Germany charges Indian man with spying
Indian man accused of spying on Sikh group in Germany and passing on information to Indian secret service.
German federal prosecutors say they have charged a 45-year-old Indian man with spying for his country in Germany.
The man, identified only as Ranjit S in accordance with German privacy laws, is accused of spying on members of a Sikh organisation in Germany in early 2013, prosecutors said in a statement on Monday.
He then passed on information to “an Indian secret service” and was paid for his information, the prosecutors said without providing any further details.
Prosecutors say the suspect was charged in Koblenz in February.
The Sikh dominated province of Punjab in western India had witnessed a violent separatist movement in the 1980s. The movement was crushed, but some still carry scars of the events.
In 1984, the then-Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi was gunned down by two of her Sikh bodyguards, weeks after she had sent in the army to weed out armed men from the Golden Temple in Amritsar – the holiest shrine of the Sikhs.
Gandhi’s assassination triggered anti-Sikh riots in India and hundreds were killed, mainly in the Indian capital New Delhi.