Nijjar row: India withdraws high commissioner to Canada, expels six Canadian diplomats

The Indian government on Monday said that it is withdrawing High Commissioner Sanjay Kumar Verma and some other diplomats from Canada. It also announced that it had expelled six Canadian diplomats.

The fast-paced developments came after New Delhi rejected a Canadian diplomatic cable naming Verma and other Indian envoys as “persons of interest” in an investigation in the country.

While the ministry did not confirm to which investigation Ottawa was referring, NDTV reported that it is related to the June 2023 murder of Sikh separatist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Canada.

Later in the day, India summoned Canadian Charge d’Affaires Stewart Wheeler.

After leaving the Ministry of External Affairs, Wheeler told reporters that his government had “provided credible, irrefutable evidence of ties between agents of the government of India and the murder of a Canadian citizen on Canadian soil”.

He said it was time for India to “live up to what it said it would do and look into all those allegations”.

Shortly after, the Canadian Police released a statement claiming that it had evidence “tying agents of the government of India to homicides and violent acts”.

“Investigations have revealed that Indian diplomats and consular officials based in Canada leveraged their official positions to engage in clandestine activities, such as collecting information for the government of India, either directly or through their proxies; and other individuals who...

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