India shifts Devyani to UN Mission, says US planned her arrest

www.mangaloretoday.com

New Delhi, Dec 18, 2013: IIndia has charged United States of America with planning the arrest of Devyani Khobragade in an alleged case of visa fraud related to her domestic help Sangeeta Richards.

To ensure diplomatic immunity to Devyani, India has shifted her to the United Nations Permanent Mission in New York.

 

Devyani will have to apply for UN accreditation which in turn will need US State Department’s approval. Now she will get full diplomatic immunity, not the limited one as a consular official.

The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) India while pointing out that the US should have handled the matter quietly and not publicly arrested, strip searched and put Devyani in a lockup with common criminals said that summons in the case should have been sent through diplomatic channels.

According to Indian officials the immigration fraud was carried out by Sangeeta Richards and not Devyani. Richards’s husband and two children flew out of India on Air India 101 to New York on December 10 after they had got visas from US authorities and the entire thing was planned by US Department of Justice two days before Devyani was arrested.

The visas were issued despite India warning the US about a warrant and court injunction against Richards’s husband.