Lashkar-e-Toiba behind Uri attack, says NIA
The Army had earlier claimed that the attack was likely to have been carried out by JeM.
18 soldiers were killed in the terror attack on Uri base.
The NIA probe into the September 2016 Uri attack has found that the assault was carried out by Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) operatives and not Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) terrorists, as claimed by the Army earlier. At a press meet organised to commemorate its Raising Day, the NIA said the evidence it had gathered so far suggested that the Uri attack, which claimed the lives of 18 soldiers, was carried out by LeT.
“Evidence collected till now suggests that the Uri attack was carried out by LeT operatives. Similarly, there are strong indications that the Nagrota attack was carried out by Jaish-e-Mohammed,” NIA DG Sharad Kumar said.
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A senior NIA officer explained that the data collected from GPS sets recovered from terrorists killed in Uri attack showed that they were launched from launchpads in Pakistan that are known to be under LeT control. “Matrix sheets from different operations carried out by LeT have been tallied and they also match with matrix sheets recovered here. An additional evidence is the poster that appeared in Pakistan where LeT claimed the attack and called for performing Namaz-e-Janaza for the slain terrorists,” the officer said.
On October 26, The Indian Express had first reported about this poster. The poster named one perpetrator as Gujranwala resident Muhammad Anas alias Abu Siraqa. It invited local residents to join namaz for the Lashkar’s “lion-hearted holy warrior Abu Siraqa Muhammad Anas, who sent 177 Hindu soldiers to hell at the Uri Brigade camp in occupied Kashmir, and thus drank from the glass of martyrdom”. It carried a picture of Hafiz Saeed.
The Army had earlier claimed that the attack was likely to have been carried out by JeM. “All four killed were foreign terrorists and had carried with them items which had Pakistani markings. Initial reports indicate that the slain terrorists belong to Jaish-e-Mohammed tanzeem (outfit),” Lieutenant-General Ranbir Singh had been quoted in the media as saying after the attacks.
The NIA, too, after arrest of two teenagers from Pakistan on September 27, 2016, said, “During interrogation they have disclosed that they were tasked by JeM commanders to facilitate infiltration of a group of four JeM cadres who carried out the Uri Army camp attack.” The NIA has found that there were four attackers in the October 6 attacks on an Army camp in Langate, Kupwara. One attacker is suspected to have fled while three were killed by the Army.
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