The Czech authorities mentioned the US had requested Mr Gupta’s extradition in August.
New Delhi:
The Indian man charged in an alleged plot to kill Khalistani terrorist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun had been detained on the request of the United States, the federal government of the Czech Republic has informed NDTV. Nikhil Gupta was detained on the Prague airport in June and, the Czech authorities mentioned, the US had submitted an extradition request two months later.
Responding to a sequence of queries despatched by NDTV’s Senior Producer Mir Rafae, the Czech Republic’s Ministry of Justice mentioned the extradition had been requested for conspiracy to commit “murder for hire”.
“The Ministry of Justice of the Czech Republic can confirm that Mr. Nikhil Gupta was apprehended and afterwards taken into provisional custody in the Czech Republic at the request of the competent authority of the USA, which subsequently submitted the request for extradition of Mr Gupta to the USA in August 2023. The extradition of Mr Gupta was requested for the crime of conspiracy to commit murder for hire,” the ministry mentioned.
The ministry mentioned the Municipal Public Prosecution Office in Prague performed a preliminary investigation after which filed a movement to declare the extradition admissible.
“Upon this motion, the Municipal Court in Prague ruled that the extradition of Mr. Gupta to the USA is admissible. However, the decision of the Municipal Court in Prague is not yet in legal force,” it added.
To a query on entry to Czech courtroom data, the ministry mentioned the choices of courts aren’t publicly accessible on-line.
The US Department of Justice has charged Mr Gupta with conspiring with an Indian authorities official to assassinate Pannun on American soil. The Khalistani terrorists holds citizenship of each the US and Canada.
Mr Gupta, 52, is accused of making an attempt to rent a hitman, who turned out to be an undercover US federal agent.Â