A week after his return from yet another embarrassing visit to India, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has launched a diplomatic attack on India stirring an escalation in the Indo-Canadian ties not seen in decades. On Tuesday, India woke up to Canada expelling its top diplomat, and Trudeau’s statement in the House of Commons claiming “credible allegations of a potential link” between the Indian government and the murder of Canada-based Khalistani terrorist Hardeep Singh Nijjar.
Bruised by the drubbing he received for a whole week over a lost opportunity at the G20 summit, criticism from India and an airplane snag holding him down for more than a day before finally taking off from New Delhi, Trudeau is out to save face making unprecedented allegations against India as if in retaliation. One look at Canada’s behaviour over the last few days will tell you that if the word “unhinged” were a person, it would be Justin Trudeau.
Firstly, Canada announced it would postpone an October trade mission to India. Then, reeling under pressure from his Conservative rivals on Tuesday, Trudeau told an emergency session of the parliamentary opposition that his government had “credible allegations” linking Indian agents to the killing of Nijjar, a Khalistani terrorist wanted by India and the Interpol.
Foreign minister Melanie Joly further announced that Canada has expelled a top Indian diplomat. Joly said the expelled diplomat is the head of the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), India’s foreign intelligence agency, in Canada. The Canadian Foreign Minister also said, “If proven true this would be a great violation of our sovereignty.”
India Hits Back
This obviously led to a huge diplomatic escalation with India reciprocating in kind and expelling a senior Canadian diplomat. One could sense the tensions simply from a clip of the Canadian High Commissioner to India, who was summoned by the Ministry of External Affairs and aggressively slammed the car door on a journalist’s face on his way back.
In a statement, India rejected Canada’s claims of its involvement in the murder of Nijjar, who was shot dead by two gunmen outside a Sikh Gurdwara in Surrey, British Columbia, in June this year. It said these “unsubstantiated allegations seek to shift the focus from Khalistani terrorists and extremists who have been provided shelter in Canada and continue to threaten India’s territorial integrity and sovereignty. It cited Canadian inaction and sympathies openly expressed by Canadian politicians for such elements. Further, it seemed to point to Canada’s own responsibility for the crime by stating that the space given in Canada to a range of illegal activities including murders, human trafficking and organised crime was not new.
Canada in Violation of Indian Sovereignty
India’s frustration is warranted. Not only has Canada actively shunned India’s sensibilities over Khalistani terrorism, but it also provides safe haven and political patronage to the terrorists and extremists without an iota of remorse. Canada has for years been a fertile recruiting ground for Khalistani terrorists who are engaged in actively disrupting the security of non-Sikh Indians in Canada. There have been at least four instances of Hindu temples being vandalised by Khalistanis in Canada just this year. India’s diplomatic missions have been attacked multiple times, and senior diplomats’ faces emerged on Khalistani posters calling for their assassination. The most graphic of them all was a violent depiction in celebration of the 1984 assassination of former Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi.
All of this comes on top of an unofficial referendum calling for a separate Sikh state, organised by Pakistan-linked Khalistani terrorists in the state of Canada, forcing the Sikh diaspora to take sides. Neither of these offences made Trudeau stand up in the House of Commons and unequivocally condemn such violent extremism. Instead, his government openly sympathises with Khalistani extremists and terrorists.
Trudeau talks about Canadian sovereignty and the rule of law when it is actually Canada that is challenging India’s sovereignty with its actions. Canada consciously provides safe haven to these elements and extends political patronage to them, and therefore it is Canada that is in violation of Indian sovereignty and not the other way around.
Nijjar’s Death: A Strange Hill to Die On
It is also strange that Trudeau chose Nijjar’s death as a hill to die on. Nijjar was a wanted terrorist, chief of the Khalistani Tiger Force, charged by India of reviving Khalistani extremism, radicalising and recruiting terrorists in Canada, visiting his associates in Pakistan and allegedly deploying them for murders and other illegal activities in India. India had called for Nijjar’s extradition in 2018, and Interpol too had issued a red notice against him.
Not only was Nijjar embroiled with gangsters in Canada and wanted by India, but he had a chequered immigration history. Nijjar, whom Trudeau referred to as a Canadian citizen, arrived in Canada in 1997 on a fake passport and had his citizenship application rejected twice. Nijjar arrived on a passport that falsely identified him as “Ravi Sharma” and the story backing his refugee claim was rejected as fabricated. Eleven days later, he married a British Columbian woman who sponsored his immigration, but even then his application was rejected and he was placed on the no-fly list.
It is not clear at what point he did receive Canadian citizenship, if it all, and it raises questions about the status of Canada’s immigration authorities, not to mention Trudeau’s motivations. After all, Trudeau is a flailing prime minister whose political survival relies on Khalistani leaders including Jagmeet Singh, the chief of the third-largest political party in Canada.
The Canadian and Western media overall are referring to Nijjar as a “Sikh leader”, “Sikh activist” or “Sikh community leader”, all misleading references whitewashing the individual’s crimes. For them, Nijjar was a peaceful and religious community leader who dealt in plumbing services to make a living. This could not be further from the truth, and Canadian and Indian authorities know it best. However, the dishonesty of the Western media, unsettling but also unsurprising, obfuscates the truth which is far more intricate than the narrative being weaved out.
After a week of humiliation, Justin Trudeau’s way of redeeming himself is by escalating a diplomatic row with India. He is in a desperate situation. His ratings are affected deeply by the rise of Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre. He could not care less about foreign policy as we have seen. And his only priority is to win favour with his voter constituencies.
As a result, however, Indo-Canadian relations are seeing new lows. It will not come as a surprise if ties between New Delhi and Ottawa are further downgraded. While for Trudeau and his peers, pandering to the Khalistani lobby is a game of political compulsions, for India, this is about sovereignty and the security of Indians internally and abroad. There is no way that Canada can win this fight.
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