NEW DELHI: India’s exterior intelligence service is a feared foe in its neighborhood: Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Nepal have all accused it of political meddling and involvement with outlawed teams which have perpetrated acts of violence. Now, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s allegation final month that Indian authorities brokers have been concerned within the June killing of Sikh separatist chief Hardeep Singh Nijjar in a Vancouver suburb has thrust Delhi’s secretive Analysis and Evaluation Wing (RAW) into the worldwide highlight. India angrily denied the allegations and demanded that Canada – which expelled RAW’s station chief – furnish proof. Ottawa stated it shared proof with allies, however won’t launch it publicly. Reuters spoke to 4 retired and two serving Indian safety and intelligence officers aware of RAW who stated the company was galvanized to play a extra assertive worldwide position after the 2008 Mumbai assaults that left 166 folks useless. The officers spoke on situation of anonymity to debate delicate issues. 4 officers stated that RAW expanded its attain in Western nations regularly after 2008. One present official cited India’s failure to safe the extradition of a US citizen convicted of involvement within the Mumbai assault as a key motivation for RAW to extend its sway within the West. Whereas in its quick neighborhood RAW has superior sign and technical intelligence capabilities, within the West the company stays largely depending on human intelligence for its operations, based on one serving and one former official. RAW, like different arms of India’s nationwide safety equipment, has been emboldened by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has bolstered India’s protection capabilities since his 2014 election and constructed a strongman picture, 5 of the officers stated. Learn India tells Canada to withdraw 41 diplomats Modi’s workplace didn’t reply to a request for remark for this story. RAW Chief Ravi Sinha, the one serving official publicly affiliated with the company, didn’t return messages looking for remark. Sinha stories to Modi’s workplace by the highly effective Nationwide Safety Advisor Ajit Doval, who additionally didn’t return a request for remark. All six officers denied that RAW engages in focused killings, noting that the company has no mandate for such operations. Fallout from the Vancouver incident has additionally raised issues that RAW will come underneath higher international monitoring, Indian intelligence officers and analysts stated. “The present developments have undoubtedly elevated international curiosity about RAW,” stated Dheeraj Paramesha Chaya, an skilled on Indian intelligence at Britain’s Hull College. He stated that higher Western scrutiny of RAW’s actions may additionally carry a better understanding of Delhi’s safety issues. The West has expanded navy and intelligence cooperation with Delhi as tensions with China have grown, with Washington agreeing in 2020 to share delicate mapping and satellite tv for pc knowledge with India. Within the brief time period, Canada’s assertion may make it more durable for Western international locations to belief RAW, one of many officers stated. Ottawa and Delhi have been in a diplomatic standoff since Trudeau made his allegations in public. India has suspended the issuance of recent visas to Canadian residents and demanded that Ottawa scale back its diplomatic presence. Canada had unsuccessfully pushed allies such because the US to problem a joint assertion condemning India, the Washington Put up reported. Increasing presence post-Mumbai RAW has lengthy been recognized as an arch-rival by Pakistani safety leaders. Most not too long ago, Islamabad – with out offering proof – blamed RAW for a suicide blast close to a mosque on Friday that killed over 50 folks. An Indian Overseas Ministry spokesperson didn’t return a request for touch upon the accusation. The Indian authorities publicly blamed Islamabad for the 2008 Mumbai assaults – extensively seen by policymakers in Delhi as RAW’s most up-to-date main failure – which Delhi says have been carried out by Pakistan-based militants. Islamabad denied that its brokers have been concerned. The company enhanced its intelligence gathering operations within the West, together with North America, as a result of position of US citizen David Headley, now serving a 35-year jail sentence in Chicago on expenses that included scouting places for the Mumbai assaults, one of many officers stated. American legislation enforcement was warned earlier than the assault that Headley had terrorism ties, based on US media stories. High Indian policymakers have publicly prompt that he was a US “double agent,” and Delhi’s failure to safe his extradition pissed off RAW, the official stated. The USA, which gave India entry to Headley, has denied he was a double agent. The American Embassy in Delhi didn’t return a request for remark. RAW has had a small Western presence since its inception within the 1960s, when it inherited the London station of the Intelligence Bureau, a colonial-era company that now focuses on home safety, based on Chaya, the Hull professor. The big Indian diaspora in international locations like the USA, Canada, Britain and Australia is an asset, two officers stated. However the danger of Indian brokers coming underneath surveillance of their host nations means they’re used for political affect campaigns fairly than safety operations, they stated. The Canadian Broadcasting Company reported in 2020, citing authorities and intelligence sources, that the nation’s safety companies have been monitoring the opportunity of India and China utilizing their diaspora to affect candidates in that yr’s federal election. “Our footprint is rising in components of the world which weren’t necessary earlier,” a not too long ago retired senior RAW official stated, with out offering specifics. RAW has “lengthy been related to direct motion…together with focused killings and disappearances” in its quick neighborhood, stated Adrian Levy, co-author of a ebook on South Asian spy businesses, including that such actions have been organized by way of proxies, which gave India deniability. Delhi has usually not seen a necessity for covert operations outdoors South Asia as a result of it has pleasant relations with many international locations that allow it to safe goals resembling extradition and gaining access to folks of curiosity, one official stated. Learn extra Canada has ‘local weather of violence’ for Indian diplomats The company has been “tremendous cautious” about its operations within the West, stated Levy. Whereas RAW has organized the motion of money, weapons and males to different places from Europe, “direct motion was reserved for South Asia and Southeast Asia,” he stated. Political help RAW operates from a colorless workplace complicated with no signage in central Delhi. Reuters was unable to find out specifics concerning the company’s operations, resembling its price range and its measurement. It break up off from the Intelligence Bureau in 1968 and was initially tasked with retaining a eager eye on China after Delhi’s humiliation of their transient 1962 battle. RAW had shut hyperlinks to Israel’s Mossad and the CIA since its inception, based on a 2008 report by the US Council on Overseas Relations, a suppose tank that tracks Indian overseas and safety insurance policies. One serving and one retired official informed Reuters that RAW’s political masters within the Modi authorities demanded that it increase its “presence, significance and capabilities.” “What they’ve finished is to present confidence to the group,” one of many officers stated. Two serving and one retired RAW brokers informed Reuters that some earlier governments didn’t supply enough sources and political help. Underneath Modi, India’s nationwide safety neighborhood “has change into much more proactive, when it comes to diplomacy (and) deal making but additionally direct motion, analog and digital,” stated Levy, the intelligence author. However as Indian intelligence companies have gained extra capabilities and much higher attain, the authorized framework they function in has not saved tempo with how fashionable democracies handle espionage operations, he stated. RAW was created underneath a authorities order with no formal parliamentary or constitutional backing and is exempt from legislative oversight, based on PRS, a analysis group that research India’s federal and state legislatures. “This implies there’s much less oversight, and fewer authorized hurdles…as actual command and management is centralized” with the prime minister, Levy stated.