The International Republican Institute (IRI) today released its survey of Pakistan public opinion. The poll was conducted March 7-30, 2009. As many as 42% Pakistanis – nearly every other citizen of the country – hold India responsible.
** IRI’s March 2009 poll explored attitudes regarding the Mumbai terror attacks. When asked if they believed it to be true that the attacks were carried out by Lashkar-e-Taiba, only seven percent replied yes, another seven percent replied maybe, and 78 percent said no. In response to an open-ended question as to who they thought was responsible for the **attacks, the top three replies were India (42 percent), I don’t know (33 percent), and America (20 percent).
** Further, when asked what should happen to those involved in the attack if it was proven
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that it was carried out by Lashkar-e-Taiba, five percent said that they should be turned over to India, while 82 percent said that they should be tried and punished in Pakistan; seven percent replied nothing. Pakistanis were opposed, however, to Lashkar-e-Taiba, Al-Qaeda and other terrorists using Pakistan as a base of operations to launch attacks against India, with 79 percent saying that it would be a serious problem and 17 percent
saying that it would not be.