VANCOUVER, June 30, 2004
CBC News
A defence witness at the Air India trial has testified
that the Indian government could have been behind the 1985 bombing plot.
Gurmit Singh Aulakh testified he believes agents of
the Indian government infiltrated Sikh organizations in North America.
He made the comments while giving evidence at the B.C.
Supreme Court trial of two men accused of the 1985 Air India bombings.
The theory that the Indian government was behind the
bombings isn't new. It was the subject of a book released a few years
afterward.
But Aulakh testified that the theory has merit.
Aulakh is the head of a Sikh separatist organization
that's based in Washington, D.C. He's testifying on behalf of accused
Air India bomber Ajaib Singh Bagri.
Aulakh said he believes Indian government agents infiltrated
Sikh groups where they created chaos and caused Sikhs to be labelled
as terrorists. He said one such group was the Babbar Khalsa, which is
on Canada's list of terrorist organizations.
At one time Bagri was a high-ranking member of the group.
The witness also testified it's possible a prominent
Babbar Khalsa leader, who had ties to both Bagri and co-accused Ripudaman
Singh Malik, was really a government agent.
The leader, Talwinder Singh Parmar, is believed to have
been the mastermind of the Air India bombing plot. Parmar was killed
by Indian police a decade ago.
Aulakh testified it's possible Parmar was murdered after
he was through working as an Indian government agent.