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Lashkar as big a threat as al-Qaida, admits US

NEW DELHI: The US has acknowledged that ISI-backed terrorist outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) is as big a threat as al-Qaida. US secretary for homeland security Janet Napolitano said, "I think in my judgment, the LeT ranks right up there in the al-Qaida and related groups as terrorist organisations, one that seeks to harm people and takes innocent lives." The statement of the US official, who is here for a bilateral security dialogue, comes in the wake of strong evidence that Lashkar had outgrown its initial focus on J&K to emerge as a global terror threat, matching al-Qaida in aspiration, resources and reach. "Our perspective, the US perspective, is LeT is very very, I do not want to say important as that gives it too much credibility, but an organisation that is of the same ranking as the al-Qaida related groups," Napolitano said after the first homeland security dialogue with home minister P Chidambaram on Friday. Napolitano was talking against the backdrop of the Chicago trial of Pakistan-born Lashkar jihadis David Headley alias Dawood Gilani and Tahawwur Hussain Rana in connection with the ISI-scripted 26/11 terror attack on Mumbai. Headley has disclosed to the US's Federal Bureau of Investigation that Lashkar, which set out by seeking to wage jihad to wrest "Muslim lands" of J&K, Hyderabad and Junagarh, has now set its sight farther afield, plotting to assassinate the editor of a Danish newspaper which had published offending cartoons of Prophet Mohammad. During the Mumbai attacks as well, the Lashkar terrorists targeted westerners, killing six Americans among others. Pre-26/11, Pakistan had consistently held that Lashkar, being devoted to the "liberation" of Kashmir, posed no threat to the US. The alibi had started wearing thin after Lashkar terrorists were found to be involved in terror plots in the US and Australia before 26/11 and the mounting evidence of its collaboration with al-Qaida in Afghanistan alerted the Americans to the grave threat. Napolitano said the US had worked with India on investigations into the Mumbai attacks and would grant Indian investigators further access to Headley. "The United States has given India full access to the witness and once the case is over, more access will be given. It is an example of how our two countries cooperate," she said. She, however, did not respond to questions on if the US should influence Pakistan in extradition of one of the most wanted men -- Hafiz Saeed. Earlier in the day, Chidambaram had described Pakistan as the most "difficult neighbourhood" in the world. In his opening remarks to the homeland security dialogue, he said, "The global epicentre of terrorism is in our immediate western neighbourhood. The vast infrastructure of terrorism in Pakistan has for long flourished as an instrument of state policy."

                                                                                                               
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