Garcetti: US ‘satisfied’ with accountability demanded from India

WASHINGTON The US is “satisfied” with the accountability it has demanded from India on the allegations that its officials were involved in an alleged plot to kill a Sikh separatist on American soil, US ambassador to India Eric Garcetti said.

In November last year, US federal prosecutors charged Indian national Nikhil Gupta with working with an Indian government employee in the foiled plot to kill Gurpatwant Singh Pannun.

Pannun, wanted in India on terror charges, holds dual citizenship of the US and Canada. He has been designated as a terrorist by the Union home ministry under the anti-terror law Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. “When I was referring to a relationship that might have bumps along the road, this would be potentially the first big fight in a relationship,” Garcetti said in response to a question at an event organised on Thursday by the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), a top American think-tank.

“And so far, knock on wood, I would say the administration is satisfied with the accountability that we’ve demanded on this, because this is a red line for America, for our citizens,” he said.

He said it was an ongoing criminal case.

“There’s an indictment that’s been brought. And if there is any connection to state actors in that, there has to be accounta- bility. We expect that not only from our side, but we expect India to have that accountability,” he said. “So, there’s been a commission of inquiry that India has brought together and that we expect, while we do the criminal case that is about American justice, that there need to be consequences and shared information,” he said.

“So far, one of the most difficult things you can do as an ambassador in diplomacy, I have been satisfied with what they have done. I think the administration is, but we have many steps still to go,” Garcetti said.

Garcetti appeared in a discus- sion with Michael Froman, the former US Trade Represent- ative under the Obama Administration.