Harassment, intimidation: India alleges surveillance of officials in Canada

Amid the ongoing diplomatic crisis between India and Canada, the Centre on Saturday accused Ottawa of surveillance on the country’s consular staff there.
The Ministry of External Affairs said that it had protested in the “strongest possible terms” to the comments by a Canadian minister on Union Home Minister Amit Shah and warned that such “absurd and baseless” allegations would have serious consequences for bilateral ties.
Canada’s Deputy Foreign Minister David Morrison had told a parliamentary panel on Tuesday that a top ranking official in the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government was behind the plots to attack Sikh separatists in Canada, which drew a sharp reaction from India.
Randhir Jaiswal, spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs, said on Saturday that Canada had put Indian officials under audio and video surveillance and was ‘harassing and intimidating’ them by resorting to such measures.
“Some of our consular officials were recently informed by the Canadian government that they have been and continued to be under audio and video surveillance. Their communications have also been intercepted,” he told reporters on Saturday, adding that such actions made it difficult to establish diplomatic norms and practices.
“By citing technicalities, the Canadian government cannot justify the fact that it is indulging in harassment and intimidation. Our diplomatic and consular personnel are already functioning in an environment of extremism and violence,” Jaiswal added.
The ongoing diplomatic standoff began last month with the Canadian government’s statement in which it said that the Indian diplomats in Ottawa were the ‘persons of interest’ in its probe into Khalistani terrorist Hardeep Singh Nijjar’s killing in September 2023.
After Nijjar’s killing, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau alleged that certain Indian agents were involved in the murder, a charge vehemently refuted by the Indian government.
The Canadian government statement last month led India to recall its High Commissioner in Ottawa and other targeted diplomats. The Canadian government then expelled the six diplomats, prompting India to reciprocate the move.
Since then, a war of words and a series of allegations and counter-allegations has been going on between the two countries, with no signs of the tensions being defused any time soon.