CHICAGO: Two Chicago men were yesterday indicted on charges they planned a violent attack on a Danish newspaper and helped lay the groundwork for

the November 2008 terrorist rampage that killed 166 people in the Indian city of Mumbai.

Businessman Tahawwur Rana and his associate David Coleman Headley already had been charged with assistance to terrorism but the 12-count indictment expanded allegations against Rana to include the Mumbai attacks. Both are in federal custody in Chicago. Retired Pakistani military officer Abdur Rehman Hashim Syed and reputed terrorist leader Ilyas Kashmiri - described as having been in regular contact with al-Qaida’s No. 3, Sheikh Mustafa Abu al-Yazid - also were charged in the new indictment.

Abdur Rehman and Kashmiri are accused of being involved with the plans to attack the Danish newspaper Jyllands Posten, which in 2005 printed 12 cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad that sparked outrage in the Muslim world. Officials say the defendants were linked to the terrorist organisation Lashkar-e-Taiba.

Headley, 49, formerly named Daood Gilani, is the son of a Pakistani father and an American mother. He has authorised the government to disclose that he is cooperating in the investigation, prosecutors said. His attorney, John Theis, declined to comment yesterday. Rana, 49, is a Pakistan-born Canadian national who has based his First World Immigration Service company and other businesses in Chicago for more than a dozen years.

The indictment alleges Headley

attended terrorism training camps

run by Lashkar in Pakistan in

2002 and 2003. He is accused of

conducting surveillance of Mumbai targets in five trips over two years preceding the 2008 attacks.

The indictment said Headley photographed and videotaped potential targets, including the Taj Mahal Hotel and other sites later attacked with firearms, grenades and improvised explosive devices by 10 terrorists who stormed through the city, killing dozens and wounding hundreds more, including Americans.

Headley is charged with 12 counts. Six charge a conspiracy to murder

and maim people in India and

provide material support to a foreign terrorist organisation.