Indian proxies funding Canadian politicians "at all levels of government": CSIS Report

October 2022 Intelligence Assessment suggests Indian Consulate interfered in Conservative Federal leadership contest

The DEA responded rapidly to an Indian government assassination plot and used its sources to gather evidence.

Government of India agents appear to have interfered in the Conservative’s 2022 leadership race by purchasing memberships for one candidate while undermining another, and also boasted of funding “a number of politicians at all levels of government,” according to CSIS.

The allegations come from an October 2022 CSIS Intelligence Assessment that details sweeping election interference operations from hostile states including China and India.

The Bureau has reported on numerous Chinese efforts to clandestinely fund preferred candidates, as cited in this high-level CSIS report, which explains how Beijing leverages diaspora groups to elect Canadian politicians.

China is by far the biggest threat in this foreign corruption, which offers candidates campaign workers, funding and media support, in exchange for secretly advancing policy positions “to the detriment of Canada.”

But the “Canadian Eyes Only” October 2022 report underlines that India is using the same corrosive tactics as Beijing. And allegations that India uses proxies to corrupt Canadian politicians have gained new urgency since CSIS filed this report.

That’s because an explosive U.S. Department of Justice indictment unsealed last week charges that Indian government agents were caught red-handed while directing international gangsters in assassination plots against a number of Sikh separatists in Canada and the United States.

The indictment suggests masked gun men that murdered Khalistan-separatist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Vancouver on June 18 were directed by the same Indian intelligence handler that subsequently accelerated a plan to murder Nijjar’s associate in New York City.

The terrifying connections between Indian security officials and transnational gangs revealed by this U.S. investigation, resemble similar criminal networks active in Beijing’s United Front-linked police stations and election interference in Canada, according to a new intelligence report from a Washington-based anti-corruption NGO.

The report says Canada is ill-equipped to deter a new lethal form of transnational crime that fulfills geopolitical objectives for states including China, Russia and Iran.

It isn’t clear whether Canada’s upcoming Foreign Interference Commission, which has been criticized for its narrow mandate, will examine the U.S. Justice allegations cited in this story, or evidence from RCMP that foreign states including China are employing organized crime proxies to interfere in Canada.

Gatekeepers

The October 2022 Intelligence Assessment says “a body of CSIS reporting since 2020 indicates that a Canadian GoI [Government of India] proxy agent continues to claim that they are providing electoral support – including significant amounts of money – to a number of politicians at all levels of government.”

It says the unidentified Indian agent is trying to keep pro-Indian politicians in office with clandestine funding, but also to forge “a bond with newly elected politicians who, in turn, will owe the proxy agent future favours.”

And like Chinese Communist Party-affiliated community leaders that attempt to corral Chinese-language voters for preferred candidates, CSIS says this Indian agent is “a gatekeeper for the sort of community support upon which political candidates rely for electoral success in ridings with a significant South Asian diaspora.”

AsThe Bureau recently reported, the Intelligence Assessment strongly suggests Beijing’s proxies infiltrated the Conservative’s federal leadership race in 2022, after leader Erin O’Toole was attacked with Chinese disinformation in the September 2021 election and failed to retain caucus support in the aftermath.

The document suggests India also tried to elect the Conservative’s new leader.

“CSIS intelligence indicates that the Government of India has engaged in Foreign Interference activities related to the leadership race for a political party in Canada,” the October 2022 report says.

It continues, saying “recent CSIS reporting indicates that a proxy agent claims the Government of India is providing support to an elected Canadian politician’s campaign for the leadership of a political party in Canada, by securing party memberships for that campaign.”

The elected Canadian politician isn’t identified.

The document says “separate CSIS reporting” alleges an Indian Consulate in Canada “informed a different leadership candidate who was running for the leadership of the same political party that he ‘cannot attend any Indian community events or events hosted by the [Consulate].’”