Adding to the strong proof of non-state actors of Pakistan being involved in the 26/11 terror attacks, David Coleman Headley on Saturday identified and confirmed the voice samples of three Lashkar-e-Toiba operatives who were present in a control room in Karachi and guided the 10 fidayeens in Mumbai.

Headley identified the trio as his LeT handler and main contact Sajid Mir besides Abu Khafa and Abu Al Kama, the trainers and coordinators of the 10-member fidayeen squad. 

When Special Public Prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam asked how many voices he heard, he said: “Three....Sajid Mir, Abu Khafa and Abu Al Kama.”

The three audio clips that were played contained the conversations of the people in the control room with the four terrorists who had entered the Taj Mahal Palace and Tower hotel in south Mumbai, where the seize lasted for 60 hours. 

When the voices were played, one of them could be heard saying that ATS chief of Mumbai and some senior officers have been killed, a reference to the Rang Bhavan Lane encounter in which Mohammed Ajmal Kasab and Abu Ismail, the head of the fidayeen group, gunned down the Special Inspector General of Police Hemant Karkare, who was the then Anti-Terrorism Squad chief, Additional Commissioner of Police Ashok Kamte and encounter specialist and Anti-Extortion Cell chief Vijay Salaskar. 

“The testimony is very important for us...he has clearly named three persons present in the control room directing and guiding the fidayeens,” Nikam later told reporters.