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Canada’s prime minister has mentioned there are “credible allegations” that India’s authorities was concerned within the deadly capturing in June of a distinguished Sikh chief in British Columbia.
Justin Trudeau’s accusations triggered a hostile response from New Delhi and a spherical of diplomatic expulsions, deepening a rift between the 2 G20 nations.
Citing intelligence from nationwide safety providers, Trudeau on Monday informed members of parliament that Canadian authorities have been investigating whether or not “brokers” of New Delhi have been behind the June killing of Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Surrey, a suburb of Vancouver with a big Sikh neighborhood.
“Canadian safety businesses have been actively pursuing credible allegations of a possible hyperlink between brokers of the federal government of India and the killing of a Canadian citizen,” Trudeau mentioned. “Any involvement of a international authorities within the killing of a Canadian citizen on Canadian soil is an unacceptable violation of our sovereignty.”
Trudeau informed parliament he raised the allegations with India’s prime minister Narendra Modi throughout a gathering in New Delhi final week throughout the G20 summit.
A prime Indian diplomat was expelled from Canada on Monday, mentioned Mélanie Joly, the nation’s international minister. “We are going to shield Canadians always,” Joly informed reporters. “We anticipate India’s full collaboration to unravel this.”
India’s authorities on Tuesday dismissed Trudeau’s assertion and Joly’s remarks, as “absurd and motivated”.
“Comparable allegations have been made by the Canadian Prime Minister to our Prime Minister, and have been fully rejected,” India’s exterior affairs ministry mentioned in a press release. “We’re a democratic polity with a powerful dedication to rule of legislation.”
The Indian authorities additionally mentioned it had requested a senior Canadian diplomat to go away the nation. “The choice displays [the] authorities of India’s rising concern on the interference of Canadian diplomats in our inside issues and their involvement in anti-India actions,” New Delhi mentioned.
Ties between India and Canada have lengthy been strained, as have private relations between their two prime ministers. New Delhi in 2020 accused Ottawa of interference after Trudeau spoke up in favour of protesting farmers who pressured Modi to desert a deliberate overhaul of agriculture legislation. The 2 nations paused talks on a deliberate free commerce settlement final week.
Canada is house to almost 800,000 Sikhs, a lot of whom dwell in Surrey and Brampton, a suburb of Toronto. Some Sikh Canadians help the Khalistan independence movement, which seeks to create a sovereign state in India’s northern Punjab state.
India’s authorities condemns the motion and has lengthy accused Canada of harbouring Sikh separatists, whom it described on Tuesday as “Khalistani terrorists and extremists” who “proceed to threaten India’s sovereignty and territorial integrity”.
“That Canadian political figures have brazenly expressed sympathy for such parts stays a matter of deep concern,” New Delhi mentioned.
India’s authorities had accused Nijjar, a Sikh nationalist, of terrorism and posted bounties for his arrest. In 2016, Nijjar wrote a letter to Trudeau that known as New Delhi’s allegations baseless and mentioned his activism was “peaceable, democratic and guarded beneath the Canadian Constitution of Rights and Freedoms”.
The World Sikh Group of Canada known as Nijjar’s killing on the grounds of the gurdwara — a Sikh home of worship, the place he was president — an “assassination” and urged Ottawa to analyze India’s position. British Columbia police mentioned final month that it had recognized three suspects, although they weren’t recognized. No arrests have been made.
Jagmeet Singh, the chief of Canada’s New Democratic celebration and a Sikh, mentioned on X, previously Twitter, that he would depart “no stone unturned within the pursuit of justice, together with holding Narendra Modi accountable”.
Professional-Khalistan protests in Canada and elsewhere this yr have infuriated Modi’s Hindu nationalist authorities, with supporters of the motion attacking New Delhi’s diplomatic missions in San Francisco and London.
In July, India summoned Canada’s excessive commissioner in New Delhi after protesters organised a “Khalistan freedom rally” in Toronto and made threats towards Indian diplomats whom they accused of involvement in Nijjar’s demise.
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