India says Pakistan shifting blame over Mumbai

By Bappa Majumdar and Zeeshan Haider

NEW DELHI/ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - India accused Pakistan on Monday of trying to shift blame for the Mumbai attacks and demanded it do more to dismantle militant networks, while a top U.S. commander landed in Islamabad for more talks.

As tension between the nuclear-armed neighbors simmered, Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani said the armed forces were fully capable of defending the country and the people would be united if war was imposed.

India and the United States have blamed Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) for last month's attacks which have provoked a sharp rise in rhetoric between the nuclear-armed neighbors who have fought three wars since 1947.

Pakistan denies any links to the assault on India's financial heart, which killed 179 people, blaming "non-state actors," and has promised to cooperate in investigations. However, Pakistan says India has provided no evidence for it to investigate.

"Pakistan's response so far has demonstrated their earlier tendency to resort to a policy of denial and to seek to deflect and shift the blame and responsibility," Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee said.

Mukherjee reiterated that India was keeping all its options open after the Mumbai attacks, comments the Indian media have widely interpreted to mean that a military response was still possible. Mukherjee said that was not his intent.

Amid the war of words, the Pakistani air force conducted an exercise, causing delay to two civilian flights in the eastern city of Lahore, said Muhammad Latif, a spokesman for Pakistan International Airlines.

A Pakistani air force spokesman would only say the air force had "enhanced its vigilance" in view of the situation.

Gilani said Pakistan's desire for peaceful coexistence should not be taken as weakness.

"However, if war is imposed upon us the whole nation would be united and the armed forces are fully capable of safeguarding and defending the territorial integrity," Gilani's office quoted him as telling Pakistan's high commissioner to India.

LETTER FROM GUNMAN

On Sunday, Mukherjee said India had given Pakistan specific evidence about who was behind the Mumbai attacks, including intercepted satellite telephone conversations and an account given by the lone surviving gunman, Ajmal Amir Kasab.

A Pakistani spokesman said India had provided no evidence and the only information it was getting was through the media.

"We are doing our own investigation but it can go only so far because we do not have anything from the scene of the crime, we do not have anything from India," said Pakistani Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Sadiq.

The Indian foreign ministry later said it had handed a letter written by Kasab to Pakistan's acting high commissioner in New Delhi in which Kasab said he and the nine gunmen killed in the siege were all from Pakistan.