The National Investigation Agency (NIA) has told a Delhi court that the seven foreign nationals who were arrested this March for allegedly conspiring to carry out terrorist activities against India were involved in a drone attack on a civilian aircraft in neighbouring Myanmar.

The foreigners — six Ukrainians and an American — are currently in Tihar Jail. On August 31, Special Judge Prashant Sharma allowed the NIA’s application seeking permission to interrogate two of the men in prison.

“…The Central Government has received credible information indicating the involvement of certain Ukrainian and US Nationals in a drone attack on a civilian aircraft in Myanmar,” the NIA said in the application to the court dated August 19.

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“In this regard”, the application said, “14 Ukrainians had entered India on tourist visa on different dates and flew to Guwahati and thereafter, they travelled to Mizoram without requisite documents (Restricted Area Permit (RAP) / Protected Area Permit (PAP) and entered into Myanmar illegally to conduct a pre-scheduled training on the drone warfare, drone operations, assembly and jamming technology for Myanmar-based Ethnic Armed Groups (EAGs) targeting the Myanmar Military Junta.”

Several Ethnic Armed Organisations (EAOs) have been active in Myanmar for decades. Since the military, known as Tatmadaw, seized power in a coup on February 1, 2021, EAOs acting in a loose alliance with local militias and other resistance forces have been leading an armed struggle against the government of the junta.

More than 1 lakh Myanmarese are estimated to have been killed in the fighting so far, and the civil war has resulted in an effective fragmentation of the country into several ethnic administrations and resistance councils who control specific areas.

Burma News International, a network of media organisations based in and around Myanmar that positions itself as the voice of the country’s ethnic minorities, reported on February 24 that a Myanmar National Airlines ATR 72-600 passenger aircraft preparing for take-off to Mandalay had been struck by an FPV suicide drone at Myitkyina airport in Kachin state four days earlier. It was not immediately clear if the NIA application referred to this particular attack.

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The seven foreign nationals “had earlier travelled similarly through Mizoram and conducted training on two separate occasions in addition to illegally imported huge consignments of drones and its relevant parts from Europe to Myanmar via India for use of EAGs”, the application said.

“…These EAGs are also known to support certain proscribed Indian insurgent groups by supplying weapons, terrorist hardware and training them thus affecting national security and interest of India,” it said.

According to the NIA, which is being represented by Special Public Prosecutor Rahul Tyagi, Public Prosecutor Ankit Gautam, and advocates Jatin Khatri and Amit Rohilla, “multiple digital devices” seized from the accused have been sent for forensic examination and extraction of data.

Some reports have been made available, but the “very huge and voluminous data…needs time for thorough analysis for the purpose of investigation”, the NIA told the court.

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“During scrutiny of the data extracted from seized devices of the accused persons, incriminating information and facts emerged in the form of images, videos, voice samples, etc., which are required to be confronted and corroborated with arrested accused persons in order to take the investigation to its logical conclusion,” the agency said.

In its application, the NIA said it needed to interrogate Matthew Aaron Van Dyke, the American, and Viktor Kaminskyi, one of the six Ukrainians, in order to confront them with facts disclosed by certain witnesses to “unearth the larger conspiracy” in the case.

The interrogation was also “necessary to obtain more details about other suspects who are the masterminds sitting in Myanmar”, the application said.

Van Dyke was detained at Kolkata airport on March 13, and the Ukrainians – Kaminskyi, Petro Hurba, Taras Slyviak, Ivan Sukmanovskyi, Marian Stefankiv, and Maksim Honcharuk – were detained at the airports in Lucknow and Delhi. The men were produced before the Special NIA Judge in Patiala House court on March 14, and they have been in Tihar since April 6.

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The NIA is expected to interrogate Van Dyke and Kaminskyi with the help of a Ukrainian translator. The team will also carry laptops, mobile phones, printers, and stationery with them to Tihar. A chargesheet is likely to be filed next week.

Allowing the application, Special Judge Sharma said: “…It is an admitted position that…NIA is investigating mentioned accused persons,…there is no specific law/ judgment to the effect that this court should or can refuse NIA from doing so. Courts ordinarily are not supposed to interfere with investigation.”

Appearing for the accused, advocates Rohit Dandriyal, Rohit Gour, and Nitin Saluja argued that the NIA’s application does not mention any fresh or specific ground for interrogating the accused, and that the application was an “afterthought”.

The NIA’s investigation has found that several consignments of drones from Europe were allegedly delivered by the accused persons to individuals and groups in Mizoram. According to the NIA, the accused have told interrogators that they were in “direct touch and abetted in their terrorist illegal activities by unknown terrorists carrying AK47 rifles”.

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Van Dyke, the 46-year-old American, claims on his website that he “fought in the 2011 Libyan Civil War to overthrow Muammar Gaddafi”. His X bio shows he has 5.74 lakh followers, and the pinned post says: “The family of @Matt_VanDyke seeks urgent U.S. diplomatic intervention as he is presently still denied basic detainee rights, and is being kept in solitary confinement at Tihar Jail 8/9 in Delhi, India… Matthew is innocent of all charges against him.”