INDICATING THAT the extradition of Canadian-Pakistani citizen Tahawwur Rana, who played a role in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks, could be imminent, the Indian government has started making preparations for him to be handed over by the United States, The Indian Express has learnt. According to sources, Rana could be extradited latest by the second half of December.
Sources said officials — including those from Central investigative agencies and legal departments of both countries — recently held a meeting in this regard at the US Embassy in Delhi. “In the meeting, which lasted around three hours, Rana’s extradition was a key point of discussion. The talks focused on what preparations and logistics need to be in place by the Indian government to facilitate the extradition, as well as Rana’s jail arrangements once he arrives,” a source said.
The meeting follows the denial of Rana’s request on September 23 by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit for rehearing of his extradition case. Just the previous month, on August 15, the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in California had affirmed the District Court’s denial of Rana’s habeas corpus petition. It said India provided sufficient competent evidence to support the magistrate judge’s finding of probable cause that Rana committed the charged crimes.
Now, Rana has a 45 days window to appeal against the extradition ruling before the top court. After that, the extradition may at best get delayed by another 45 days, till the Supreme Court waives off his last ditch appeal.
But this is rare, said the source. According to the US government's courts website on procedures, the Supreme Court accepts only 100-150 of the more than 7,000 cases it is asked to review each year, i.e., approximately only 2 per cent of the cases are accepted.
Requests for comments sent to the US embassy in New Delhi did not elicit a response.
Rana, 63, was a childhood friend of David Headley. Headley, a US citizen who was born to an American mother and a Pakistani father, was arrested in October 2009 by US authorities and sentenced to 35 years in prison for his involvement in the Mumbai attacks.
Rana studied at the Hasan Abdal Cadet School in Pakistan, which Headley too attended for five years. After a stint as a doctor in the Pakistan Army, Rana moved to Canada and was eventually granted Canadian citizenship. He later established a consultancy firm called First World Immigration Services in Chicago. It was a branch of this business in Mumbai that provided Headley with the perfect cover to identify and surveil potential targets for the Pakistani terror group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT).
In the 26/11 attacks, on November 26, 2008, 10 LeT terrorists stormed into Mumbai and for three consecutive days, the city was in the grip of terror. The violence claimed the lives of 166 people, including six Americans. Pakistani nationals who carried out the attacks reached India via boats, it was later found.
Rana was arrested by US police soon after Headley’s arrest at Chicago’s O’Hare airport in October 2009. He was convicted in Chicago in 2011 of providing material support to the LeT for the India attack and for supporting the never-carried-out plot to attack a Danish newspaper named Jyllands-Posten, which printed cartoons of the Prophet in 2005. However, jurors in the US cleared Rana of a more serious charge of providing support for the attacks in Mumbai.
Headley told prosecutors that in July 2006, he had travelled to Chicago to meet Rana and told him of the mission that the LeT had assigned him. Rana approved Headley’s plan to establish a First World Immigration Services centre in Mumbai and helped him obtain a five-year business visa. However, while deposing via video link at the Bombay City Civil and Sessions Court in February 2016, Headley claimed that he had informed Rana of his activities only a few months before the attacks in November 2008.
In 2011, the NIA filed a chargesheet against nine people, including Rana, for planning and executing the attack. In 2014, a Sessions Court in Delhi issued fresh non-bailable warrants against the men, whom the NIA had listed as absconders.
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