External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar has said that the government is open to the idea of an investigation into the killing of Canadian citizen and Khalistani separatist Hardeep Singh Nijjar. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has said agents of the Indian government were behind the killing of Nijjar in British Columbia earlier this year.
Mr. Jaishankar was speaking at the Royal Overseas League in London on Wednesday evening at an event organised by a U.K. government think tank, Wilton Park, and the Indian High Commission.
“We are not ruling out an investigation and looking at anything which they may have to offer,” Mr. Jaishankar told his interviewer, former Editor of the Financial Times Lionel Barber.
The Minister emphasised that the government had told the Canadian government that it would consider any evidence that was shared by them. He said he has continued to articulate this to his Canadian counterpart (Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly).
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Mr. Jaishankar categorially denied that he had seen any evidence, that implicated India in the killing of Nijjar.
Asked if he had seen any “indirect or direct” evidence linking the Government of India to the killing, he said “no”.
His denial of having seeing any evidence was more direct than suggestions he had made in the U.S. that he had not seen evidence, which the Canadian government has insisted it had shown the (Indian) government.
When in the U.S., Mr. Jaishankar had said that he had spoken with National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and Secretary of State Antony Blinken about the government’s view that Canada had a history of enabling extremists. He dwelt on this theme in London as well.
‘Diplomats intimidated’
“We feel that Canadian politics has given space to violent and extreme political opinions, which advocate separatism from India, including through violent means,” Mr. Jaishankar said, adding that Indian diplomats were intimidated and properties in Canada — such as the High Commission — were attacked.
“And this is a country where there is a previous history,” Mr. Jaishankar said, as he reminded the audience of the 1985 Air India Flight 182 bombing by Khalistani separatists in Canada.
There was a misuse of the freedom of expression in this instance, as per the Minister.
Mr. Jaishankar pushed back against the suggestion that if India was engaged in extra-territorial assassinations, then it was simply doing what other major countries engaged in.
“That’s not the logic which should be pursued in this day and age,” Mr. Jaishankar said, and that if some countries were engaged in such activities it did not justify other countries following them.
Wednesday’s discussion was wide-ranging and covered topics including India’s relations with Russia and China, Hindu nationalism, the reform of multilateral institutions and climate change.
Khalistani activity has been a concern for the government in London as well, where on March 19, protesters vandalised the Indian High Commission. One protester, Avatar Singh Khanda, took down the national flag from the front facade of the building. Khanda died in June this year, days before Nijjar was killed. The official cause of death was blood cancer. In October the family’s lawyer made a formal request for an inquest into Khanda’s death.
