To eliminate terrorists living abroad, India’s foreign intelligence agency has assassinated as many as 20 individuals in Pakistan since 2020, according to a Guardian report, which quoted several Indian and Pakistan intelligence officials.
The report further said that the assassinations were carried out by Research & Analysis Wing (RAW), which comes directly under the command of the Prime Minister’s Office. The new emboldened approach was triggered by the Pulwama attack in 2019, which lead to the death of 40 paramilitary personnel in a suicide bomb attack, the report claimed.
Moneycontrol could not independently verify the report.
The killings were organized by the sleeper cells of RAW in the United Arab Emirates. The report said that the Indian agency paid millions of rupees to local criminals or poor Pakistanis to conduct the assassinations. Jihadists were also recruited and they were made to believe that they were killing ‘infidels’, the report said.
The inspiration behind this approach was drawn from foreign agencies such as Israel’s Mossad and Russia’s KGB. The murder of Jamal Khashoggi led to the question that, “If the Saudis can, why not us,” the report said.
However, India's ministry of external affairs refuted all the allegations and said they were “false and malicious anti-India propaganda” in a response to the Guardian. The ministry further said targeted killings were “not the government of India’s policy”, re-emphasising a previous denial made by External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar.
The development comes in the backdrop of the US and Canada accusing New Delhi of targeting those it considers “hostile to India”. The two countries have alleged that New Delhi is involved in the murder of several dissidents, particularly the killing of a Sikh activist in Canada and a failed assassination in the US, the report said.
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