LeT operative Naseer in Kerala, to be grilled about terror cases

Suspected Lashkar-e-Tayiba militant Thadiyantavida Naseer, arrested recently for his alleged involvement in terror attacks in various parts of the country, was brought to Kozhikode from Bengaluru on Friday for questioning in connection with some cases in the state.

"Naseer has been brought to Kerala from Bengaluru," Inspector General of Police (North) Tomin J Thankary told reporters at the Karipur International Airport near Kozhikode, but declined to divulge further details.

The IGP sought the cooperation of the media in carrying forward the investigation into various terror-related cases.

Two officials from the Bengaluru police also accompanied Naseer.

Meanwhile, a senior official of the Special Investigating Team, probing the terror related-cases in Kerala, said Naseer would be taken to Kozhikode, Kannur and Kochi in the next four days.

Naseer and Shafaz were arrested by Bangladesh Rifles personnel and subsequently handed over to the Border Security Force on December 2. They were brought to Bengaluru where they were questioned about the serial blasts in the city that let two people dead and many injured last year.

Naseer also reportedly plotted the March 2006 bomb blasts in two bus shelters in Kozhikode, in which two persons, including a policeman, were injured.

The officials suspect that Naseer was behind the torching of a Tamil Nadu Transport bus near Kochi a few years ago, to protest the continued detention of People Democratic Party chairman Abdul Naser Madhani in a Coimbatore jail.

Naseer reportedly confessed to an aborted attempt to bomb the Taj hotel in Kozhikode to avenge the 2002 communal clashes at Marad beach, in which five persons were killed.

A native of Neerchal locality in Kannur, he is wanted by the SIT, which is investigating the recruitment of Muslim youths from Kerala to the LeT for carrying out subversive activities.

The recruitment came to light after four youths from Kerala were shot dead in an army encounter in Jammu and Kashmir last year while they were trying to sneak in to Pakistan through the Line of Control.

Nazir has also reportedly confessed that he had organised camps in parts of Kerala to lure youths to carry out subversive activities against the country.

Several bomb blasts in Kannur district in recent years were carried out on an 'experimental' basis as part of carrying out subversive activities in major cities of the country.