LONDON (Reuters): ” If Pakistan’s battle against the Taliban seems difficult, a much tougher challenge lies ahead: deciding what to do about the Lashkar-e-Taiba militant group it once nurtured to fight India in Kashmir.
Security experts from the United States and India believe the Pakistan Army and its Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency could shut down the group blamed for last year’s attacks on Mumbai — if they choose to do so.
“The Pakistan Army could do it and the ISI could tell them where to find those guys in a heartbeat,” said Bruce Riedel, a former CIA officer who led a review of strategy in Afghanistan and Pakistan for President Barack Obama.
“If they wanted to shut them down they could,” said B. Raman, a former Additional Secretary at India’s Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW) intelligence agency. “They can do it, but they don’t want to do it because they look upon it as a strategic asset.”
But Samina Yasmeen, a professor at the University of Western Australia who is researching a book on the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), said the reality on the ground may be more complicated.”
