India on Thursday strongly rejected Canadian top foreign intelligence agency’s charge that New Delhi interfered in Canada’s elections and accused Ottawa of interfering in the internal affairs of this country.
“We have seen media reports on the Canadian Commission inquiring into foreign interference. We strongly reject such baseless allegations of Indian interference in Canadian elections. It is not the Government of India’s policy to interfere in the democratic process of other countries. In fact, quite on the reverse, it is Canada, which has been interfering in our internal affairs,” Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said at a media briefing.
He said India has been raising the issue of the involvement of Canada in the internal affairs of India regularly. ”We continue to call on Canada to take effective measures to address our core concerns,” he added.
The Canadian Security Intelligence Service, the country’s highest foreign intelligence agency, recently alleged that India had potentially interfered in the country’s election in a recent intelligence report. The report accessed by the media on Thursday named India as a ‘foreign interference threat’ and stated that the government “must do more to protect Canada’s robust democratic institutions and processes.”
Relations between India and Canada touched a new low last year after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau alleged the involvement of Indian agencies in the killing of ‘Khalistan’ supporter Hardeep Singh Nijjar in June.