Indian man charged for spying on Sikhs in Germany

An Indian national has been charged in Germany for spying on the Sikh community and Kashmir activists.

The 54-year-old man, known as Balvir S, is accused of working for India’s Research & Analysis Wing (RAW) intelligence service in Germany since 2015.

His trial will commence at a state court in Frankfurt on 25th August 2020, in the same court that convicted an Indian couple for spying on the Sikh and Kashmiri communities December 2019. The husband in that case was handed a suspended prison sentence of 18 months for acting as a foreign intelligence agent and his wife was fined 180 days’ wages for aiding him.

According to prosecutors, the suspect was in regular telephone and personal contact with the Germany-based Indian intelligence officer and passed on information “in numerous cases” until December 2017.

“He allegedly provided information about figures in the Sikh opposition scene and the Kashmiri movement and their relatives in Germany, and passed this on to his handlers who were working at the Indian consulate general in Frankfurt,” the higher regional court in the city said in a statement.