New York (AFP) – A man allegedly recruited by Indian intelligence pleaded guilty Friday to plotting to hire a hitman to kill Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, a Sikh separatist who holds dual US and Canadian citizenship, federal prosecutors said. Pannun is affiliated with a New York-based group called Sikhs for Justice that advocates for the secession of Punjab, a northern Indian state with a large Sikh population.
Nikhil Gupta, who entered his plea in a Manhattan court, was alleged to have contacted an individual he believed to be a criminal associate to hire a hitman. The individual was in fact a confidential source working with the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). Gupta pleaded guilty to all three counts he faced, including “murder-for-hire, conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire, and conspiracy to commit money laundering, in connection with his efforts to murder a US citizen in New York City,” the office of the US attorney for the southern district of New York said in a statement. Gupta will be sentenced on May 29.
Prosecutors allege that Indian intelligence officer Vikash Yadav, who remains at large, directed the plot and recruited Gupta in May 2023 to hire a hitman to carry out the murder. According to the Justice Department, Yadav was employed by the Indian government’s Cabinet Secretariat, which houses the country’s foreign intelligence service, the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW).
Canada separately alleged that India arranged a plot on its soil that ended in the 2023 killing of another Sikh separatist, who was a naturalized Canadian citizen, outside a Vancouver temple. Unlike the United States, Canada publicly highlighted its concerns at the highest level, with the then-prime minister criticizing India’s actions.
Pannun “became a target of transnational repression solely for exercising their freedom of speech,” said FBI assistant director Roman Rozhavsky. Gupta was detained at Prague airport in June 2023 on a US warrant and extradited to the United States. US intelligence agencies assessed that the plot on American soil was approved by India’s top spy official at the time, Samant Goel, The Washington Post has reported. India has denied involvement in the murder plots and previously pledged to carry out an investigation into the allegations.
© 2024 AFP
