The Narendra Modi government is livid at Prime Minister Justin Trudeau after Canada sent a communique on Sunday night asking India to waive off diplomatic immunity on six Indian diplomats including High Commissioner Sanjay Kumar Verma and submit to an interrogation by Royal Canadian Mounted Police on murder of terrorist Hardeep Singh Nijjar on June 18, 2023.
In a significant development, India has decided to expel six top Canadian diplomats, including the acting High Commissioner, Deputy High Commissioner, and four First Secretaries. The decision comes in the wake of Canada’s request for India’s High Commissioner to join investigations in the Hardeep Nijjar murder case, a move India found unacceptable.
Meanwhile, addressing the media, Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) Commissioner Mike Duheme said that the country had reached a point where “it was imperative to confront the Govt of India and inform the public about some very serious findings” that they had uncovered during their investigations. “….there have been well over a dozen credible imminent threats to life which have led to the conduct of duty to warn, by law enforcement with members of South Asian community and specifically, members of the pro-Khalistan movement,” Duheme said. He said that a multi-disciplinary team of the RCMP had gained significant amount of information regarding “criminal activity orchestrated by agents of the Government of India”.
In what appeared to be an effort to thaw the frozen diplomatic ties between India and Canada over the assassination of Khalistani separatist Hardeep Singh Nijjar last year, Canada’s Deputy Foreign Minister David Morrison on October 4 said there is “one India” and “India’s territorial integrity must be respected”.
The statement was made by the deputy minister at a public forum of the Canadian Foreign Interference Commission in Ottawa on October 4. The deputy foreign minister Morrison had stated, “Canada’s policy is very clear that India’s territorial integrity must be respected. There’s one India, and that’s been made very clear.”
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