Thaindian News

Chicago, May 27 (IANS) Self-confessed Pakistani-American terrorist David Coleman Headley has said that he may have been wrong to divulge the Mumbai attack plot to his long-time friend Pakistan-born Canadian businessman Tahawwur Rana.

In doing so he violated the espionage training he received from Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and Pakistan-based terror group Lashkar-e-Taiba, blamed for the deadly 26/11 attacks, Headley aka Daood Gilani told a Chicago court.

During cross examination Thursday, lawyers defending Rana challenged Headley about what evidence he had of his ISI handler, known as Major Iqbal, who provided guidance during Headley’s surveillance work in Mumbai.

“You can’t even identify him, or find him?” Swift asked, to which Headley agreed.

Headley testified this week that ISI and elements of Pakistan’s military - namely a retired army major he knew as “Pasha” - coordinated Lashkar’s attacks.

“Major Iqbal said to give Rana only generalities?” Swift asked. “Just what he needed to know,” Headley confirmed.

“That was one of the lessons (of Headley’s espionage training): trust no one,” Swift said. “They could give you away, sometimes without even knowing … Yet you violated every rule that you had been taught?”

“I violated some,” Headley said.

Headley brought his Moroccan second wife, covered in Muslim garb, to the Taj Mahal Hotel in Mumbai more than a year before the raid on the hotel and other targets.

Swift said the misstep could have exposed his cover as a non-Muslim American opening an immigration office for Rana.

“I guess I was being careless,” Headley said.

Headley, who was married to three women at the time, unbeknownst to the women, said he was posing as a tourist while he was videotaping sites for the LeT, but he still wasn’t sure if the hotel was a target.