Toronto:Canadian evidence of “credible allegations” that Indian agents were involved in the murder of Hardeep Singh Nijjar many weeks ago has been shared with India, according to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. He has urged New Delhi to “commit constructively” to working with Ottawa to ascertain the truth in this grave matter.
Following Trudeau’s explosive allegations of the “potential” participation of Indian spies in the execution of Khalistani fanatic Nijjar on his country’s soil on June 18 in British Columbia, tensions between India and Canada erupted early this week.
In retaliation for Ottawa’s decision to dismiss an Indian official over the matter, India strongly rejected the accusations as “absurd” and “motivated” and expelled a senior Canadian ambassador.
“I just want to simply say that we’ve shared those allegations, those credible allegations with India for weeks. We are working with our partners,” Trudeau said on Friday in a press conference with the visiting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
“And what we are asking is for India, to commit constructively with Canada to establish the facts on this situation. We’re there to work with them. And we have been for weeks now,” Trudeau said in response to a question.
“Canada has shared the credible allegations that I talked about on Monday with India. We did that many weeks ago…We hope that they engage with us so that we can get to the bottom of this very serious matter. That’s important,” he said.
As tensions between the two countries over the killing of Nijjar reached an all-time low on Thursday, India demanded Canada to crack down hard on terrorists and anti-India elements operating from its soil and suspended visa services for Canadians.
India has requested that Canada reduce the size of its diplomatic mission there, stating that both countries’ diplomatic missions should be of comparable size and rank. In comparison to New Delhi, Canada has a greater diplomatic presence in India.
