- Tuesday, April 22, 2025
The CBC report said citing sources that behind closed doors, the Indian side did not deny the allegation over Nijjar’s death.
By: Shubham Ghosh
AS Canada’s Justin Trudeau government came under increasing pressure to publicise evidence of an assassination of a Sikh separatist leader on its soil by agents of a foreign government as has been alleged by the prime minister, media reports indicated that Ottawa could be in possession of intelligence linking officials and diplomats from India with the murder in Surrey in British Columbia in June.
According to a report by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) on Thursday (21), information gathered in an investigation that lasted for months were communications involving Indian officials, including diplomats in Canada.
The CBC also said that the intelligence did not just come from Canada but also an unnamed ally in the Five Eyes intelligence alliance that includes, besides Canada, the US, UK, Australia and New Zealand. It also said citing sources that the Trudeau government “amassed both human and signals intelligence”.
The report added that Canadian officials went to India a number of times seeking co-operation in the investigation of the killing of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, who was gunned down outside a gurdwara by unidentified persons. He reportedly had been warned by Canadian Security Intelligence Service that his life was at risk.
Canada’s national security and intelligence officer Jody Thomas visited India both in August and September and his last visit overlapped with the meeting between Trudeau and his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi on the sidelines of the G20 summit in New Delhi.
The CBC report said citing sources that behind closed doors, the Indian side did not deny the allegation over Nijjar’s death — that there is proof to suggest the Indian government’s involvement in the assassination of a Canadian citizen on the country’s soil.
“I can assure you that the decision to share these allegations on the floor of the House of Commons … was not done lightly,” the Canadian prime minister, who has faced a backlash over his allegations, said in New York on Thursday (21) after attending the United Nations General Assembly.
“It was done with the utmost seriousness.”
His government has not released the evidence and suggested that it could come out during a legal process.
The Indian government has refused the allegations, calling them “absurd” and “motivated” and accused the North American nation of sheltering Sikh separatists, including Nijjar, who it referred to as a terrorist.
India also stopped processing visitor visas in Canada and asked Ottawa to downsize its diplomatic presence on its soil.
