Pakistan's investigation team arrives in new Delhi to probe Pathankot attack
According to Indian media, investigative team will be given limited access up until the attack site.
LAHORE (Dunya News) – Pakistan’s five member investigation team for probing the attack on Pathankot airbase reached New Delhi today (Sunday).
Indian media reports that the investigative team will be given limited access up until the attack site.
According to the details, the 5 member team will talk to eyewitnesses and will also interrogate Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) Salwinder Singh, who is alleged to be involved in the incident.
The team will also examine the ammunition used in the onslaught.
The investigation team is being headed by Muhammad Tahir Rai, who is the Additional Inspector-General (IG) of Punjab Counter Terrorism Department (CTD). Other members include Intelligence Bureau (IB) Lahore’s Deputy Director Muhammad Azeem Arshad, Lieutenant Colonel of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Tanvir Ahmad, Lieutenant Colonel Irfan Mirza of Military Intelligence (MI) and CTD Gujranwala’s Shahid Tanvir.
On January 2, six militants had stormed Pathankot airbase in Indian Punjab killing around seven personnel. Repercussions of the attack in regard to tensions between Pakistan and India were not as bad as the case has been in the past years.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had immediately taken Indian counterpart Narendra Modi in confidence over a telephone call, even though he was on a foreign tour.
PM Nawaz Sharif had assured Modi of full cooperation in terror attack’s probe.
Indian media have claimed that neighbouring country’s team would visit India in last week of March.
It was not the first attack in India that Pakistan was alleged of. However, the budding ties between the two countries after Modi’s Jati Umra visit tackled the Pathankot blow.
On Christmas last year, Modi dropped by Lahore on way back from one-day Afghanistan tour and wished Nawaz Sharif on his birthday.
The two leaders held more than an hour long meeting at Nawaz Sharif’s residence in Lahore’s Jati Umrah where pleasantries were exchanged.
Pathankot attack came a week after the surprise meeting. Reports claimed that the attack was meant to sabotage the attempt to better relations with the Lahore meeting.
India had suspended all contact with Pakistan in November 2008 after an attack in Mumbai. However, talks were resumed in 2011 amid high tensions across the Line of Control (LoC).
Cross-border shelling claimed lives of dozens of Pakistanis in 2014 and 2015.
The most recent scheduled talks between Pakistan and India, National Security Advisers-level dialogue was postponed after the Pathankot attack.
However, NSA Sartaj Aziz, in a recent statement said that the dialogue was still on only delayed due to ongoing probe.
