Mumbai’s night of terror without end

A city in siege and a horrified nation watched perhaps the most audacious attack by terrorists at home as heavily armed men, with automatic weapons, grenades and low-intensity bombs, struck at least nine locations killing over 70 people and wounding some 200.

Landmark symbols of cosmopolitanism and affluence as well as public hubs were targeted. The dead included top police officers such as the chief of the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad Hemant Karkare, Additional Commissioner (East) Ashok Kamte and encounter specialist Inspector Vijay Salaskar. All were killed fighting the attackers.

The attacks, sophisticated and co-ordinated on a scale never seen before, continued well into the night as reports trickled in of fresh explosions and continuing gun battles.

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Terrorists are at work in Jammu and Kashmir, India is not a threat: Zardari

Declaring that India is not a “threat” to his country, Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari has described the militants operating in Jammu and Kashmir as “terrorists”, the first such admission by any top Pakistani leader.

“India has never been a threat to Pakistan. I, for one, and our democratic government is not scared of Indian influence abroad,” Zardari told The Wall Street Journal in an interview.

He spoke of the militant groups operating in Kashmir as “terrorists,” the paper said noting that former President Pervez Musharraf would more likely have called them “freedom fighters.”

Indicating a major shift in Pakistan’s well known position, Zardari had, as chief of Pakistan People’s Party, said in March that the ties between two countries should not be held “hostage” to the Kashmir issue, which should be left for future generations to decide, raising hackles at home.

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