October 1, 2025

US Condemns Threats to Diplomats as SFJ Activity Spikes

2048px-The_Air_India_Memorial._-_panoramio — Air India Memorial, Cork, Ireland [dennis white, CC BY-SA 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons]

WASHINGTON – Sikhs for Justice (SFJ) has been drawing increased scrutiny. Its activists have been linked to weapons arrests in Canada, glorification of assassins, threats against Indian diplomats, and even bounties for officials’ personal data and movements.

Amid these incidents, the US State Department told GSV, “Vandalism, threats, or violence against diplomatic facilities or foreign diplomats in the United States is a criminal offense. We condemn any such actions.”

SFJ and its activists have been linked to a series of incidents across North America, the most recent being:

Canada: SFJ-linked activists were arrested on firearms charges.
Indiana: An SFJ-organized Khalistan referendum event honored the assassin of former Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh with an effigy display.
Ottawa: SFJ announced a $10,000 reward for information disclosing the Ottawa residence of Dinesh Patnaik, India’s High Commissioner to Canada. The poster showed Patnaik’s face in the crosshairs of a gun.
New York – SFJ’s Khalistan rally poster calling for the arrest of the Indian External Affairs Minister Dr. S. Jaishankar, depicting his image in the crosshairs of a gun.

SFJ continuously threatens to “siege” Indian consulates in North America, with Pannun daring Indian officials to “come to Canada, the U.S., or Europe.”

The group has repeatedly issued threats against Indian politicians, places, and airlines, framing them as boycotts or blockades, but the threats explicitly warn of life-threatening dangers, evoking the 1985 Air India Flight 182 bombing by Khalistani terrorists, which killed 329 people.

In 2023, Pannun released a video urging Sikhs not to fly Air India after November 19, warning “there could be a danger to life” and declaring a “global blockade” to prevent the airline from operating. The State Department condemned SFJ’s threats in 2023, telling GSV that “Violence, or the threat of violence, is never an acceptable form of activism.”

Such acts echo Canada‘s “safe haven“ problem. External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar warned Ottawa that extremist elements had “organized themselves politically and become a political lobby.”

Describing India-Canada relations in 1984, former Canadian High Commissioner to India, Bill Warden, wrote about “incursions into Indian consular missions, threats to diplomats, desecration of the Indian flag and the like.“ He described an “armed gunman [who] walked into the Consulate General in Toronto, fired some shots, and then slipped away unimpeded,“ and his frustration that Ottawa’s response was “cavalier.“ His message to his own government was simple: “Simply enforce the law. That is all that is being asked.”

Four decades later, his words remain painfully relevant. Canada’s reluctance to confront extremist networks has enabled the glorification of political assassinations, open threats to Indian diplomats, and violent anti-India propaganda to flourish with impunity.

By contrast, the U.S. State Department’s unequivocal statement serves as a timely reminder that while peaceful protest is a democratic right, intimidation, threats, or violence against diplomatic personnel and facilities are criminal acts. Upholding this distinction is essential, not only for the safety of diplomats but for the integrity of democratic discourse itself.

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