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08-06-2025
NEW DELHI/ OTTAWA: Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney invited his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi to the upcoming Group of Seven summit in a phone call on Friday, as the two sides look to mend ties after relations soured in the past two years.
The leaders agreed to remain in contact and looked forward to meeting at the G7 summit later this month, a readout from Carney’s office said.
India is not a G7 member but can be invited as a guest to its annual gathering, which will be held this year in Kananaskis in the Canadian province of Alberta, from June 15 to 17.
“Glad to receive a call from Prime Minister (Carney) … thanked him for the invitation to the G7 Summit,” Modi said in a post on social media.
Modi also stated in his post on Friday that India and Canada would work together “with renewed vigor, guided by mutual respect and shared interests.”
Bilateral ties deteriorated after Canada accused India of involvement in a Sikh separatist leader’s murder and of attempting to interfere in two recent elections. Canada expelled several top Indian diplomats and consular officials in October 2024 after linking them to the murder and alleged a broader effort to target Indian dissidents in Canada.
New Delhi has denied the allegations, and expelled the same number of Canadian diplomats in response.
India is Canada’s 10th largest trading partner and Canada is the biggest exporter of pulses including lentils, to India.
Carney, who is trying to diversify trade away from the United States, said it made sense for the G7 to invite India, since it had the fifth-largest economy in the world and was at the heart of a number of supply chains.
“In addition, bilaterally, we have now agreed, importantly, to continued law enforcement dialogue, so there’s been some progress that recognizes issues of accountability. I extended the invitation to Prime Minister Modi in that context,” he told reporters in Ottawa.
Four Indian nationals have been charged in the killing of the Sikh separatist leader.
Earlier in October, Canada alleged on Tuesday that Amit Shah, India’s interior minister and the chief aide of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, was behind plots to target Sikh separatists on Canadian soil.
The allegation follows Canada’s expulsion this month of six Indian diplomats it has linked to the murder of a Sikh separatist leader on Canadian soil. India has previously denied Canadian allegations and has responded by expelling Canadian six diplomats.
New Delhi thinks the information is very weak, flimsy and does not expect it to cause any trouble for Shah or the government, the source and another government source said.
Both spoke on condition of anonymity as they are not authorized to speak to the media.
India has called Sikh separatists “terrorists” and threats to its security. Sikh separatists demand an independent homeland known as Khalistan to be carved out of India. An insurgency in India during the 1980s and 1990s killed tens of thousands.
That period included the 1984 anti-Sikh riots that left thousands dead following the assassination of then-Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards after she ordered security forces to storm the holiest Sikh temple to flush out Sikh separatists.
Canada in mid-October expelled Indian diplomats, linking them to the 2023 murder of Sikh separatist leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar on Canadian soil. India also ordered the expulsion of Canadian diplomats. (Int’l Monitoring Desk)
