With Indian diplomats expelled, RCMP commissioner says 'significant reduction' in public safety threat

RCMP Commissioner Mike Duheme says there has been a “significant reduction” to the public safety threat since six Indian diplomatic officials were expelled from the country last week.

“I can confirm, from different techniques that we use in normal investigation and reach out from the community, I can confirm that there has been a significant reduction in the threats,” Duheme told CTV’s Question Period host Vassy Kapelos, in an interview airing Sunday.

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“You look at some of the key players — and I said it in my in my statement on Thanksgiving Day — you had diplomats, as well as consular officials, that were involved, working on behalf of the Government of India, on top of agents as well,” Duheme said. “So, you look at the Government of Canada expelling these six people, had an impact on what we're seeing in South Asian communities.”

When asked by Kapelos about whether the prospective replacement of those diplomats would result in the public safety threat returning, the commissioner said it likely would.

“I think based on what I know, I would have a concern.”

In a pair of Thanksgiving Monday press conferences, the RCMP and the federal government accused Indian diplomats and consular officials based in Canada of engaging in clandestine activities linked to serious criminal activity in this country, including homicides and extortions.

Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly went a step further than the RCMP and said since-expelled Indian High Commissioner to Canada Sanjay Kumar Verma, along with five other Indian diplomats, are considered persons of interest in the murder of Sikh separatist leader and Canadian citizen Hardeep Singh Nijjar in B.C. last summer.

Verma and his colleagues were declared persona non-grata for refusing to waive their diplomatic immunity to be questioned by law enforcement.

“There has always been a separate and distinct investigation on the involvement of the Government of India in criminality in Canada, and that's when we came out that was specific to that, and nothing to do with the Nijjar case, which is before the courts,” Duheme said, when asked by Kapelos whether he draws the same link as Joly between Nijjar’s murder and the expelled high commissioner.

“We are investigating diplomats, consular officials, that have direct ties through agents up to the Government of India in different crimes, as I mentioned, homicide, coercion, harassment,” he also said, without making any direct links between other open investigations and the Nijjar case.

Duheme said in his 35 years in policing, he’s “never seen this,” adding “it's actually a little surreal when you look at all this.”

“I can't say that the threat would be forever eliminated,” Duheme also said. “Because, like any organized crime group or in the criminal space, they reorganize and find a different way of doing things.”

Then-acting RCMP Commissioner Mike Duheme waits to appear before the Procedure and House Affairs committee, in Ottawa, Tuesday, June 13, 2023. (Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press)

The RCMP commissioner added the issue is not unique to Canada, but rather there have been similar examples in other countries, namely in the United States, where a recently partially unsealed U.S. Justice Department indictment links an Indian government official to the foiled alleged assassination attempt on a dual Canada-U.S. citizen in New York City.

That indictment also makes links between the alleged assassination attempt in the U.S. and Nijjar’s murder in Canada.

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In an exclusive interview on CTV’s Question Period last week, Verma denied any involvement in Nijjar’s killing and insisted that “not a shred of evidence has been shared” with the Indian government by Canada.

Duheme refuted that statement, saying while both law enforcement and political officials tried “on numerous occasions” to contact their Indian counterparts to share evidence, to no avail, evidence was eventually delivered during a meeting in Singapore.

“So perhaps … the high commissioner never saw the evidence, but it was shared with the government official of India,” Duheme said.

“There was evidence to demonstrate how agents working for the government of India here in Canada, through the diplomatic process, and official consular, how taskings were done, how information flowed back to the Government of India, into organized crime groups, and then back into Canada,” he also said.

Verma also said in his interview with CTV News that he chose not to waive his diplomatic immunity because the lack of evidence presented to him prevented him from being able to mount a defence in an interrogation.

But Duheme said “evidence would have been shared,” had Verma presented himself for an interview.

When asked about Verma’s criticisms that the Canadian government is risking diplomatic relations with one of its largest trading partners over intelligence, as opposed to evidence, Duheme specifically said the RCMP made its accusations on Thanksgiving Day based on evidence.

“The evidence that we have was presented to the prime minister, was presented to a minister, was presented to the minister of government of Global Affairs Canada, and I would say that our evidence is strong enough that government took a position to expel six diplomats,” he said.

Duheme in his interview also discussed the procedural standstill in the House of Commons over unredacted documents related to the now-defunct Sustainable Development Technology Canada.

You can watch Duheme’s full interview in the video player at the top of this article.