Top officials in Canada Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's administration handed over sensitive intelligence about India to US-based newspaper The Washington Post, just days before the Canadian police publicly linked Indian government agents to the killing of Khalistani extremist Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a report has claimed
Sources told The Globe and Mail, a Canadian newspaper, that Nathalie Drouin, Trudeau's national security and intelligence adviser and David Morrison, deputy minister at Global Affairs, told the US publication about India's alleged interference operations in Canada a week before Thanksgiving.
The Post was told that the report should not be published until the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) Commissioner Mike Duheme holds a press conference, which took place on Thanksgiving Day.
Notably, The Washington Post reported on the same day that Canada has linked India for the murder of Sukhdool Singh Gill (aka Sukha Duneke), a former gangster with links to terrorism. The report cited "Canadian officials" as the source of the information. The report named linked top government officials, claiming that they authorised such acts in Canada.
Gill's murder had taken place just two days after Trudeau had first accused India of being behind Nijjar's murder in Surrey, British Columbia.
India has vehemently denied all the charges of intereference by Canada as well as New Delhi's alleged role in the murder plot. In a hard-hitting statement, the ministry of external affairs has called out PM Trudeau for using these allegations to advance his own domestic political agenda.
It has also ripped into the Trudeau administration for levelling baseless charges without presenting even a shred of evidence.
During the press conference on October 14, the Canadian police alleged that Indian officials were behind crimes in Canada but did not give any details.
"Commissioner Duheme never acknowledged that Mr. Gill’s killing in Winnipeg was connected to India nor did the RCMP reveal other sensitive information reported by The Post," The Globe and Mail report said.
Dan Stanton, a former senior executive at CSIS, told the Canadian newspaper that information about Gill's murder and the alleged Indian links would be considered classified since it was not in the public domain till reported by The Washington Post.
“If it is evidence or intelligence it would certainly be classified. If it doesn’t exist in open source and The Washington Post is quoting Canadian government officials then it sounds like something that would have been classified unless there is some special regime where they can release stuff to certain designated persons,” Stanton said, hinting at a leak of classified information by the Trudeau administration.
A spokesperson for both Drouin and Morris said that no classified information was shared with anybody.
The Washington Post was one of the earliest publications to release the name of the Indian government official who was said to be the alleged mastermind in the attempted murder of US-based Sikh separatist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun. Pannun is another India designated terrorist.
Ties between India and Canada hit rock bottom after Canada linked New Delhi's envoy to Ottawa Sanjay Kumar Verma and some other Indian diplomats to the Nijjar case.
India strongly rejected the charges and said that it will recall Verma and five other diplomats from Ottawa. It also expelled six Canadian diplomats from India. On its part, Canada said it expelled the Indian envoy and five other diplomats.
(With inputs from agencies)
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