The Ministry of External Affairs has denied allegations of a foreign media report that India carried out targeted assassinations in Pakistan, calling them "false and malicious propaganda". The report in The Guardian quoted intelligence operatives in India and Pakistan to claim that India's move was part of a wider strategy to eliminate terrorists living on foreign soil.
The allegations are "false and malicious anti-India propaganda", the Ministry of External Affairs told The Guardian, in response to the report. The ministry also underlined a previous statement by Foreign Minister S Jaishankar in which he said that targeted killings in other countries were "not the policy of the government of India."
WHAT DOES THE REPORT CLAIM?
Pakistan-based terror group Jaish-e-Mohammed later claimed responsibility for the attack.
According to Pakistani investigators, these deaths were orchestrated by Indian intelligence sleeper cells mostly operating out of the United Arab Emirates.
Quoting an Indian intelligence operative, the report also claimed India had drawn inspiration from intelligence agencies such as Israel's Mossad and Russia's KGB, which have been linked to extrajudicial killings on foreign soil. He also said the killing of the Saudi journalist and dissident Jamal Khashoggi, who was murdered in 2018 in the Saudi embassy, had been directly cited by RAW officials.
INDIA-PAKISTAN TIES
"Our relations with India could be improved after elections there," Asif said, as he spoke to reporters outside the Parliament House in Islamabad on April 1.
