to take the
investigation forward.

Pakistan and Bangladesh Face a Problem
--------------

4. (C) Chidambaram acknowledged that Pakistan's civilian
leadership faced a serious problem in moving forward against
Islamist forces, but pointed to the election results in Jammu
and Kashmir and Bangladesh as indicative of the rejection of
terrorist ideologies by the South Asian public. He thought
that Sheikh Hasina had grown as a leader after her hard
experience of the last several years and understood that this
was her last chance to point Bangladesh in the right
direction. He noted that India had heard through back
channels before the election that Hasina was committed to
working with India to stamp out terrorists. Chidambaram
noted that there were strong forces in Bangladesh -- the Army
and intelligence services -- which would make it difficult to
improve relations in other spheres, but was confident that
Bangladesh would step up its counterterrorism cooperation.
MULFORD