TRENTON, Canada — Canadian Foreign Minister Melanie Joly announced on Friday that the last remaining Indian diplomats in Canada have been put “on notice” that the country will not tolerate any further criminal activity on its territory.
This warning comes in the wake of the expulsion of six Indian diplomats earlier this week after Canada’s national police force indicated there is substantial evidence linking agents operating in Canada to murder and extortion on orders from New Delhi.
Among those expelled was India’s high commissioner, identified as a person of interest in the June 18, 2023, assassination of Canadian Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in British Columbia.
India has vehemently denied these charges and subsequently ordered six Canadian diplomats to leave the country.
Joly stated that evidence suggests New Delhi has employed criminals in Canada to carry out violent acts, including targeting Sikh separatists who seek to establish a Sikh state in India.
“There was definitely a threat, and that’s precisely why the RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) decided to take the extraordinary measure of making public the fact that Canadians were being intimidated, were victims of extortion, or even received death threats due to the involvement of Indian agents and diplomats in these criminal activities,” Joly said at a news conference in Montreal, as reported by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.
“We’ve never seen that in our history. That level of transnational repression cannot happen on Canadian soil.” — Agencies