US State Department's acting assistant secretary Alice G Wells, said that the US supports and lauds India’s use of its new terror law for listing of the four terrorists. This new law will help India and US’ joint efforts and combined action in our fight against terrorism.
India on Wednesday declared Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) chief Hafiz Saeed, Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) chief Masood Azhar, LeT's supreme commander of operations in Kashmir Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi and fugitive underworld don Dawood Ibrahim, all based in Pakistan, as terrorists under the amended Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.
The declaration, made through a gazette notification issued on Wednesday, comes nearly a month after the Parliament approved a crucial amendment to the UAPA law.
According to the amendment, individuals could also be declared as terrorists. Earlier, only groups or organisations could be declared as terrorists.
The notification was issued based on clause (a) of sub-section (1) of section 35 of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act which empowers the Central government to notify the name of an individual in the fourth schedule to the Act, if it believes that the individual is involved in terrorism.