Chicago man charged in Mumbai terror plot, Pakistani ex-general detained

Pakistan-born US citizen David Coleman Headley, 49, first arrested in October in Chicago faces 12 counts of terrorist conspiracy to bomb public buildings in India and murder and maim individuals in India and Denmark, for which he could be sentenced to death.
The son of a former Pakistani diplomat who Americanized his name from Daoou Gilani, Headley was charged with a Chicago businessman, Canadian citizen Tahawwur Rana, 48.
debkafile‘s counter-terror sources revealed earlier that in Chicago, Headley and his accomplices ran al Qaeda’s first known US-based headquarters for orchestrating worldwide terrorist operations.
Following the joint FBI-Indian intelligence investigation into the Mumbai attack, the Pakistani army has confirmed it has retired Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas in custody. He is being questioned on his ties with Headley and Rana.
Court documents show Headley made five extended trips to Mumbai for surveillance to set up the Nov. 2008 attacks for the al Qaeda-linked Pakistani Lashkar-e-Taibe which killed 160 people including six Americans.
The Taj Mahal and Oberoi hotels, the Leopold Cafe, the Chabad Center and Mumbai train station were attacked with guns, grenades and explosives in the terrorists’ three-day siege.
The Pakistani general is said to have coordinated surveillance of the Danish newspaper and participated in planning an attack there with Lashkar-e-Taibe and a man called Ilyas Kashmiri, leader of the Harakat-ul Jihad Islami terrorist group. Two months after the Mumbai atrocity, in January, Headley is said to have visited Pakistan and was taken by Gen. Abbas to the Federally Administrated Tribal Areas on the Pakistan-Afghan borders where al Qaeda and Taliban maintain headquarters.