Congress leader Manish Tewari on Thursday said the government must take cognizance of the announcement made by terrorist group Al-Qaeda to set up a new branch in South Asia and asked New Delhi to put pressure on Islamabad to expedite the 26/11 trial.
"It is extremely worrying if the Al-Qaeda chief has now put India in the cross hairs of the erratic Islamistic organization of the world," Tewari told ANI here.
"The government must take cognizance of this and more than that they must put pressure on Pakistan to expedite the 26/11 trial, which is going on in Pakistan because only when people who are linked to these instrumentalities are convicted of offences would a salutary message go out to them," he added.
Terrorist leader Ayman al-Zawahiri has announced the creation of a new branch of Al-Qaeda in South Asia through a video message released by the organization's media arm.
According to a translation provided by the Jihad and Terrorism Threat Monitor of Washington DC-based Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), the new organization called, "Al-Qaeda Jihad Organization in South Asia" will be reportedly headed by militant commander Maulana Asim Umar.
Another militant Usama Mahmood has been named as the spokesman of Al-Qaeda Jihad Organization in South Asia.
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The video, released on September 3 in both Arabic and Urdu voiceover, shows Al-Zawahiri calling on Muslims to "wage jihad against its enemies, to liberate its land, to restore its sovereignty and to revive its caliphate".
"We want Islam to return to the Indian subcontinent, which was part of the Muslim world before it was invaded. It will serve Muslims in Burma, Kashmir, Gujarat, Bangladesh, Ahmedabad and Assam," al-Zawahiri said.
In the video, al-Zawahiri goes on to say, "Establishing Al Qaeda in the Indian subcontinent is the result of two years of work to unify the Mujahideen. The rise of this new branch demonstrates that jihad under the leadership of Amir of Believers, Mullah Omar (head of the Afghan Taliban) is expanding.