Toronto: Former Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper has called on the country’s political parties to “sever relations” with separatist forces targeting India.
Harper made these remarks while speaking at 5th Canada India Charity Gala organised by the organisation Impact Media and Events Coordination (IMEC) in Brampton over the weekend, where the former PM was honoured with the Global Impact Award.
“Canada cannot have that strong relationship unless the governing party, and frankly, any political party that aspires to government, unless they sever relations with those who seek to bring the battles of India’s past to Canada,” he told the audience at the event, according to local media reports.
He also called upon political parties to “sever relations with those who seek to divide the great country that is modern India”.
“The Khalistani movement is a fringe movement in Canada. It is a fringe movement among Indo-Canadians and it is even a fringe movement among Sikh Canadians,” he said.
He said he didn’t know why various politicians spent so much time on that and added that during his tenure his caucus “understood” they were to have “no contact whatsoever with the Khalistani movement”.
He said he hoped “all political parties will return to that kind of a policy”.
“There is no reason why countries like Canada and India cannot be those enlightened voices working together, which we can do and should do by putting our recent disputes behind us,” he said.
Relations between Canada and India cratered on September 18, 2023, when then Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stated in the House of Commons that there were “credible allegations” of a potential link between Indian agents and the killing of pro-Khalistan figure Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Surrey, British Columbia, three months earlier. India described those accusations as “absurd” and “motivated”.
This is not the first time that Harper has spoken out against Canadian politicians indulging pro-Khalistan elements in Canada.
In November last year, he said the country should stop cultivating such divisive groups.
This isn’t the first time Harper has condemned the pro-Khalistan movement in Canada. In July 2019, while speaking at an event organised by the Canada India Foundation in Brampton, he said that during his tenure as PM his government had “denounced and refused all relationships with those Khalistanis and others who seek to bring the battles of the past to Canada and seek to divide the great country of India”.
Speaking at an event organised by the Abraham Global Peace Initiative (AGP)I in Toronto, he said, “We must stop cultivating Jihadists, antisemites, Khalistanis, Tamil Tigers, and other divisive groups. When it comes to our immigration system, we are going to have to ask ourselves some hard questions about how we screen people.”
“We cannot start importing age-old hatreds onto our streets,” the former PM stated, adding, “We need to do something about this — we cannot let it continue.”
Harper was Prime Minister from 2006 to 2015, before the Conservative Party he led was defeated by his successor and Liberal Party leader Justin Trudeau.
As PM, Harper had established a Commission of Inquiry into the bombing of Air India flight 182, the Kanishka, by Khalistani terrorists on June 23, 1985, which claimed 329 lives. That Commission, headed by retired Justice John Major, submitted its report on July 16, 2010
Harper said then, “The destruction of Air India Flight 182 remains the worst terrorist attack in Canadian history. It was a cowardly, despicable and senseless act.”
On the 25th anniversary of the tragedy, Harper issued an apology on behalf of the government for the failures that led to the terror attack.
The Harper government devised the “one, united India” policy which remains Canada’s official position.
