Slip-ups over Headley issue: U.S. sends review findings to India

Home Ministry plans to forward questions after examining reply

The Shyam Niwas building, where terror suspect David Headley stayed, in Mumbai.

The U.S. has formally sent to India the reply of Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper Jr. on the review of slip-ups following the warning received by U.S. agencies about David Coleman Headley's possible Lashkar-e-Taiba connections and involvement in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks.

The report was received by the Union Home Ministry on Monday, official sources in the Ministry said.

The Ministry planned to forward some questions to the U.S. after examining the reply.

David Headley, son of a former Pakistani diplomat and an American woman, is being held in the U.S. He has admitted to helping to plot the Mumbai attacks in which 166 people were killed.

The DNI ordered the review after American newspapers disclosed that Headley's two wives tipped off the U.S. authorities about his LeT links.

“The review finds the U.S. government aggressively and promptly provided the Indian government with strategic warning regarding the LeT's threats to several targets in Mumbai between June and September 2008,'' Mr. Clapper said in a statement.

“The review finds that while some information relating to Headley was available to U.S. officials prior to the Mumbai attacks, under the policies and procedures that existed at the time, it was not sufficiently established that he was engaged in plotting a terrorist attack in India. Therefore, the U.S. government did not pass on information on Headley to the Indian government prior to the attacks,” he said.

Earlier this month, Home Minister P. Chidambaram said the U.S. had instituted a full-scale review of “what they knew and when they knew” about Headley, who was arrested in October 2009 for his involvement in the Mumbai attacks. He had said that the U.S. had promised to share the outcome with India.

Mr. Chidambaram maintained that the U.S. had shared intelligence with India in the months leading to the attacks and thereafter, though the name of David Headley was not mentioned. He said the name of Headley was shared with India some time in October 2009.

In recent weeks, Home Secretary G.K. Pillai said the Ministry was “disappointed” that the U.S. did not provide specific information about Headley, his movements and activities, though he travelled to India after the attacks.