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U.S. Says Indian Official Directed Assassination Plot in New York
A Manhattan indictment says the agent orchestrated an unsuccessful plot against a Sikh separatist, a plan linked to a killing in Canada.
Jesse McKinley, Julian E. Barnes and
Jesse McKinley reported from New York, Julian Barnes reported from Washington and Ian Austen reported from Ottawa.
It was described as a New York hit job with international implications: an audacious assassination plot against a Sikh separatist.
The target was a lawyer at a New York-based group called Sikhs for Justice — an American citizen and an outspoken proponent of independence for the northern Indian state of Punjab. And the man who would attempt to arrange his murder, prosecutors said, was an Indian national who had been hired by an official inside the Indian government.
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But the plot failed: The man planning the assassination hired a hit man who was, in fact, working for the American government.
The scheme burst into public view on Wednesday, when federal prosecutors in Manhattan announced that they had charged the Indian national, Nikhil Gupta, with murder for hire and conspiracy to commit murder for hire. The allegations could complicate the delicate relations among Washington, Ottawa and New Delhi.
The plot, prosecutors indicated in court documents, was no empty threat. It was linked to the June killing of another Sikh separatist in Canada, and they said that the Indian government official who orchestrated the attempted assassination told Mr. Gupta that there was another target in California.
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