US envoy backs Canada's claim, says allegation against India based on intel shared among 'Five Eyes' partners

‘Five Eyes’ network is an intelligence alliance consisting of the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. It is both surveillance-based and signals intelligence (SIGINT).

Washington DC on Saturday lent credence to Ottawa’s claim that its allegation about New Delhi’s role in the killing of Khalistani Sikh extremist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Canada was based on inputs shared among the partners of the ‘Five Eyes’.

The ‘Five Eyes’ is an intelligence alliance comprising Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States.

The envoy of Washington DC to Ottawa, David Cohen, told a TV channel that Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s allegation against New Delhi was based on “shared intelligence among the Five Eyes partners”.

“There was shared intelligence among the Five Eyes partners that helped lead Canada to making the statements that the prime minister (Trudeau) made,” Cohen told CTV News.

Trudeau told the House of Commons – the lower house of Canadian Parliament – that his government’s security agencies were actively pursuing the ‘credible allegations’ about ‘a potential link’ between India’s agents and the killing of Nijjar.

Nijjar was one of India’s most-wanted fugitive extremists but lived freely in Canada till his murder in front of a Gurdwara at Surrey in the British Columbia province of the North American country.

“There was a lot of communication between Canada and the United States about this,” a report on the website of the CTV News quoted Cohen saying during an interview on the Canadian TV channel’s ‘Question Period’ programme.

The media reports quoting Canadian Government sources earlier claimed that Ottawa’s allegation against New Delhi had been based on not only its own findings about the June 18 murder but also on intelligence inputs received from one of its partners in the ‘Five Eyes’ alliance. Some media outlets also quoted sources to report that Canada had communication intercepts to corroborate the claim about the role of India in the killing of Nijjar.

Trudeau’s allegation against New Delhi took India-Canada relations to a breaking point over the past few days. The two sides over the past few days expelled each other’s diplomats and issued tit-for-tat travel advisories. India called Canada ‘a safe haven’ for terrorists – a rebuke it so far kept exclusively reserved for its next-door arch-rival Pakistan. New Delhi also stopped issuing visas to citizens of Canada and asked Ottawa to downsize its diplomatic and consular missions in India. The negotiation for a trade deal has also been suspended.

The US officials over the past few days repeatedly urged India to cooperate with Canada to carry forward the probe into the allegation.