New Delhi
New Delhi, Old Tactics
The accusations against Indian government officials for plotting to kill Canadian citizens have vindicated Pakistan’s long-held view that India has been sponsoring terrorism in Pakistan.
According to PBS News, the US, dated 15 October 2024, India’s anxieties about the Canadian Sikh diaspora’s support for the demand of the Sikh majority population of the Indian State of Punjab for their right to self-determination to create an independent Sikh state (named Khalistan), have long been a strain on the relationship. Still, the two countries maintained strong defense and trade ties.
However, in June 2023, a diplomatic row started between Canada and India when Hardeep Singh Najjar, 45, an Indian-born Canadian citizen, was shot dead on June 18, 2023, by unknown assailants in Canada. And in September 2023, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau formally accused Indian authorities of being linked to Nijjar’s killing. Then, while Canada had expelled an Indian diplomat, India expelled a Canadian diplomat in response.
As published by the EFE on 15 October 2024, the diplomatic row was compounded when Canada announced the expulsion of Indian ambassador Sanjay Kumar Verma and five other diplomats on 14 October 2024 after the Royal Canadian Mounted Police said it had found evidence of the involvement of Indian agents “in serious criminal activity in Canada. India rejected the accusations as absurd and expelled the Canadian ambassador and five other diplomats.
Justin Trudeau accused Indian authorities of making a “fundamental error” in the killing of Najjar and added, “We will never tolerate the involvement of a foreign government threatening and killing Canadian citizens on Canadian soil, a deeply unacceptable violation of Canada’s sovereignty.”
As per Al Jazeera News dated 30 October 2024, Canada-India relations are touching a new low as Canada’s Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister David Morrison confirmed to the members of the national security committee on 29 October 2024 that the Canadian government considers India’s second-highest leader and a close ally of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Minister of India’s Home Affairs, Amit Shah, the architect of the campaign against Sikhs in Canada, which has included the assassination of an activist, Najjar.
According to Al Jazeera News, dated 14 October 2024, a year after Najjar’s assassination in Canada, the US authorities also accused an Indian government official of directing an unsuccessful/foiled plot to murder Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, a dual citizen of the US and Canada. The Washington Post had said that on 20 June 2023, Yadav, an officer of India’s RAW, had emailed Nikhil Gupta, an Indian man hired for the killing, that Pannun’s assassination was a “priority now.” Legal proceedings in the US Justice Department against Nikhil Gupta are underway, as the Chez Republic has extradited him to the US.
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) recently published an article accusing Indian agents of harassing and threatening members of the Sikh diaspora in Australia. ABC had previously reported on Australia expelling an alleged “nest of spies” from India.
The assassination plots against Sikh citizens of Canada and the US and Australia’s concerns about India’s RAW activities are testing New Delhi’s ties with these countries, being their strategic partner to counter China’s rise. India is a lynchpin in the US’s Indo-Pacific strategy, a major US defense partner, and a member of the QUAD. It has also signed agreements with the US to share military logistic facilities with real-time satellite imagery and sensitive technology.
As per the DW News dated 17 October 2024, the US and the UK have recently sought to pressure India to cooperate with Canada in the investigation of Najjar’s murder. But India, an arrogant aspiring world power with the assistance of the US/West, will likely continue to resist the US/UK’s pressure, and Canada-India tensions will likely stay. However, India is cooperating with the US in investigating a foiled plot to kill Pannun.
According to DW, Indian foreign ministry officials think that the above-discussed allegations will not have adverse implications for India’s status as the US/West’s trusted ally. Given the above-stated serious allegations against India and the resultant diplomatic tensions, even if no major shift occurs in their strategic relations with India given the China factor, it is for sure that through its alleged state-sponsored terrorist acts in Canada/US to advance its national objectives, India has considerably shaken their trust.
India had already shaken the trust of the US/West by displaying its pro-Russia tilt in the Russia-Ukraine war by not voting for the US/Western powers’ sponsored UN/UNSC resolutions. This indicates India will not actively participate in any Indo-Pacific war, even against China. However, in peacetime, it will continue to appease the US/West to acquire sensitive weapons/defense technology and economic investment.
The accusations against Indian government officials for plotting to kill Canadian/US eminent Sikh citizens have vindicated Pakistan’s long-held view/accusations that India has been/is still sponsoring terrorism in the Western provinces of Pakistan, namely Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan, using the Afghan and Iran’s soils.
India has already shaken the trust of the West by displaying its pro-Russia tilt in the Russia-Ukraine war by not voting for the UN/UNSC resolutions.
The arrest of Indian naval officer Kulbhushan Jadhav by Pakistan’s intelligence from the Iranian border in 2016 and the statement of former US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel that, over the years, India has financed problems for Pakistan from across the border in Afghanistan are clear evidence of India’s direct involvement in sponsoring/supporting terrorism in Pakistan.
To cover its state-sponsored terrorism in Pakistan, India, especially Prime Minister Modi and his ministers, has been blaming Pakistan at all important international forums for supporting the indigenous freedom struggle of the people of India’s illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIO J&K) state to get their right to self-determination promised to them vide UNSC resolutions of 1948/49, which India terms as terrorism.
Being a UNSC-recognized party to the Jammu and Kashmir dispute, Pakistan only provides political, moral, and diplomatic support to the people of IIOJ&K. It is India that is violating the UNSC resolutions by denying the Kashmiris’ right to self-determination and crushing their freedom struggle by using state terrorism deploying over 900,000 troops, which are committing endless human rights violations.
Given the above-discussed scenario, with their shaken trust in India, the US/West may now be less enthusiastic about further supplying sensitive weapons and technology to India and relegating their support to India for becoming a permanent member of the UNSC. However, the US/West may continue to strengthen India against China by supplying conventional military hardware and military logistics to use Indian logistics during any conflict with China in the Indo-Pacific region, and with the hope that India will fix a considerable number of the Chinese forces on its border.
Moreover, with their broken trust in India, the West will now not believe in India’s propaganda against Pakistan for supporting terrorism. Also, to reign in arrogant India by keeping it South Asia-centered, the US/West may start reviving their military and economic relations with Pakistan and diplomatically assist Pakistan in resolving Jammu and Kashmir with India.
Therefore, while Pakistan should continue to highlight India’s use of state terrorism in IIOJ&K, it sponsoring terrorism in Pakistan/South Asia, Canada, and the US to dub India as a state sponsoring terrorism, it should also intensify its efforts to develop closer economic and defense relations with the US/Western powers and get their support for resolving the Jammu and Kashmir dispute as per the UNSC resolutions.
The writer is a former research fellow of IPRI and a senior research fellow of SVI Islamabad. He can be reached at hanifsardar@hotmail.com
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