Austria: Pakistani under probe for possible links to Mumbai, Paris attacks

Vienna: Austrian prosecutors have revealed that they are probing a possible link of a Pakistani national apprehended in Salzburg with 2015's Paris terror attacks and the 26/11 terror strike in Mumbai.

The identity of the Pakistani suspect, who has been in custody since his arrest in December in the western Austrian city along with an Algerian, has not been confirmed. "Leads pointing to this are being looked into. Wide-ranging investigations on this question, among others, are ongoing, although the public prosecutors" office has been waiting for information on this from Pakistan since December 2015," the Dawn quoted prosecutors in Salzburg, as saying in a statement.

According to reports, the man arrested is thought to be a bomb-maker for the banned Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) organisations. Lashkar-e-Taiba has been blamed for string of high-profile attacks in recent years.

India holds it responsible for the 2008 Mumbai attack that killed 166 people and injured several. It has been suspected by the French investigators that the militant Islamic State (ISIS) group, which claimed responsibility for both the Paris bombings as well as attacks in Brussels on March 22, had sent both men to Europe in carrying out attacks.

Austrian authorities in February said that both men were believed to have been in the same boat bringing around 200 refugees to Greece. Meanwhile, a senior security official in Pakistan said he had no information about the matter, reports Dawn.