Two Pakistani teenagers, arrested for their alleged involvement in the terror attack on an Army camp in Uri last year, are likely to be cleared of terrorism charges, a senior government official told The Hindu . They could be booked under milder Sections for illegally crossing over to India.
Three days after the September 18 attack, in which 18 soldiers were killed, the Army claimed to have nabbed Faisal Hussain Awan and Ahsan Khursheed for allegedly guiding the terrorists to the 12 Infantry Brigade headquarters.
The Army said the two were working for the Pakistan based Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) and guiding terrorists to cross the Line of Control (LoC). They were first caught by a patrol team of the Border Security Force at a village near Uri and then handed over to the Army.
Khursheed hails from Khaliana Kalan and Awan from Pottha Jahangir. The villages are in the Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and close to the LoC. The case was transferred to the National Investigation Agency (NIA).
On January 19, the NIA said it was the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), and not the JeM, that carried out the attack.
No evidence yet
“We will decide on the fate of the two Pakistani boys in a month. So far, there is no evidence of them having guided the terrorists to the Uri camp. We are still verifying the details and their antecedents,” a senior official of the Union Home Ministry said.
Within hours of the attack, Director General of Military Operations (DGMO) Lt. Gen. Ranbir Singh said the attack was carried out by two JeM terrorists.
The charred bodies of the four terrorists were buried by the Army before an NIA team could reach the site. The NIA recovered GPS sets, AK-47 rifles, grenades with Pakistani markings and food packets.
“We have recovered data from the three GPS sets used by the terrorists to enter the camp. We have also retrieved the route taken by them to enter the camp and its point to known launch pads of the LeT in Pakistan,” an NIA official said.
NIA officials could not visit the points of ingress earlier to verify certain leads because of continuous shelling from across the border, the official said.
In October last, posters of one of the killed attackers, identified as Abu Anas, had come up in Gujranwala district of Pakistan, urging the people to take part in his funeral in absentia.
JeM chief Masood Azhar has been accused by the Indian agencies of orchestrating several terror attacks, including the one on the Pathankot airbase on January 2. India had even planned to mention the Uri attack in a dossier to be submitted to the 1267 UN committee to declare Azhar an international terrorist, but the plan was dropped after the NIA’s investigation. The proposal was blocked by China last month.
In touch with India: Pak.
On Thursday, a spokesperson of Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry told reporters in Islamabad that Pakistan established contact with India and was in touch with the authorities concerned for the repatriation of the teenagers.
“As soon as we came to know of their arrest, the Pakistani High Commission established contact with the Indian government. First consular access was provided to them on November 29, 2016. At the first meeting with the children, our consular officer facilitated a phone call of these children to their families. Thereafter, all formalities for ascertaining their national status were undertaken with the involvement of the Ministry of Interior. Our High Commission is in touch with the authorities concerned for their repatriation,” the spokesperson said.
