The US State Department has told the Centre’s Narendra Modi government to cooperate with the Canadian investigation on the killing of pro-Khalistan Sikh leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar. This came hours after Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau accused the Indian agencies of being behind the killing of Nijjar on Canadian soil.
A State Department official said that the US had been in close contact with Canada over the accusation.
“We’re q about the allegations. We think it’s important there is a full and open investigation and we would urge the Indian government to co-operate with that investigation,” the BBC quoted a senior official as saying.
British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly had said that his country will ‘listen very, very carefully to the serious concerns that have been raised by Canada’ about the killing of Nijjar in British Columbia.
A Labour MP raised a point of order in the British parliament on Tuesday asking the Rishi Sunak government to make a statement to assure the country’s Sikh community.
“I would urge the government to warn the Indian counterpart that such state terrorism will not be allowed to impact the government-to-government relations,” Mahmood said in the British parliament.
The diplomatic row between India and Canada centres around the murder of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Canadian citizen shot dead outside a Sikh temple on 18 June in British Columbia.
Trudeau said that his country’s intelligence agencies were actively pursuing ‘credible allegations’ of a link between Nijjar’s death and the Indian government headed by Modi.
This prompted Canada to expel a high-ranking Indian diplomat from the country. India retaliated by summoning the Canadian High Commissioner in New Delhi and announcing the expulsion of a Canadian diplomat.
India also rejected Trudeau’s allegations and accused Canada of sheltering ‘Khalistani terrorists and extremists’ who threatened India’s security.
