US accuses RAW official in Pannun’s murder over mercenary case

• Co-conspirator Gupta had previously been extradited to the US.
• The US government has affirmed its commitment to protect live: Pannun.
• Vikash Yadav gave Gupta the address of Pannun.

LONDON: The US has indicted a senior official of India’s Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) spy agency for masterminding a botched assassination plot against separatist Sikh leader Gurpatwad Singh Pannoon in New York last year, escalating efforts to hold India accountable. government for the act of violence and terrorism on US soil.

Vikas Yadav — an Indian foreign intelligence officer named by federal prosecutors for the first time in Thursday’s indictment — is accused of money laundering, conspiracy and leading a murder-for-hire scheme to kill Gurpatwad Singh Pannun, an American and Canadian citizen who serves as general counsel for New York-based Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), who are mobilizing Sikhs around the Khalistan Referendum, seeking to carve out of India an independent Sikh state called Khalistan.

Vikash Yadav’s co-conspirator Nikhil Gupta was previously charged and extradited to the US. He remains in a Brooklyn jail. Yadav – described by law enforcement officials as the “mastermind” of the scheme – remains at large in India and the US has now formally requested his extradition to the US to face the charges.

The indictment alleged that beginning in May 2023, Yadav, who was described as an Indian government employee at the time, worked with others in India and abroad to direct a conspiracy against Pannun.

Reacting to the indictment, Gurpatwant Singh Pannun said, “By charging RAW official Vikash Yadav in the ‘Murder For Hire’ plot, the US government has reaffirmed its commitment to the fundamental constitutional duty to protect life, liberty and freedom expression of the US citizen at home and abroad. RAW Official Yadav is a mid-ranking soldier who was tasked by NSA Ajit Doval and then RAW chief Samant Goel to assassinate me as part of the Modi regime’s policy of violently suppressing the Khalistan referendum campaign aimed at secession of Punjab from India by democratic means.

“The Modi government of India wants to kill me because as the General Counsel of the advocacy group Sikhs for Justice (SFJ) I am organizing the vote in Khalistan on the question ‘Should Indian-ruled Punjab be an independent country?’

“The attempt on my life on American soil is the glaring case of India’s transnational terrorism, which has become a challenge to America’s sovereignty and a threat to freedom of speech and democracy, which proves beyond doubt that India believes in the use of bullets while pro-Khalistan Sikhs believe in the polls.

“Continuous assassination attempts on my life in America and Canada by the Modi regime cannot deter me from organizing the independence referendum vote and I am going ahead with organizing the New Zealand Phase of the Khalistan Referendum on 17 November 2024 in Auckland of New Zealand. .

“Despite India’s use of violence against pro-Sikhs, the SFJ is committed to democratically resolving the dispute over the sovereignty of Indian-occupied Punjab through a referendum. First by assassinating Nijjar in Canada and then by attempting to assassinate me on American soil, India under Modi extended to foreign lands its policy of violently crushing the Sikh movement for the right to self-determination. It is the same policy under which India extrajudicially killed pro-Khalistan Sikhs in Punjab with impunity in the 1990s.”

“The Department of Justice will be relentless in holding accountable anyone — regardless of position or proximity to power — who seeks to harm and silence American citizens,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement Thursday.

“The United States continued to aggressively investigate the attempted assassination of an American citizen in New York by an Indian intelligence official and to press India to conduct its own credible and transparent investigation,” said Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn. ), speaking generally about US research. “It is absolutely critical that any nation, whether a partner like India or an adversary like Iran, understands that targeting anyone on American soil for extrajudicial killings is unacceptable and the United States will catch them and hold them accountable.”

The Justice Department charged Vikas Yadav as some Biden administration officials grew frustrated with India’s internal investigation, reports said. The decision to do so now follows months of frustration among some administration officials with the course of India’s own investigation into the assassination attempt. Some officials had privately expressed concerns that India’s research would amount to calcium, the Washington Post reported.

Gupta was introduced to a supposed “assassin” who was actually an undercover officer. Yadav provided Gupta with Pannun’s address, phone number and other personal information, and Gupta urged the “assassin” to carry out the assassination as soon as possible, but to avoid timing the assassination during high-level meetings between the Americans and Indians officials, according to prosecutors.

Days before Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s official visit to the US, masked gunmen killed Hardeep Singh Nijjar outside a Sikh temple in British Columbia, Canada. The next day, Gupta allegedly told the killer that Nijjar “was also the target” and “we have so many targets”.

He said “we don’t have to wait” for Pannun to be killed, according to the indictment. “It’s a priority now,” he wrote on June 20.

The latest indictment is a “serious example of the increase in lethal plots and other forms of violent transnational repression targeting diaspora communities in the United States,” according to a statement from Assistant Attorney General Matthew G Olsen of the Department of Justice’s National Security Division.

The Justice Department’s most immediate public confrontation with New Delhi over the botched assassination attempt comes as Canada publicly denounces India’s broader campaign of violence against Indian dissidents, including allegations that the killing of a Sikh separatist was directed by government officials.

Yadav “used his position of power and access to classified information to direct the assassination attempt of an outspoken critic of the Indian government here on US soil,” according to DEA Administrator Anne Milgram.

Canada on Monday expelled Indian diplomats, linking them to the 2023 assassination of Sikh separatist leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a close Pannun ally, on Canadian soil.

The US Department of Justice says Nijjar and Pannun were associates and said Gupta, who was allegedly hired by Yadav, felt that after Nijjar was killed in Canada, “now we don’t have to wait” for the killing of Pannun. The plot against Pannun was thwarted by American authorities.

This week, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau accused the Indian government of orchestrating violence in the countries.

Trudeau rejected the accusations during an inquiry into foreign interference, saying there is “increasingly clear evidence” that India violated Canada’s sovereignty by targeting Sikh dissidents on its territory.

India’s actions, Trudeau said, are a “horrible mistake.”

Trudeau said Nijjar’s killing was part of an even broader operation in India, with Indian government agents systematically targeting dissidents inside Canada.

“Violence against Canadians … has been permitted and in many cases directed by the Indian government,” the Canadian prime minister said, citing a national police investigation. He added that New Delhi, when the allegations were presented, had simply redoubled “the attacks against this government”.

While Canada’s government doesn’t want to pick “a fight with a major trading partner,” Trudeau said he would not waver when “defending Canadian sovereignty.”