With news out of the US last week that an Indian national pleaded guilty to a plot to assassinate an American citizen who criticized the Indian government — all at the direction of an employee of the Indian government — Prime Minister Mark Carney’s rapprochement with Modi looks even more foolish than it already did. 

Nikhil Gupta pleaded guilty to three federal counts in a US court, including murder-for-hire and conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire of an American citizen on American soil. Gupta stated that he was working at the direction of an Indian government employee, Vikash Yadav, who was employed by the Indian cabinet secretariat, which houses the Indian foreign intelligence service known as the Research and Analysis Wing. 

Although Gupta’s primary target was an American activist, his guilty plea shines a light on the killing of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, the Canadian Sikh leader who was gunned down outside a gurdwara (Sikh temple) in Surrey, British Columbia in June 2023.

Gupta sent text messages boasting about Nijjar’s murder, stating that Nijjar “was also the target” and “we have so many targets,” adding that in light of Nijjar’s murder, there was “now no need to wait” on killing his American target. 

This guilty plea ends any question of India’s involvement in extra-judicial and extra-territorial reprisals against members of the diaspora who are critical of the Indian........

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