Sikh activists mark anniversary of Hardeep Singh Nijjar's killing

Sikh activists marked the anniversary of the killing of British Columbia temple leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar by holding a mock murder trial for Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi Tuesday outside the Indian consulate in downtown Vancouver.

On a block of Howe Street cordoned off by police, the mock trial included a jury made up of actors and a judge in a curly white wig, who invited the «prosecutor» to present evidence of Modi's involvement in the killing in Surrey, B.C., last year.

An effigy of Modi, dressed in prison stripes, was paraded down the street in a makeshift cage before the mock trial began on Tuesday.

Jatinder Singh, a lawyer and director with activist group Sikhs for Justice, told the crowd that Nijjar was «executed,» and quoted Martin Luther King Jr.

«Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere,» Singh said. «This crime was against a Canadian citizen and it was perpetrated on Canadian soil, however the conspiracy and ultimate responsibility was hatched thousands and thousands of kilometres away in India.»

Nijjar, a key organizer for an overseas referendum on an independent Sikh state in India, was gunned down in the parking lot of the Surrey temple, where he was president, on June 18 last year.

Singh said they convened a «people's court» to demonstrate that Modi was responsible for Nijjar's killing, calling the court a «voice for the voiceless.»

Several police officers guarded the consulate building as the loud spectacle unfolded, with Singh presenting news reports and a CBC documentary as «evidence.»

He said in an interview that the mock trial was meant to send a message to the Indian government that the «issue is not going to go away,» and also bring awareness to the broader Canadian public of the