The Washington Post reported on Monday that an Indian intelligence officer was directly involved in a foiled plot to assassinate a United States citizen who is an outspoken critic of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The report added that the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) officer was also involved in the murder of a Sikh activist last June in Canada. RAW is India’s external intelligence agency.
However, India’s Ministry of External Affairs rejected the report, saying it made “unwarranted and baseless imputations on a serious matter”.
A day later, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) published another report, saying that a “nest” of Indian spies had been discovered and expelled from the country for trying to steal defense secrets and monitor expatriate communities in 2020.
So is India’s spy agency increasingly targeting dissidents abroad? Here are the latest:
What is the US case about?
In November, U.S. authorities said an Indian government official directed an unsuccessful plot to assassinate Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, a Sikh separatist with dual U.S. and Canadian citizenship.
Pannun is the general counsel of Sikhs for Justice, a group that India labeled an “illegal association” in 2019, citing its involvement in extremist activities. In 2020, India listed Pannun as an “individual terrorist”.
Sikhs for Justice is part of a decades-long movement pushing for an independent Sikh state, called Khalistan, primarily incorporating the Indian state of Punjab. Although the movement at its height saw the murder of thousands of Sikhs and Indian security personnel in the 1980s, it has largely lost momentum in India, although it maintains influence among some Sikh diaspora groups in the US, Canada, Australia and the UK. United.
In its report, the Washington Post said Vikram Yadav, an Indian RAW official, ordered Pannun’s assassination around the same time Modi visited the White House on a high-level trip, as the two nations built closer ties in the face of shared concerns about China. growing power.
According to the indictment, on June 20, 2023, two days before Modi spoke at the White House, Yadav emailed Nikhil Gupta, an Indian hired for the assassination, that Pannun’s assassination was a “priority now ”. But Gupta turned out to be an informant, working with US federal agencies, and that’s how the plot was foiled.
Pannun’s murder did not happen, but the entire episode left many questions for New Delhi to answer.
“India should get to the bottom of this horrific murder-for-hire case — and the United States should make clear that it will not tolerate such crimes within its borders,” said an editorial in The Washington Post on Tuesday.
What happened in Australia?
Public broadcaster ABC reported on Tuesday that Indian spies were captured there by the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO) in 2020 as they attempted to “steal secrets about sensitive defense projects and airport security, as well as confidential information about the company’s business relationships. Australia”.
Citing unnamed “government and national security figures,” the report said the Indian “nest of spies” was also accused of surveilling Indians living there and developing close relationships with current and former politicians.
Australian intelligence officials in 2021 mentioned a “nest of spies,” but the country’s government refused to name the country they worked for.
The ABC revelations are politically awkward for Canberra, given the growing security relationship between India and Australia. Along with the US and Japan, they are members of the Quad security partnership.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the Foreign, Defense and Treasury ministers dodged questions about allegations that Indian spies tried to steal defense secrets and monitor diaspora groups. Albanese said he would not comment on intelligence matters.
Like Biden, Albanese also courted Modi last year, referring to the Indian leader as “boss” during a massive rally of Indian Australians.
Are other countries also involved?
Yes, there is Canada – home to the largest Sikh population after Punjab – where an alleged Indian attack on a critic of the Modi government was actually successful last year.
As the alleged U.S. plot to kill Pannun unfolded, another Sikh separatist, Hardeep Singh Nijjar, was shot dead outside a Sikh temple in the province of British Columbia on June 18, 2023.
Nijjar, an associate of Pannun, was also declared a “terrorist” by New Delhi.
In September, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau publicly linked Indian intelligence to Nijjar’s murder on Canadian soil.
Speaking in Parliament, Trudeau said Canadian law enforcement agencies were investigating “credible allegations of a potential link” between Indian government agents and the murder.
New Delhi called the allegations “absurd” as the dispute between the two nations resulted in the mutual expulsion of diplomats and the withholding of visas.
Then there is Pakistan, India’s archenemy, where at least eight Sikh and Kashmiri separatists living in exile and labeled “terrorists” by the Modi government have been killed in the past three years. Pakistani authorities blamed India for their murders.
This story originally appeared on Aljazeera.com read the full story
