The Indian and Canadian governments have expelled each other’s senior diplomats, as relations between the two countries deteriorate sharply after Indian diplomats were named in an investigation into the killing of the Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar.
In a statement on Monday night, India’s foreign ministry said it had no faith in the Canadian government’s ability to assure the security of its top diplomats and had “decided to withdraw the high commissioner and other targeted diplomats and officials”.
It also announced that six top Canadian diplomats would be expelled from New Delhi in response.
However, Canada’s Globe and Mail newspaper and the Associated Press quoted unnamed Canadian officials alleging that it was Canada that had expelled the Indian diplomats first, after evidence implicated India’s high commissioner, Sanjay Kumar Verma, and six top diplomats in the assassination of Nijjar.
Nijjar, a Canadian Sikh, was gunned down outside a gurdwara in Vancouver in June last year.
He had been a vocal advocate for the Khalistan movement, which advocates for an independent homeland for Sikhs and is banned in India. The Indian government had accused Nijjar of involvement in Khalistani terrorism.
In the aftermath of Nijjar’s killing, Canada’s prime minister, Justin Trudeau, took the unusual step of publicly announcing there were “credible allegations” that the Indian government was involved in Nijjar’s assassination. India denied the charges, calling them “absurd”.
On Monday, India’s foreign ministry said it “strongly rejects these preposterous imputations” after a diplomatic communication from Canada confirmed that Indian diplomats were cited as “persons of interest” in the investigation into Nijjar’s killing.
The Indian government said the allegations were “ludicrous and deserve to be treated with contempt” and summoned Canada’s charge d’affaires in New Delhi, Stewart Wheeler, to express that the targeting of its diplomats was unacceptable.
The Indian ministry spokesperson accused Trudeau’s government of a political agenda and claimed Canada had not shared any further evidence about Indian state involvement in the fatal shooting since Trudeau had made the allegations in September 2023.
“This leaves little doubt that on the pretext of an investigation, there is a deliberate strategy of smearing India for political gains,” the Indian ministry said.
However, according to reports in Canadian media, the Canadian government presented evidence to India last week but was met with denials by the government of Narendra Modi.
Nijjar’s murder resulted in a significant chilling of diplomatic relations between India and Canada. It also prompted officials and activists to accuse the Modi government of carrying out a campaign of transnational killings against those it considered to be threats to the state.
The accusations were further fuelled last November after US agencies said they had thwarted an assassination attempt by an Indian government official to murder Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, a firebrand Sikh separatist and dual citizen of the US and Canada.
Other prominent Sikh Khalistani activists in the US, Canada and the UK also said they had also been given warnings of threats to their lives.
Last year, the White House said it took the allegations of India’s involvement in attempted killings on US soil “with utmost seriousness” and confirmed it had been raised at the highest levels of the Indian government.
The Indian government set up its own investigation which, according to unnamed officials, recently concluded that the attempted assassination of Pannun was the work of “rogue agents”.
According to intelligence officials who spoke to the Guardian this year, India had also ordered the assassination of dozens of individuals in Pakistan as part of a wider strategy to eliminate terrorists living on foreign soil.
According to the Globe and Mail report, Canada’s national police force is poised to reveal new details about the Indian government’s alleged connection to criminal activity in the country.
In May, three Indian nationals who had been living in Canada on student visas were charged as the alleged shooters who carried out Nijjar’s assassination. However, police emphasised that the investigation was continuing and “these efforts include investigating connections to the government of India”.