The assassination target ‘betrayed’ by Carney’s India policy

or more than three years, Moninder Singh has been living each day knowing he could be assassinated. Police have advised the Canadian-born activist no less than three times they believed he was about to be killed.As recently as March, police notified him of an imminent threat to his life and, in April, suggested he avoid public events. The warnings all came from the RCMP national security unit.As a longtime B.C.-based campaigner for independence for India’s Sikh-majority Punjab state, Singh is confident he knows who wants him dead: the government of India.The threats have forced him to vacate his home for months at a time, so his kids wouldn’t get caught in the crossfire, and move into hotels and Airbnbs, booking rooms under false names and using borrowed credit cards, trying to cover his tracks.“Nobody should have to live like this,” he told Global News in an interview last week at his Surrey, B.C., residence.Singh isn’t complaining, or hiding, and he has only ramped up the activism that upsets India. But with Prime Minister Mark Carney now mending ties with New Delhi in the name of trade, he feels let down.Canadian Sikhs, particularly those like Singh who hold leadership positions, are the primary targets of Indian transnational repression and disinformation.The RCMP has linked Indian agents to the 2023 murder of a B.C. Sikh temple leader, as well as shootings, extortions, arsons and assassination plots.The foreign interference inquiry found that India’s meddling in Canadian elections, which allegedly included secretly financing candidates, was outpaced only by that of China.India has still not publicly acknowledged its actions or promised to stop them, but the Carney government is nonetheless pushing to not only renew ties with New Delhi, but to deepen them.“I think the entire Sikh community, including myself, feel a sense of betrayal in this,” Singh said. “But I also feel that it’s a betrayal of all Canadians and what Canada stands for.