WSJ, quoting unnamed sources, said Zarar Shah had, during his interrogation, also implicated other members of the Lashkar, and “broadly confirmed” the story Ajmal Amir Kasab had given Indian investigators. Kasab was captured alive near Girgaum Chowpatty on November 26.

The Sunday Express had reported on December 28 that after New Delhi shared extensive information on the attackers with visiting FBI officers, the US asked Pakistan for access to both Shah and Lakhvi, but failed to get a favourable response. Shah in particular, has been under US watch for a while now, and American investigators have been keen to confront and interrogate him.

“Pakistan's own investigation of the terror attacks in Mumbai has begun to show substantive links between the 10 gunmen and an Islamic militant group (Lashkar) that its powerful spy agency spent years supporting,” WSJ reported. “He (Shah) is singing," WSJ quoted a Pakistani official as saying. He had admitted to playing a key role in the attacks, an "admission (that is) backed up by US intercepts of a phone call between Shah and one of the attackers at the Taj Mahal Palace & Tower”. Over the phone, Shah gave the attackers “advice and kept them focussed”, the report said.

Shah had corroborated Kasab's story about the terrorists having trained in PoK and then travelled by sea to Mumbai from Karachi. He had also said the terrorists spent a few weeks in Karachi, “training in urban combat to hone skills they would use in their assault,” WSJ said.

... contd.