UPDATES WITH PAKISTAN FOREIGN MINISTRY STATEMENT; REVISES HEADLINE, LEDE, DECK
By Aamir Latif
KARACHI, Pakistan (AA) - Pakistan Wednesday said India's alleged assassination of a Sikh activist on Canadian soil is a "clear violation of international law and the UN principle of state sovereignty."
Islamabad called the incident, which has further strained ties between Canada and India, “a reckless and irresponsible act that calls into question India's reliability as a credible international partner and its claims for enhanced global responsibilities," Pakistan Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mumtaz Zehra Baloch told reporters in the capital Islamabad.
It shows “that India's network of extra-territorial killings has now gone global," she added.
Earlier, Pakistan's Foreign Secretary Cyrus Qazi said that Islamabad is not "surprised" by Canada's allegation that the Indian government was involved in the murder of the Sikh activist on its soil.
At a news briefing in New York on Tuesday, Qazi urged the international community to recognize the ways of the country it considers “a supposedly indispensable ally.”
Baloch said Pakistan has remained a target of a series of "targeted killings and espionage" by the Indian intelligence agency Research and Analysis Wing or RAW.
Last December, she added, "Pakistan released a comprehensive dossier providing concrete and irrefutable evidence of India's involvement in an attack in northeastern city of Lahore in June 2021."
The attack, which Islamabad blames the Indian intelligence agency for, was reportedly aimed to kill the incarcerated leader of outlawed Jama'at-ud- Dawah, Hafiz Muhammad Saeed.
“We are aware of the nature of our eastern neighbor, we know what they are capable of … so it is not a surprise for us,” said Qazi, who is accompanying caretaker Prime Minister Anwaarul Haq Kakar at the UN General Assembly.
- Killing, accusations, expulsions
Sikh leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar was shot dead on June 18 in Surrey, British Columbia, in front of a Sikh temple. So far, no arrests have been made.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Monday there are "credible allegations" that the Indian government was behind Nijjar's shooting death.
However, New Delhi has dismissed the allegation as "absurd" and demanded that Ottawa take "prompt and effective legal action against all anti-India elements operating on their soil."
Ottawa expelled a "top Indian diplomat" from the country, and in a tit-for-tat move, India Tuesday ordered a senior Canadian diplomat in New Delhi to leave the country within five days.
The US, Australia and New Zealand have expressed concern over the allegations made by Canada against India.
Meanwhile, members of the Sikh community held a protest demonstration in Lahore, northeastern Pakistan against Nijjar's killing.
Carrying banners and signs with anti-India slogans, Sikh leaders urged the international community hold New Delhi "accountable" for Nijjar's "brutal" murder.
Nijjar was a vocal supporter of independence for a Khalistani state in the Punjab region. The Indian government has repeatedly insisted that Nijjar was a terrorist – a label his supporters denied – and at the recent G-20 summit in New Delhi, Prime Minister Narendra Modi chided Trudeau for allowing Sikh separatist protests in Canada.