Pakistan took no action against LeT: US

Noting that Pakistan-based terror group Lashkar-e-Taiba "continues to operate, train, rally, propagandize, and fundraise in Pakistan", US Friday acknowledged that India remains one of the most persistent terror targets.

Pakistan itself "continued to experience significant terrorist violence, including sectarian attacks", and "Pakistani military undertook operations against groups that conducted attacks within Pakistan such as TTP (Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan)", a State Department report said.

"But it did not take action against other groups such as Lashkar e-Taiba, which continued to operate, train, rally, propagandize, and fundraise in Pakistan," the Congressionally mandated annual Country Reports on Terrorism 2014 said.

With Pakistan taking no action against LeT, the group responsible for the November 2008 Mumbai terror attacks, "Indian authorities continued to blame Pakistan for supporting terrorists operating in Jammu and Kashmir", the report said.

India also continued to attribute attacks against Indian facilities in Afghanistan, to transnational terrorist groups, such as LeT.

At their Sep 30 summit, the report noted, President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Narendra Modi stressed "the need for joint and concerted efforts against networks such as Al-Qaeda, LeT, Jaish-e-Mohammed, and the Haqqani Network".

They also reiterated their call to bring the perpetrators of the November 2008 terrorist attacks in Mumbai to justice.

"The level of terrorist violence in India was substantially unchanged from 2013," the report noted, "demonstrating that India remains one of the most persistently targeted countries by insurgents and transnational and domestic terrorist groups".

"Although Al Qaeda's core in Afghanistan and Pakistan has been seriously degraded, Al Qaeda's global leadership continued to operate from remote locations in the region that the group has historically exploited for safe haven," the report said.

"Afghanistan, in particular, continued to experience aggressive and coordinated attacks by the Afghan Taliban, the Haqqani Network (HQN), and other insurgent and terrorist groups," the report said.

"A number of these attacks were planned and launched from safe havens in Pakistan," the report noted.

"Afghan Taliban and HQN leadership continued to find safe haven in Pakistan, and although Pakistan military operations disrupted the actions of these groups, it did not directly target them," the report said.

(Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)