GRAPHIC, al-Qaeda inspired group Bombs New Delhi courthouse killing 11 injuring 76 (raw footage)
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NEW DELHI — Police in India detained three men for questioning in Kashmir Thursday in connection with a bombing at a New Delhi court complex Wednesday that killed 11 people and injured at least 76, the Associated Press reported.
The blast, from a bomb hidden in a briefcase, occurred outside the reception area of the Delhi High Court complex during the morning rush hour, shortly after 10 a.m
In an e-mail received by an Indian news television station, a Pakistan-based group called Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami asserted responsibility for the blast. The
e-mail said the al-Qaeda-inspired group, which also has cells in India and Bangladesh, would target several courts across India, including the Supreme Court, unless authorities immediately rescinded the death sentence of Afzal Guru, a Kashmiri convicted for his role in a 2001 attack on India's Parliament.
A clemency petition from Afzal was recently rejected.
Security officials said they were examining the e-mail's authenticity. "This could even be a smoke screen, maybe meant to distract us," one intelligence official said. The official said the Harkat-ul-Jehadi cell in Kashmir has been weakened because of a series of arrests and surrenders.
Early Thursday, police in Kashmir said investigators had traced the e-mail to an Internet cafe in Kishtwar, in Kashmir, and they detained three residents of the town for questioning, including the owner of an Internet cafe.
A security official in Kashmir said the two-line e-mail was sent three hours after the bomb blast in New Delhi, by an 18-year-old man. An assistant at the cyber cafe told the official that the sender of the e-mail spoke a local dialect that indicated that he was from Kishtwar.
Authorities also were searching various locations in Kishtwar for clues, the Associated Press reported.
Also Thursday, the Indian news station Headlines Today received an e-mail from an indigenous militant group, called Indian Mujahadeen, which also claimed responsibility for the attack. Indian Mujahadeen is accused of carrying out a series of bombings in several cities since 2007. The news channel said it sent the e-mail to the Home Ministry for verification.
India's top internal security official, U.K. Bansal, said preliminary investigation of the blast site turned up traces of nitrate-based explosives and pentaerythritol tetranitrate, known as PETN, which he called "the explosive of choice for terrorists."
Unlike in some earlier attacks, Indian officials and police appeared reluctant to jump to conclusions or point a finger immediately at Muslim groups or neighboring Pakistan, with which New Delhi began a fragile peace process this year. In 2007, India was quick to blame Pakistan for a train bombing, but a subsequent investigation pointed to the involvement of radical Hindu groups based in India.
"There is a directive that has gone out that we will not name anyone in a hurry. It is because of the earlier mess-ups," said the intelligence official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media. He also said that there have been no substantial leads in any of the seven attacks across India since last summer.
The blast, from a bomb hidden in a briefcase, occurred outside the reception area of the Delhi High Court complex during the morning rush hour, shortly after 10 a.m
In an e-mail received by an Indian news television station, a Pakistan-based group called Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami asserted responsibility for the blast. The
e-mail said the al-Qaeda-inspired group, which also has cells in India and Bangladesh, would target several courts across India, including the Supreme Court, unless authorities immediately rescinded the death sentence of Afzal Guru, a Kashmiri convicted for his role in a 2001 attack on India's Parliament.
A clemency petition from Afzal was recently rejected.
Security officials said they were examining the e-mail's authenticity. "This could even be a smoke screen, maybe meant to distract us," one intelligence official said. The official said the Harkat-ul-Jehadi cell in Kashmir has been weakened because of a series of arrests and surrenders.
Early Thursday, police in Kashmir said investigators had traced the e-mail to an Internet cafe in Kishtwar, in Kashmir, and they detained three residents of the town for questioning, including the owner of an Internet cafe.
A security official in Kashmir said the two-line e-mail was sent three hours after the bomb blast in New Delhi, by an 18-year-old man. An assistant at the cyber cafe told the official that the sender of the e-mail spoke a local dialect that indicated that he was from Kishtwar.
Authorities also were searching various locations in Kishtwar for clues, the Associated Press reported.
Also Thursday, the Indian news station Headlines Today received an e-mail from an indigenous militant group, called Indian Mujahadeen, which also claimed responsibility for the attack. Indian Mujahadeen is accused of carrying out a series of bombings in several cities since 2007. The news channel said it sent the e-mail to the Home Ministry for verification.
India's top internal security official, U.K. Bansal, said preliminary investigation of the blast site turned up traces of nitrate-based explosives and pentaerythritol tetranitrate, known as PETN, which he called "the explosive of choice for terrorists."
Unlike in some earlier attacks, Indian officials and police appeared reluctant to jump to conclusions or point a finger immediately at Muslim groups or neighboring Pakistan, with which New Delhi began a fragile peace process this year. In 2007, India was quick to blame Pakistan for a train bombing, but a subsequent investigation pointed to the involvement of radical Hindu groups based in India.
"There is a directive that has gone out that we will not name anyone in a hurry. It is because of the earlier mess-ups," said the intelligence official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media. He also said that there have been no substantial leads in any of the seven attacks across India since last summer.
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