Pakistan joint investigation team arrives in India; to visit Pathankot base Tuesday

Pakistan's Joint Investigation Team (JIT) comprising five members reportedly arrived in India Sunday and will visit the Indian Air Force base in Pathankot, Punjab, that came under militants' attack Jan. 2. The JIT has one Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) official.

The team will Tuesday examine the site where seven security personnel were killed in the attack on the Air Force base and question witnesses, according to Indo-Asian News Service.

The National Investigation Agency (NIA) will visually barricade the airbase to avoid exposure of any critical areas in the facility, Hindustan Times reported. The witnesses the JIT will question are Superintendent of Police Salwinder Singh, his friend Rajesh Verma and cook Madan Gopal, who were abducted by gunmen on the night of Dec. 31, 2015.

The JIT will Monday visit the NIA headquarters in New Delhi, where it will be briefed about the probe carried out by India. It will be shown a 90-minute presentation on the investigation. The NIA will also share details of the four militants and people who helped them infiltrate into India through the Bamiyal village. 

The Pakistani team may also examine the weapons the six militants used to attack the airbase, Press Trust of India cited Pakistani media reports as saying.

The team, headed by Chief of Punjab's Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) Muhammad Tahir Rai, includes Lahore's Deputy Director-General of Intelligence Bureau Mohammad Azim Arshad, ISI official Lieutenant Colonel Tanvir Ahmed, Military Intelligence official Lieutenant Colonel Irfan Mirza and Gujaranwala CTD Investigating Officer Shahid Tanveer.

The decision to allow Pakistan's JIT to visit India for further probe was taken after External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj's meeting with Sartaj Aziz, the foreign affairs adviser to Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, in Kathmandu on the sidelines of SAARC meeting March 17.

Following the JIT's visit, India is also expected to seek certain details from Pakistan's JIT, like contact numbers of Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) chief Masood Azhar's brother, and of the companies the militants got their food from. Azhar is suspected to be the mastermind of the Pathankot attack.

Besides, New Delhi may also seek Islamabad's approval to carry out investigations in Pakistan, according to HT.

Pakistan set up a six-member special investigation team on the orders of Sharif to investigate the evidence provided by India after the probe into the Pathankot attack suggested the militants were from Pakistan and members of JeM.