Islamic militants warn of more attacks in India

A little-known Islamic militant group that claimed responsibility for Mumbai’s train bombings warned of more attacks today, as investigators questioned Muslim preachers in India’s remote north-east about the blasts.

The death toll in the July 11 attacks, meanwhile, rose to 207 from 182 when officials added people who died after being taken to hospitals in Thane, a town outside Mumbai.

“All of them are blast victims,” said BM Raut, a disaster management official in the state government of Maharashtra, where Mumbai is located.

While police are still trying to determine who carried out the well-co-ordinated attack, an outfit calling itself Lashkar-e-Qahhar said in an email to a local television station that 16 people took part in the bombings in Mumbai and that one was killed.

But “all the remaining 15 … are totally safe, and celebrating the success of this mission and also preparing for the next mission,” said the email, written in poorly punctuated, often ungrammatical English.

“We also request all the Muslim brothers and sisters of India to (not) go near the main historical, governmental and the monumental places of India (especially in Delhi and Mumbai) in future,” the email said. “Otherwise, they get hurt too.”

Indian police said they were investigating the veracity of the email.

In the email, Lashkar-e-Qahhar said it would soon address doubts about its earlier claim of responsibility by providing audio and video proof.

The group had first said it was behind the Mumbai bombings in an email to Aaj Tak on Saturday.

“We are surprised, why some media groups and peoples are disclaiming our responsibility?” the email said.

“Therefore it has become necessary for Lashkar-e-Qahhar to prove our claim,” it said. “Very soon, we will send you an audio/video tape regarding Mumbai blasts.”

Lashkar-e-Qahhar, or the Army of Terror, was unknown until it claimed responsibility for the March 7 bombings in the Hindu holy city of Varanasi that killed at least 20 people.

Investigators believe the group may be a front for Lashkar-e-Tayyaba, an Islamic militant group based in Pakistan that has long fought Indian rule in Kashmir, a predominantly Muslim Himalayan region.

The email was signed by a man calling himself Abu Mahaz, who identified himself as Lashkar’s spokesman and the head of its “media group”.

Investigators were also hunting for leads on the other side of India, in the north-eastern state of Tripura, where they questioned two preachers from a legal Muslim organisation called Tabliq-e-Jamaat over the train blasts, said Joint Commissioner of Police KP Raghuvanshi, who is leading the investigation into the attacks. He spoke from Mumbai.

The preachers have spent the past three weeks in Tripura, delivering sermons in remote villages along India’s porous border with Bangladesh. Authorities fear Muslim militants might be smuggling weapons and munitions into India.

Also today, Indian president APJ Abdul Kalam travelled to Mumbai to pay respects to those killed in the train blasts.

Kalam laid a floral wreath at one blast site, the Mahim train station, and observed a moment of silence at the time the first blast rocked the commercial and entertainment capital of India exactly a week ago.

Air, train and bus services and private cars also came to a halt in Mumbai.

Yesterday, authorities announced that the powerful military explosive RDX, often used by Islamic militants in the Himalayan territory of Kashmir, especially the group Lashkar e-Tayyaba, was used in the train attacks.

Muslim-majority Kashmir is divided between nuclear-armed neighbours India and Pakistan but claimed in entirety by both, and lies at the heart of their rivalry.

Several rebel groups have been fighting since 1989 to end largely Hindu India’s rule over two-thirds of Kashmir. The insurgency has claimed about 65,000 lives.

India accuses Muslim-majority Pakistan of materially aiding the rebels. Pakistan says it only offers them moral and diplomatic support.

While no one has been arrested over the carefully co-ordinated Mumbai train blasts, investigators suspect Lashkar-e-Tayyaba, a Pakistan-based Muslim militant group blamed for a number of bombings in India in recent years. Lashkar is known for using the explosive RDX.

India’s suspicions of a Pakistan link have prompted New Delhi to slow a two-year peace process with Islamabad, which denies involvement in the blasts.