New Delhi: Two days before Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s arrival in the US, senior US officials briefed Sikh advocates about the government’s talks with India regarding the alleged plot to murder Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, Reuters cited attendees as saying.
Senior White House and intelligence officials also discussed threats facing Sikhs in the country and sought to assure the community that the government would protect it from instances of ‘transnational repression’, the news agency also said.
They apprised attendees of US law enforcement efforts to sensitise local police about threats faced by Sikhs and to encourage the community to report threats or instances of harassment, it reported.
Modi arrived in Philadelphia on Saturday (September 21) evening for a three-day US visit, during which he will meet President Joe Biden, participate in the Quad summit and later travel to New York to attend the UN’s Summit of the Future and speak with tech executives.
In November, US prosecutors alleged that an Indian government official orchestrated an attempt to kill US citizen and pro-Khalistan lawyer Pannun on US soil and that the American government ultimately foiled this plot.
The unsealed indictment revealing the allegations came only two months after Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau claimed the existence of “credible allegations” of the involvement of Indian government agents in the killing of Hardeep Singh Nijjar near Vancouver.
While the Union government outright rejected Trudeau’s claims and initiated a diplomatic standoff after he publicised the allegations, it said the US’s allegations in the ‘Pannun murder plot’ were a “matter of concern”.
It has initiated an investigation into its role in the Pannun plot, and even as the US government has said it expects accountability from India, nothing is publicly known about the status of the probe or who is involved in it.
Pannun has since sued the Union government in a New York court seeking damages for the alleged plot to kill him, following which foreign secretary Vikram Misri said his lawsuit amounted to “completely unwarranted and unsubstantiated imputations”.
Last month, the FBI released a public service announcement in Punjabi warning listeners about transnational repression, although it did not say where such repression may originate.
It has also warned Sikh advocate and reported attendee of Thursday’s meeting Pritpal Singh of a threat to his life owing to his activism, news reports have said.
Singh said on X in reference to Reuters’s report that he was “thankful to US officials for their vigilance in protecting Sikh Americans”. “We will hold them to their assurances to do more in safeguarding our community,” he added.
Thursday’s meeting also came a day before Adam Schiff, who represents California in the US House of Representatives, introduced a Bill that if passed would require the attorney general to submit a report on transnational repression against US citizens or people in the US.
