A senior Pakistani diplomat said Saturday that he believes India's military had been preparing to attack Pakistan in the wake of the bloody siege in Mumbai, and that he warned his government and British officials about it, AP reported.
Pakistan's ambassador to London, High Commissioner Wajid Hassan, said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press that he had "circumstantial evidence" that India was preparing to strike in response to the gun-and-grenade attacks in Mumbai.
Hassan declined to identify his sources, but he said: "I am satisfied that they were credible, and they were rather in a panic to inform me that something drastic is happening."
The three-day rampage through Mumbai that began Nov. 26 killed 171 people. Indian authorities have blamed members of a banned Pakistani militant group that was set up by the country's intelligence agencies to battle Indian rule in the disputed Kashmir region.
Hassan said that on Nov. 28 he received his tip-off of an impending Indian military attack on Pakistan and immediately informed Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari and alerted British diplomats.
Britain's Foreign Office declined on Saturday to comment about Hassan's claim.
Hassan did not say what he thought such an Indian attack might involve, saying only that he feared Pakistani military targets would be hit.
He added that cooler heads seem to have prevailed.
"The situation definitely has calmed a little," he said.
Earlier this week, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice traveled to India and Pakistan to ease tensions in the wake of the Mumbai atrocity, and she urged both countries to remain calm.
On another matter, Hassan cast doubt on media reports that a hoax caller had impersonated Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee in a threatening phone call to Zardari on the same day Hassan says he received his tip-off.
Pakistan's Dawn newspaper reported that none of the normal checks to establish the caller's identity were done before putting the Mukherjee impersonator through to Zardari because of the urgency of the situation during the attacks.
But Hassan said the phone call had been properly vetted.
"Calling line identification was done, and that's how we came to know it came from the Ministry of External Affairs in India - Delhi," Hassan said. "When you talk to the president or the P.M. (prime minister), they do check where it's coming from."
Hassan did not say whether he thought Mukherjee had actually been on the line.