Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stressed on Saturday that Canada was a “rule of law” with a “robust and independent” judicial system, in a reaction to the arrests announced the day before following the assassination of a Sikh separatist leader.
Three Indian nationals were arrested on Friday and charged with premeditated murder and conspiracy in connection with the death of Hardeep Singh Nijjar in the west of the country almost a year ago. This affair plunged Canada and India into a serious diplomatic crisis last fall after the Canadian Prime Minister spoke of the involvement of the Indian government in this assassination.
These arrests are “important because Canada is a country founded on the rule of law, with a strong and independent judicial system, as well as a fundamental commitment to protect all its citizens,” Mr. Trudeau said on Saturday at a gala in Toronto to celebrate Sikh heritage and culture.
Acknowledging that the Canadian Sikh community may feel “uncomfortable, even frightened at this time,” the Prime Minister called for remaining “calm” and “firmly committed to our democratic principles,” noting that two separate investigations were underway. course.
On Friday, federal police said there were other possible suspects and that they were trying to determine whether there were “any links to be established with the Indian government.” An activist for the creation of a Sikh state known as Khalistan, Hardeep Singh Nijjar, who arrived in Canada in 1997 and became a Canadian citizen in 2015, was shot dead in June 2023 in the parking lot of the temple he led in Surrey, in the suburbs of Vancouver (west).
He was wanted by Indian authorities for alleged acts of terrorism and conspiracy to commit murder. Accusations that the 45-year-old man denied, according to the World Sikh Organization of Canada. In September, Justin Trudeau publicly incriminated the Indian intelligence services in this affair. New Delhi immediately described these accusations as “absurd”.
For its part, the American justice system announced in November that it would prosecute an Indian national accused of having sponsored, at the instigation of a New Delhi agent, a plan to assassinate another Sikh leader, Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, lawyer founder of the American organization Sikhs For Justice (SFJ).
