The Canadian prime minister said India made a “horrible mistake” by violating the country’s sovereignty as relations plunged to a new low.

India has accused Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of “cavalier behavior” amid ongoing diplomatic fallout over last year’s killing of a Sikh separatist on Canadian soil.

India’s foreign ministry said Thursday that Canada has presented “no evidence” to support its “serious allegations” that Indian government agents targeted Canada-based Sikh separatists, including naturalized Canadian citizen Hardeep Singh Nijjar, murdered in Vancouver in June 2023. .

The department criticized Trudeau, who told a parliamentary inquiry Wednesday that Canada had “clear indications that India had violated Canada’s sovereignty.”

The prime minister’s behavior has caused “damage” to relations between India and Canada, the ministry said.

Speaking at the inquiry, Trudeau accused India of making a “horrible mistake”, alleging that Nijjar’s killing was part of a larger Indian operation to systematically target Sikh dissidents in Canada who were campaign for an independent state of Khalistan.

On October 14, 2024, India again rejected allegations that it was linked to Nijjar’s murder, insisting that the “absurd” allegations were a “strategy to defame India for political purposes.”

That day, India and Canada expelled their respective diplomats over the rift.

Canada’s top envoy to New Delhi, Stewart Wheeler, who was ordered to leave Saturday evening, said Ottawa had provided “credible and irrefutable evidence of links between Indian government agents and the murder of a Canadian citizen.

Canadian authorities have arrested four Indian nationals in connection with Nijjar’s murder.

Nijjar – who immigrated to Canada in 1997 and became a citizen in 2015 – had advocated for a separate Sikh state, known as Khalistan, carved out of India.

He was wanted by Indian authorities for terrorism and conspiracy to commit murder.

Last year, the Indian government briefly reduced visas to Canadians because of the affair.

The Indian government has also been accused by the United States of attempting to assassinate a Sikh separatist on its soil.

In November 2023, the U.S. Department of Justice announced charges against Indian national Nikhil Gupta for an alleged plot targeting Sikh-American activist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, also a dual U.S. and Canadian national.