India accuses Pakistani Islamist over airbase strike

New Delhi: India accused Pakistani militant leader Maulana Masood Azhar of masterminding an audacious attack on an air force base in January that led to a breakdown in relations between the two nuclear-armed nations.

Seven soldiers were killed in the attack on the Indian air force base in Pathankot, which New Delhi has said could not have been carried out without the help of the Islamabad government.

It blames the Pakistan-based Islamist group Jaish-e-Mohammed, founded by Azhar, who was released from an Indian prison in exchange for passengers of a hijacked Indian Airlines plane in 1999.

India’s National Investigation Agency (NIA) filed formal charges yesterday naming Azhar, his brother Rauf Asghar and two other members of the banned group after concluding an investigation into the January attack.

“We have filed the charge sheet and further investigations will continue,” an NIA official said on condition of anonymity.

“We have material evidence against the accused.”

No arrests have yet been made over the Pathankot attack, a rare instance of militants targeting an Indian military installation outside the disputed region of Kashmir. All the accused are reportedly living in Pakistan.

Pakistan banned JeM in 2002, a year after it was blamed for an attack on the Indian parliament that took the two neighbours to the brink of war.

It also arrested the group’s leader in the wake of the 2008 Mumbai attacks, but he was later released. — AFP