To those saying "But Bill C-18" - it's not the Canadian government taking things down. It's the Indian government, taking down articles and posts that accuse them of assassinating a Canadian citizen on Canadian soil.
C-18 is a problem. We need to deal with it. That's not relevant to the issue at hand.
And to those saying "Well he was a terrorist..." we, in Canada, have something called the Rule of Law. You have to prove someone is guilty, in court, with real evidence. They serve time in prison for their crimes. They can be extradited to other countries to face court there.
If Bhai Hardeep Singh Nijjar was a terrorist, and there was sufficient evidence to convict him, the Indian government should have brought it to the Canadian Government. It's very simple really.
Murdering someone without trial because you don't like their political speech- why, I think there's a word for that.
Look up Omar Khadr [1]. If the United States couldn't get an extradition for that kid, could India get one for Nijjar? I doubt it. Not saying as justification for the alleged actions of the Indian government, not in the slightest. I only suggest that Canada wouldn't necessarily co-operate eagerly.
The guy was brainwashed as a child by his lunatic father and dragged to Afghanistan to resist American's invasion. There was some kind of firefight, he nearly died, and the Americans decided that since he survived he was guilty of all the crimes.
He was 15. A kid. A child soldier, by international law.
He was held for a decade in Guantanamo Bay, a US military facility, without any real trial.
The US already had him. They abused his rights and ignored international law. Why should Canada give him back to them?
Never said that Khadr should've been extradited, he shouldn't have at all and I support the Canadian government decision. But the claims of the Indian government against Nijjar are also dubious which points to the likelihood that any diplomatic transfer was a non-starter.
Of course, the difference here was that the USA attempted a diplomatic process and did not execute a citizen on Canadian soil.
>The Khalistani perpetrators of the worst terrorist act on Canadian soil, second only to 9/11 in deaths, walked free.
>I can't comment on Canada's justice system broadly. But when it comes to holding terrorists accountable, Canada's track record is a joke.
The wikipedia article says the Canadian government spent $130M prosecuting the accused, but was unable to secure a conviction. If these people can't be convicted, isn't the correct course of action "walked free"? I'm not sure what the alternative is here? Should we lock them up anyway? Is there any reason to doubt that their prosecution was botched?
> In his verdict, Justice Ian Josephson cited "unacceptable negligence" by CSIS when hundreds of wiretaps of the suspects and other informants were destroyed.
But that’s just how due process and judicial systems work.
The rule of law made it so you cannot run kangaroo courts when you just personally believe someone is guilty. If the process is failing to prosecute the guilty, the process should be updated with... more laws, which themselves are passed through representative democratic governance. If one outcome is unsatisfactory to you, you can vote for someone who will tear down the system, you can become a prosecutor, you can run campaigns for people who will tear down systems for you, etc.
A party that received 32.62% of the popular vote got 160 seats in the House of Commons, while another party that received 33.74% of the vote got only 119 seats.
A party that received only 7.64% of the votes got 32 seats, while another party that received 17.82% of the vote got only 25 seats.
A party that received 2.33% of the votes got 2 seats, while another party that received 4.94% of the vote got no seats.
With a votes-to-seats situation like that, there are a lot of Canadians who don't have proper representation in the House of Commons, or in some cases, effectively none at all.
It's no surprise that the voter turnout wasn't even 63%; many Canadians are completely disillusioned with how the current system works, and don't feel that any of the parties can offer them meaningful representation.
I don't think there's many democracies that function on a purely national popular vote in allotting seats proportionally. I think maybe Israel does. Hardly disqualifies a country as democratic.
I can't tell whether this is ironic, but, no, it is usually expected that the rule of law requires that the government can't obtain convictions just because it wants them.
> That's exactly it, isn't it? Claiming you have rule of law while being unable to secure prosecutions makes it a farce.
Seems like that's exactly what rule of law should entail: laws so strictly enforced that people can't be prosecuted when the prosecution is botched because doing so would... violate the rule of law.
So if anything, this further reinforces the idea that Canada hews closely to its laws than not.
Quite the opposite. The bar for depriving someone of their freedom through force of law should be very high. Sure, the ideal is that all actual criminals are convicted, and all innocent people are acquitted (or aren't even charged in the first place). But until we have a magical system that can achieve perfection, I would much rather the occasional criminal goes free than an innocent person has their life ruined.
If the prosecution fails to make their case, either through incompetence, or simply being outwitted by the defense, that's life. That's how the system as a whole should function. That is rule of law.
As per your own link, many of the suspects are dead, on the run, in prison for decades (in the case of one suspect that provided testimony against the other perpetrators), or were found to have not had involvement in the plot. Saying the perpetrators "walked free" is a massive distortion at best.
A man’s freedom to live in a liberal democracy is not dependent on his activity’s perceived similarity to crimes committed by other people. It’s determined by the law and the application of justice. The Canadian government guarantees this and the Indian government interfered with this sovereign right as alleged.
Where does Canada stand with regards for her southern neighbor and his proclivity for extrajudicial killings and violations of sovereignty in the name fighting a War on Terror?
And what of the murder of Sikhs that spurred that? Or the murder of muslims in India in general?
This issue is not something we want to be adjudicating. It is not a matter of black and white, good guys and bad guys. If India does not like the guy and wants him charged with terrorism, she needs to go through Canadian courts.
The primary victims and perpetrators of the Khalistani movement in Punjab were fellow Sikhs. The vast majority of Sikhs were killed by Khalistanis during the years of terror.
> the murder of muslims in India in general?
Your accusations do not pan out in any statistics. India is a safer place for Shia Muslims than any non-Iran country in the middle east. India is the only country where Ahmediyyas are not prosecuted.
There is no 'murder of muslims in India in general'. India has communal tensions just as every heterogenous country has communal tensions. But other than uncontrollable riots where both sides are usually injured, Muslims are treated fairly in the Indian system. If anything, India practices affirmative action towards Muslims, allows islamic schools (madaras) and gives them fully independent management rights of all islamic institutions. None of these allowances are extended to the majority population.
Western citizenship being inviolable golden passports for sheltering/weaponizing dissidents of foreign states is not going to be sustainable forever. The west providing sanctuary for enemies of other states is going to end when other states possess power/leverage to do something about it.
When will other states possess the power to do something about it? India doesn't have an expeditionary military, nor are they capable of building one in the next few decades. They can barely manage to defend their homeland and territorial waters.
What's more likely are additional restrictions on international trade and immigration. The great experiment with globalism appears to be winding down and powerful countries are decoupling their economies from each other.
Not everything raises to the level of full military intervention. Bluntly white western countries aren't going to go to bat when their brown/yellow citizens get murdered for diasphora drama. IMO this is more level of aggressive espionage/statecraft. India (and others like PRC) has increasing amount of loyal diasphora to activate to counter dissident disaphora and the cost-benefit seems to be leaning on the side of intervention, whether decoupling dynamic (PRC) or new geopolitical leverage (india).
But ultimately this is effort to moderate west, well smaller countries like Canada (increasingly dependent on Indian immigration) to control what domestic diasphora voices they amplify. Which may very well backfire. Or not - decades of increased PRC immigration + students in Canada was associated with fed gov playing down PRC dissident voices (and still do to some extent). Short of getting rid of problems via extradition - which is political suicide for Canada and won't happen - India limited to raising political cost of associating unfriendly diasphora politics. Canada isn't going to hit immigration targets without playing nice with either India or PRC. So there's no reason not to push, and almost extra reason to. There's likely going to be millions of new Indians in Canada by 2030, India doesn't want dissident elements to organize, and is incentivized to make domestic politics difficult in Canada if they're allowed to.
And Pompeo wanted to whack snowden. The asymmetry is west shelters much more foreign dissidents/criminals, and has more opportunities to weaponize them for foreign policy. Frequently it's deliberate, sometimes it's just happenstance of high immigration. But ultimately, west won't be able to stay clean of diasphora foreign policy drama, especially ones they actively cultivate or fail to suppress. Old legal excuse of, lol no we don't extradite to non-like minded countries, is going to lead to extra legal actions like this.
Whacking Snowden in RU is different tier of drama than whacking a Canadian. Time will tell if this is going to be a significant issue. Hard to imagine FVEY / US not knowing when Canada brought it up during G20 and have this not dominate the G20 narrative.
> Whacking Snowden in RU is different tier of drama than whacking a Canadian
Sure. There isn’t the necessity of a military response here. But it was exceedingly dumb. New Delhi has a rogue security element. I, at the very least, didn’t see that coming. From the indignant response, it appears Delhi didn’t either. That’s concerning.
All those persecuated one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighters etc, political asylum west provides foreign dissidents (or what foreign actors consider dissidents) out of human rights. Frequently they settle in west and move on with their lives. The issue arises when these people organize and create movements or organizations to influence foreign policy of new host country to go against interest of where they fled, or independantly meddle to undermine. Many so far assumed western influence, more or less depending on functional immunity from extradition allows them to operate unmolested. IMO more countries with reach realizing it's fine to meddle in western sovereignty as long as west allows their citizens/diasphora to meddle in theirs under excuse of liberalism/free speech/association etc. And obviously people in "free" societies with right to influence foreign policy, may still, but govs ability to protect them from motivated actors will likely decline.
Every single time anyone posts anything that puts one nation in a bad light, someone comes in with this. Can we please not do this? Your nation will have its chance in the sun too. Hijacking threads like this to say, "well, what about your nation?" is childish to say the absolute least.
Honestly I have come to see the concept of “whataboutism” as harmful because it allows people to engage in extreme double standards while shaming others into supporting any policy no matter how unfair. I have outlined exactly why here, in this post that got a lot comments and upvotes before it was flagged and buried:
It’s like if all humans fart, but then someone points out that we must put someone in jail because they farted. It’s actually extremely appropriate to point to a broader group and say “everybody in that group farts, and it is unreasonable for you to expect zero farting”.
It becomes even worse when a person X who is #34 on the list of worst farting offenders is singled out while the other 33 above them are not mentioned. The anti-X people say “well, you gotta start somewhere”. But they paint targets around the arrow X all day long.
I am not saying everyon who makes a criticism does that, but apples-to-apples comparison and having consistent standards isn’t “whataboutism”.
Well diplomacy is built on quid pro quos and whataboutism so I don’t know what’s childish in this, if anything this comment comes off as pretty naive and childish.
I'm sorry, but no, that is not diplomacy. If you think that is diplomacy, then you're spending a lot of time on tabloids and news headlines and no time where the diplomacy is primarily happening: in stuffy meeting rooms.
This is the behavior of actual children who can't stand to be subjected to critique and deflect with screams and shouts of their own victimhood.
Tomorrow it will be China's debt crisis, and the day after America's latest foreign intervention come to haunt them again but you know what? You can wait your turn. That's the very adult thing to do.
I don't think that the U.S. killing an Egyptian in Afghanistan makes it more OK for India to kill a Canadian in Canada (if that's in fact what they did).
That would have to be a separate discussion. It's obviously not the one we're having here right now.
It was asserted that "in Canada, have something called the Rule of Law".
I don't think that assertion is true based on recent events.
Forced masking was just one of many abuses of government power we saw in Canada very recently. If there actually were rule of law in Canada, as was claimed, then none of those abuses would have happened.
This is unhinged, I'm sorry but that writing categorically cannot be the output of rational thought process. Implementing comprehensive and strong public health protocols during a once-in-a-century pandemic is exactly the type of responsibility government exists for. Right up there with building roads and national defense.
The prime minister put his credibility that of the government on the line. They obviously have evidence and are convinced of this being factual as the price to pay for being wrong will be very steep.
By the way, the word you are looking for would be the same for someone accusing of lying or deception without an iota of proof.
India’s government is apparently confidently enough in India’s global influence to be putting pressure on Canada and Facebook.
Just thinking out loud, if some parts of India started breaking away from India, that could start a chain reaction. India has incredibly diverse sets of citizens, each with their own set of cultural identities and historical grievances. Maintaining national unity has been a struggle since India become its own country. And it’s two enemies to the north would love to see India divided. Violent suppression of separatists is apparently a necessity evil for them.
If true, this was a stupid move. They’ve martyred a separatist while bringing him and his cause international sympathy and attention. The assassins have carried out an action resembling an attack on a founding member of NATO and close ally of America’s. In North America. This is a line even the Soviets and Chinese respected. Not out of fear, but rational self interest.
If true, New Delhi’s best move is to find the perpetrators and make an example out of them. (My guess is a security element went rogue and the diplomats were too incompetent to keep it quiet.)
> In North America. This is a line even the Soviets and Chinese respected
When it comes to assassination, maybe. But China conducts extra-judicial operations in Canada, and even deport citizens (send back to China), with little respect for Canada's sovereignty.
* Search for china+secret+police+canada and make your own mind. Obviously the CCP denies it and the Canadian government is mute. So you only have the mainstream media's word to go on.
> This is a line even the Soviets and Chinese respected.
Well, Russia is pretty fine with carrying out extra-judicial assassination attempts of undesirables on UK soil, so it's not clear this line is true any more.
> By all accounts that was caused by the Ukraine invasion rather than the assassination.
It's not either/or, it's both.
The counter example is USA (I'm american). USA had such a "good guy" track record post WWII that we invaded numerous countries and fucked around all over the world and we didn't get coalition'ed against.
> This is a line even the Soviets and Chinese respected
Partly because they were on the other side. It's different here (if true) because, as the BBC points out -
"Western powers would have to make a choice between backing Ottawa or New Delhi, a choice between supporting the principle of the rule of law or the hard necessity of realpolitik."
For example, it was historically non-aligned but on friendly terms with the Soviet Union:
> In 1954, the United States made Pakistan a Central Treaty Organization (CENTO) ally. As a result, India cultivated strategic and military relations with the Soviet Union to counter Pakistan–United States relations.[2] In 1961, India became a founding member of the Non-Aligned Movement to abstain from aligning with either the US or the USSR in the Cold War.
Of course, India would seem to be a natural ally given that both countries are committed democracies and there is massive immigration from India to the United States, but in practice the United States likes the reliability of less-democratic states and India likes to control its own affairs and is powerful enough to do so.
True that India isn’t strictly an ally of the west. And even now India is importing oil from Russia. Though, I’d say much of these differences with the west are not ideological as much as the result of India applying realpolitik to their geographic circumstances. And after being screwed by the British for centuries, India doesn’t feel like owes any favors to the west. If India were located in Europe, without needing to deal with Pakistan and China, I think they’d have a lot in common with other European nations. I know that’s a bold claim. At least on paper, Indias government was formed based on principle of equality and self-determination. Obviously, populism and corruption have caused the government to veer slightly off course, but India is nothing like countries like Russia or China, at least.
>If India were located in Europe, without needing to deal with Pakistan and China
Because of the Himalayas, China can't interfere with India any more than it could if India were in Europe. (Yes, I know about the recent deadly skirmishes on their shared border. They involved small numbers of soldiers and even getting large numbers of soldiers to the border would be arduous, let alone anything like a tank.)
The Soviets regularly murdered dissidents from the Soviet Union in western countries. That's like half the reason the KGB existed. You can read about it in The Sword and the Shield by Christopher Andrew and Vasili Mitrokhin, a book directly referencing KGB archives.
The Sword and the Shield is _great_. It's been a long time since I read it but I don't remember it outlining murdering western citizens who were just dissidents. I do remember a few plots to kill KGB defectors. The more interesting part of that book about assassinations were how many foreign leaders (including nominal allies) they contemplated killing and how close they got to some of them.
They did a lot of shit in North America but one of the points of Sword and Shield was explaining how assassinations were mainly directed towards ex-Soviet dissidents and not American citizens. I'm not excusing what the Indian Government did here, I'm just saying that the Soviets (and the United States for that matter) regularly performed actions on this level in a number of western countries.
> the Soviets (and the United States for that matter) regularly performed actions on this level in a number of western countries
Sure. But America didn’t assassinate Russians in Russia. And the Soviets reciprocated. This is a bright line that someone stupidly crossed. Rogue elements happen. That New Delhi appears blindsided is the concerning bit.
> If true, this was a stupid move. They’ve martyred a separatist while bringing him and his cause international sympathy and attention.
The heyday of the Khalistan movement was decades ago. It has petered out and lingers only at a minor, ineffectual level similar to how left-wing militants or Basque separatist violence still simmered for a while in Europe but achieved nothing. Plus, Western audiences are still poorly informed about ethnic and sectarian differences within India, there’s nothing here easy for them to grab on to. I wouldn’t expect this event to bring any new impetus to the Sikh separatist cause.
The Khalistani movement is pretty weak, and as Pakistan shows, repression is counterproductive in that it is makes ethnic identity more salient not less. (At least in the Kashmiri case there is already a substantial terrorist movement that can’t be ignored; the Khalistan movement is a joke and certainly can be. Turnout in the last Assembly elections was ⩾70 per cent.) Even the Akali Dal was in alliance with the BJP. (See e.g. Jaffrelot's The Pakistan Paradox for an account of the radicalisation of Bengali, Muhajir, and Sindhi nationalists, inter alios.)
Politics aside, this feels like a good policy question? How do laws apply in the context of a global platform like Facebook. Something may be in violation of a law in one country, but be totally acceptable in another. Should sovereign citizens on one country be subjected to laws of another? If Twitter files showed us anything, posts get taken down at the request of the government (including US and Canada).
India (among other countries) have passed so called "hostage-taking laws" that require large social media companies to have in-country employees that can be strong-armed from ways small to large (threats of being convicted of treason and executed).
This is a specific policy to allow them to enforce their censorship laws in other countries.
If there is a single Facebook employee on Indian soil, that Facebook cares about, then obviously, yes they can enforce it, simply by being mean to those Facebook employee(s).
It seems like India's stance is: If you want to do business in India, you have to have employees you care about on our soil, so we can be mean to them if you do something we don't like.
Facebook's stance appears to be: We like your money enough that we will comply with this.
I'm just glad I'm not one of those Facebook employees.
"Either have employees in-country so we can intimidate them so you'll do what we want, or we block your service."
Sounds pretty effective? Sure, some people will get around the blocks, but it'll be a relatively small percentage (especially if the government makes circumventing these blocks illegal, most people won't find it worth any risk to do it anyway), and your service will be effectively destroyed in that country.
There's a ton of precedence of American companies applying American laws universally across the world (regardless of whether it's applicable by jurisdiction) in IP cases, in trade issues, etc. many times it's easiest to just have 1 set of rules across the planet, so companies end up with following the lowest common denominator of legal actions and policies. (even if these policies are illegal in other jurisdictions. Many cases, American companies just go ahead with the illegal policies and then pay the fine in each country where it is found to be acting illegally. The fines are not even sufficient to be rounding errors of their operating budget in many cases so they just break laws at will just so that it's easier to match the policies around the world).
There are two differences:
First, American law does not apply globally and makes no demands to apply globally. If companies do so it is a matter of convenience and not policy. While companies may petition the US government to apply pressure on allied countries to influence policy there is no presumption that American law will apply in a foreign country outside of what is circumscribed by treaties. Second there is the matter of positive vs negative laws. American law doesn’t prohibit much by way of publishing or collecting information in public spaces. Applying American laws globally results lack of a compliance in countries with stricter laws. The law in question actually prohibits something. What results is actually a greatest common denominator of law.
American law absolutely applies globally when it is applied to American citizens. People who don't realize this routinely end up in jail.
Stuff like the drinking age (a state law) doesn't apply, but federal laws do apply, which is why American citizens who go abroad to commit gang-related crimes (and more stupidly, break fishing and hunting restrictions) are still arrested when they return despite the fact that no aspect of the crime touched American soil.
Please don’t misunderstand. Most countries (all that I am aware of) apply their laws to all people within their territory and to their citizens globally. The Indian Law in question applies to non-Indian citizens outside India. That is a big difference.
Facebook is an American company with a lot of American employees. It also has a lot of Indian employees, and I assume those will be held responsible if things don't go well.
> First, American law does not apply globally and makes no demands to apply globally.
This is completely false. There is no country that is more well versed on imposing their laws on other countries than the USA. This is done via sanctions, limiting access to the international US dollar based financial system, and by holding a dominant position in trade negotiations that often allows the USA to literally dictate the contents of foreign laws.
No. Those are political and diplomatic considerations and not legal considerations. Pressuring countries to adopt treaties and comply with American law is a diplomatic and political act and it is ultimately up to the governments in question to apply these laws (there are plenty of examples where countries reject American law). But regardless, this is an extralegal practice and Congress does not pass laws under the assumption that they will have global application. The Indian law in question is a law that applies everywhere regardless of jurisdiction and the Canadian government was never even notified that a
foreign power was attempting to regulate its media. It would be like if C-18 applied to links in India.
I think that's a fine (and correct) distinction that doesn't matter to what the GP was talking about (who perhaps worded their post in a bit of an unfortunate way that has you focusing on an mostly-irrelevant detail).
Sure, the US government pressures other countries though various means to adopt certain legal regimes. But in the absence of that pressure (or the absence of a foreign country caving to that pressure), US law does not apply in that other country (well, except to US citizens traveling there; the US can and will arrest US citizens who break US federal law while abroad, upon their return).
The overarching point is that US-based companies will often apply US law to their operations in other countries, even when they are not obligated to (by any law, US or otherwise). Likely this is for consistency and simplicity reasons: it's easier to have one policy than hundreds.
Of course in this case it's the reverse: India strong-arming Facebook into following India's censorship initiatives. Seems they can do this by requiring Facebook employ people who reside in India, who the Indian government can threaten in order to get Facebook to comply. As lame as I think that is, that's life, and capitalism. Facebook seems plenty happy to accept all the revenue generated by their Indian user base, in exchange for complying with questionable (or worse) local laws.
The US arrests or gets foreign citizens extradited to the US for acts committed in a foreign country on a regular basis. I'm not sure how you're not aware of this since it has happened to several very notable figure such as SBF, Kim Dotcom and Assange.
More words: the Cloud Act was specifically designed to apply globally. As long as a company has some kind of presence in the US, they can compel that company to produce any data stored anywhere on the globe. That definitely makes American law apply in foreign countries outside of treaties.
If you want access to that country's market, you are thrall to their potentially half-baked, wannabe democracy dictator-like decisions.
I think it's really that simple. Facebook can say "we will obey whatever your laws decide" to every country. Or it can say "deal with it. Block us." And I think it already happens that way for many countries.
He was as much as a "leader" as Osama Bin Laden was a "leader" for Al-Qaeda. The group the "terrorist" belonged to committed the world's deadliest act of aviation terrorism until the September 11 attacks in 2001. They were responsible for assasinating Indias Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. Feels weird reading the western world feeling sympathetic for a group which commits acts of terrorism.
Trudeau obviously grasping at the chance of winning over some Sikh votes. Whether the allegations are credible or not is irrelevant to him, and likely will not be found out until after elections anyway.
On the other hand, Facebook is much more likely to err on the side of India given the much larger population and associated $ potential and THE BILL.
Canada is not exactly an espionage expert relative to places like India so I find it highly unlikely that we (Canada) will be able to figure this out in the short term without external help.
Sikhs make up <2% of Canada. Even less when you account for that fact that not all of them are of age to vote. Do you really think a PM of Canada would throw away relationship with a potentially large trading partner for a few thousand votes?
This <2% population are not uniformly distributed.
And identity politics can and do win you seats in local councils, senates, congresses, and so on.
This is the very common mistake by identity politics deniers. They always say that <minority group> population is x% where x << 100. But what they forget, willingly or unwillingly, is that population is not uniformly distributed over the country and are concentrated in some parts, and a party, by appeasing the <minority> can and do win seats in democratic elections.
I have seen this first hand in multiple places.
Edit: I just learned that Trudeau's party is in power because of the support of a Shikh party. His party was 10 seats short of majority needed to form government. A Shikh party provided the support which put him in power.
Are you Canadian? Even asking the question feels ridiculous: yes, absolutely.
He shredded the Charter to fabricate a wedge (interior vaccine passports, firing civil servants) to win a few votes in the last election. This is absolutely in character.. good governance means nothing to Trudeau compared to being re-elected.
There could be more to it than just acquiring future votes for the Liberal Party.
Keep in mind that Jagmeet Singh is the leader of the NDP, the other main leftist party in Canada, and he represents the Burnaby South riding.
Due to how Canada's elections work, the Liberals drawing even a relatively small number of voters away from the NDP in key ridings could have a significant negative impact on the NDP's and Singh's level of success during the next election.
In 2021, Singh beat the Liberal candidate by only about 4,000 votes, for example. That was only 10% of the vote, and the overall turnout was merely 51% in that riding.
The context is that there's a Canadian Sikh who has been calling for parts of India to secede from India. In response, India had him assassinated.
India has laws on the books that allow them to remove content globally for things that violate Indian law. They enforce this on social media companies by requiring them to have employees on the country's soil in order to take them hostage.
C-18 just says you can't post links on Facebook without news companies getting a cut of ad revenue. India wants all discussion of their assassination of a Canadian citizen to be censored, and they're currently getting that censorship.
Why do people keep saying this like it's a fact? Often it's the same people claiming that the murdered victim in Canada should be presumed innocent of the accusations levelled at him.
In both cases, we should approach the accusations with skepticism.
Even that article you cite stops short of saying that RAW was definitely the perpetrator.
There are occasionally people who opportunistically claim credit for crimes they didn't commit, when it suits their politics. And even if it was someone in RAW, being "close to the government", does not necessarily mean it was ordered by that government.
None of us have enough information to say for sure at this point. Yet people carry on like we know the truth without equivocation.
The Prime Minister of Canada just did a state visit to India, where he was not warmly received, and made to look foolish on the world stage. So, he has his own political calculations in this affair, and is far from an objective arbiter of truth.
> The Prime Minister of Canada just did a state visit to India, where he was not warmly received, and made to look foolish on the world stage. So, he has his own political calculations in this affair, and is far from an objective arbiter of truth.
He is also deeply unpopular, sinking in the polls, and facing major public pressure over Canada's housing and cost of living crisis. He also has taken significant criticism for his handling of Chinese foreign interference campaigns.
A cynic might point out that starting a fight with an unpopular foreign government is a great way to distract attention from the government's domestic policy failures.
> none of us have enough information to say for sure at this point
Well, I agree; in these matters there is rarely definitive proof until the archives are opened. Given the implicit epistemic standards governing such assertions, I think this particular assertion is fine; there is a pretty good argument for it. Those standards vary by context, and sentences of the form 'intelligence agencies did blah' have relatively low standards.
> The Prime Minister of Canada just did a state visit to India, where he was not warmly received, and made to look foolish on the world stage. So, he has his own political calculations in this affair, and is far from an objective arbiter of truth.
I can equally make an argument that the relatively muted reaction of the Indophile UK government suggests that there is something to these reports:
> The British foreign secretary, James Cleverly, said his government backed a Canadian investigation, adding that he expected India’s “full cooperation” in the inquiry. “Obviously, we have a very strong relationship with Canada, a very strong relationship with India,” he said.
or that the States would have denied this if they could, given the importance of the Quad; and so on.
> I can equally make an argument that the relatively muted reaction of the Indophile UK government suggests that there is something to these reports:
We can try to read the tea-leaves, but we don't know for sure.
I'm not saying it's wrong, i'm saying people should stop being so emphatically absolute in their belief that they know the truth. It's a corrosive sickness that permeates much public discourse these days.
This just seems to be a misreading of varying implicit epistemic standards. When I'm in a logic seminar I'm obviously going to mean something different in using unqualified indicatives from when I'm in the pub. I don't thereby commit the sin of having unwarranted certainty when I'm in the pub.
> The Prime Minister of Canada just did a state visit to India, where he was not warmly received, and made to look foolish on the world stage.
Have you considered the possibility that the reason he got a cold reception was he brought the accusation he just made publicly? Would put the issue with the plane in a whole new light too...
> The Prime Minister of Canada just did a state visit to India, where he was not warmly received, and made to look foolish on the world stage. So, he has his own political calculations in this affair, and is far from an objective arbiter of truth
This 100%. It is the only reason why this mudslinging is happening now.
> The Prime Minister of Canada just did a state visit to India, where he was not warmly received, and made to look foolish on the world stage. So, he has his own political calculations in this affair, and is far from an objective arbiter of truth.
The state visit, and the bad PR it brought to the Canadian PM is well-reported publically. And the idea that a PM makes political calculations, which don't hold truth as more important than all other factors, wouldn't be controversial to most political observers.
So is blaming this killing on India. No evidence has been presented.
This was probably nothing but gang rivalry.
Indo-Canadian organized crime or Punjabi-Canadian organized crime is made up predominantly of young adults and teenagers of Punjabi ethnic, cultural and linguistic background, typically ethnic Jatt’s. [0]
Blaming it on criminal ties simply because the ethnicity of the victim? Are you serious? When is that okay?
And for your information, I live in Vancouver. I'm aware of the organized crime issue here. But not every Sikh is a terrorist or criminal (I can't believe I have to say that).
Suggesting they are criminally involved just because of their race is textbook racism.
> Blaming it on criminal ties simply because the ethnicity of the victim?
…
> But not every Sikh is a terrorist or criminal
Now you’re just making things up. Where in my comment did I say that every Sikh is a terrorist or criminal or I’m blaming criminal ties due to his ethnicity? Please point me to that.
I was referring to him being a Khalistani and I did point you to the fact that Khalistanis have ties with organized crime. There’s shit ton of evidence related to that.
For the record, I’m sure I know more Sikhs than you, have since childhood and none of them is a Khalistani nor a criminal.
>>Indo-Canadian organized crime or Punjabi-Canadian organized crime is made up predominantly of young adults and teenagers of Punjabi ethnic, cultural and linguistic background, typically ethnic Jatt’s. [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indo-Canadian_organized_crim...
Since you purposefully pulled a quotation from the wiki article about ethnicity, it seems pretty obvious to me you are linking his ethnicity to organized crime. Right? Am I crazy? You brought up his ethnicity. You did that.
If you meant to say Khalistanis have ties to organized crime then you should have said that. But, you didn't.
Anyways, now that you've corrected (or backtracked) to say Khalistanis have ties with organized crime, I acknowledge your correction. Though, I still don't follow the logic of "Khalistanis have ties with organized crime" therefore, this is "probably" organized crime but this has gone on long enough.
While PM Trudeau has offered no evidence, he's also unable to offer evidence when it's international intelligence data.
Trudeau's poor relationship with India has been a constant scandal for his government. Similarly his junior coalition partner Jagmeet Singh, whos relationship with the international Sikh community has resulted in constant accusations of sympathy for Khalistani terrorists.
Canada has a massive Indian diaspora, and they're Liberal voters. Pissing them off without merit would be very dangerous for the already-embattled PM
So what I mean to say is: while he cannot provide justification, he would not have made this accusation lightly. Unfortunately this is not a court case so we will not get to know the details. It is what it is.
You make some interesting, and good points; and that's perhaps reason to give some credence to the accusation. There are also some reasons to believe that the murdered victim, was not innocent of the charges levelled against him. But in both cases, we should stop short of saying we can say so for sure.
The Indian response was more or less an admission.
"India’s ministry of external affairs said in a statement it “rejected” statements by Trudeau and his foreign minister, adding that allegations of India’s involvement in any act of violence in Canada are “absurd and motivated ” ...
... “ growing concern at the interference of Canadian diplomats in our internal matters and their involvement in anti-India activities” [0]
TLDR: "We didn't do it and he was a bad guy anyway!"
> They enforce this on social media companies by requiring them to have employees on the country's soil in order to take them hostage
Are you suggesting that India requires Facebook to employ people who reside in India in order to operate in India, and that they use those employees as hostages in order to coerce Facebook to succumb to their demands even when when those demands concern communication between non-Indian nationals residing outside of India?
If so, I'd love to hear more about this; do you have any resources?
For reference from those outside of Canada/India, when a region of Canada had a problem with a terrorist separatist group... well on the one hand we temporarily suspended civil liberties with the "war measures act".
But on the other hand we also ran a referendum and asked if the public really wanted to leave.
The separatists lost the referendum. Repeatedly.
Particularly relevant since PM Trudeau's father was involved in handling that situation.
Facebook is not playing a smart game either. The government is already and understandably furious at India for this encroachment to sovereignty (the murder of a Canadian in Canada by a foreign state), it was also already not happy at Facebook for their previous encroachment to sovereignty (the blocking of Canadian news), and now it has more reason to be mad at Facebook for this latest encroachment to sovereignty of applying Indian law on Canadian citizens. I imagine the pushback could be very strong.
Canada has less than 40 million total people. If Facebook completely exited Canada and banned all Canadians from Facebook, it wouldn’t be all that big of a deal.
India on the other hand has over a billion people.
If you have to choose to piss off a government, Canada is a much better choice than India.
Number of potential users isn't the only issue though. Canada's GDP is ~66% of India's, despite the massive population difference. The potential revenue per user from Canada is far higher than from India.
Facebook is in the advertising industry. One pair of eyeballs is not worth the same as every other pair, they're worth what they can spend. Canadians are, in global terms, fabulously wealthy.
I realize that and secretly hope Canada will just flat out ban Facebook as it would have become an obvious liability to our sovereignty. It is unacceptable that other countries, India, US or others, have such a large control over the news and culture we see. This has way too much power to influence and it is a threat to democracy and local cultures.
"Canadian Sikh Facebook users posting about the assassination of a Sikh community leader are seeing posts disappear and accounts suspended in response to legal demands by the Indian government."
It's not Facebook's fault, they're just following the law. The issue, if anything, is that in Canada you don't have the legal right to freely express yourself online and Facebook is legally allowed to censor your content. So obviously Facebook are going to have no problem with doing that if the Indian government are telling them to. The mistake of allowing private companies to have the right censor legal content (for whatever reason) is the mistake here.
Imo there's little difference in what Facebook is doing here with what they did when they removed Jan 6th posts. Hardeep Singh Nijjar was trying using his political influence to overthrow the Indian government by supporting extremist groups within India. Obviously unless you pass laws to protect freedom of speech Facebook isn't going to allow posts supporting this kind of behaviour on their platform – even if in this case a lot of people in the West agree with the extremists.
I'll also note that we don't even know if Hardeep Singh Nijjar was assassinated yet. This for the time being ranges from likely to a conspiracy theory depending on which governments and media sources you trust.
Trudeau has has been having a terrible time with India. How fortuitous then, that a man, wanted as a terrorist in India who also happens to be Canadian citizen ends up dead, soon after these mishaps:
With some luck, the people of Canada will completely forget what a tool Trudeau has been when it comes to foreign policy, rally behind him in the defense of the country against that big bad bully India and give him a majority in the next election.
It's a bit naïve to think that the Canadian public will respond to this in the same way that the Indian nationalist press respond to 56 inches' chest-thumping. People can vote Poilievre and oppose extrajudicial assassinations by foreign intelligence agencies.
Here's what naive means:
Lacking worldly experience and understanding, especially. Simple and guileless; artless. Unsuspecting or credulous.
I assure you that the Canadian public is fully capable of responding to this in a far more favorable way than almost any press, including the "Indian nationalist" press.
As an example, they keep voting Trudeau back into office.
> As an example, they keep voting Trudeau back into office.
That's more just an accident due to how Canada's electoral system happens to behave.
During the 2019 federal election, the Liberal Party received 33.12% of the votes, and got 157 seats in the House of Commons. The Conservative Party had more votes at 34.34%, but only got 121 seats.
A similar thing happened in 2021. The Liberal Party received 32.62% of the votes, and got 160 seats. The Conservative Party again had more votes at 33.74%, but only got 119 seats.
Even his 2015 majority government only received 39.47% of the vote.
1984 is the last time I can think of when a majority government in Canada actually received over 50% of the vote, and even then it was only 50.03%.
Again, whatever their many faults, Canadians are capable of opposing extrajudicial assassinations and voting Poilievre (or Singh). Meanwhile, the Indian press lap up 56 inches' supposedly patriotic nonsense whilst he cedes land to the PRC.
For those wondering this isn't because of their boneheaded law the official justification is
> Your page has been unpublished,” reads a notice sent to BC Sikhs that was reviewed by PressProgress. “This is because BC Sikhs goes against our Community Standards on dangerous individuals and organizations.
I for one am so glad that we agreed it was a good idea for social media to censor dangerous people and opinions, especially ones that might spread misinformation. It is a good precedent going forward that I do not think will have any unintended consequences.
Canada's single most deadly terrorist attack was the bombing of Air India Flight 182 by Sikh Khalistani separatists. 329 people were killed, including 268 Canadians.
Trying to stereotype a group of millions or billions of people as "some of the most peace loving people on planet earth" is ridiculous. That was my point. I would not characterize Christians that way either.
islam is an inherently violent ideology. The Quran commands followers to murder innocent people for sodomy or leaving the religion. Martyrdom is an important concept. Sikh doctrine does not call for murdering people. For what it's worth christianity is also an inherently violent ideology, although the new testament eschews that a bit.
Obviously not all muslims strictly follow the ideology.
The bomb was planted on the plane in Canada, the attack was planned in Canada, the terrorists were Sikh Canadians, and the attack killed 268 Canadian citizens...
Unfortunately they possessed Canadian citizenship, making them Canada's problem. That's the unfortunate reality of having one of the world's most lax immigration systems and an embarrassingly low bar for citizenship.
What a ridiculous comment. Are you trying to say all groups are equally dangerous? You know that’s ridiculous right?
If you want to say Sikhs are at least as dangerous as the average, I’m open to see a statistical argument to support that position. I don’t think it’s true, but I could be convinced.
Phrasing something as a question doesn't make it a question. Re-read your comment and I think you'll see how it does not seem like an honest inquiry, but a rhetorical tactic.
> They’re some of the most peace loving people on planet earth.
I'd be open to see a statistical argument to support the above position.
"peace loving" != "not dangerous"
As an example: The kirpan (Punjabi: ਕਿਰਪਾਨ) is a curved, single-edged blade that Khalsa Sikhs are required to wear as part of their religious uniform . . . Sikhs are expected to embody the qualities of a Sant Sipahi or "saint-soldier", showing no fear on the battlefield and treating defeated enemies humanely.
We didn't "agree it was a good idea", this is just how the federated network we call the internet works. It's facebook's prerogative to determine what type of content appears on facebook's website.
Since this will soon become heated and full of misinformation, here are some details-
1. PM Trudeau called emergency session over "credible" allegations but no actual evidence. The leader of opposition has also called out lack of evidence.
As for background, India considers two countries as those which harbors terrorists active against India - Pakistan and Canada. Canada has harbored "Khalistani" terrorists (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_India_Flight_182) for long. Recently these "khalistani" (mind you, not Sikhs) have started threatening Indian diplomats (https://x.com/AdityaRajKaul/status/1676496624519122950?s=20) and attacked Indian properties and temples in Canada/UK. India recently started taking harder stance on push back on both Canada and UK for safety of it's nationals.
He's since changed his position and is saying Trudeau should release more information publicly. For context Poilievre has refused to get security clearance, so it's unlikely he's seen the whatever evidence CSIS has.+
+ there's a lot that's been written about his refusal. The short of it is that his position is that part of the process is he needs to promise not to reveal anything he sees and he has said that could interfere with his work as leader of the opposition.
You say Canada as "harbored" terrorists, but then link to an attack by Babbar Khalsa, which is designated as a terrorist by Canada. Do you have any basis for this assertion?
Also, I see calling credible allegations "baseless and irresponsible" doesn't inspire confidence. It's pretty clear how bad the assassination looks for India and pretending otherwise instead of promising to assist with investigations just make India look more guilty.
thank you .. also I have seen ill-informed US people accosting young Sikhs with accusations and harassment on the street in daylight .. Sikhs identified by their formal dress
While I understand that "Khalistani" have significant doctrinal differences from "traditional Sikhs", it seems like claim the Khalistani are not Sikhs is like claiming that Mormons aren't Christians. It is a prejudice based exclusion of a group in contradiction of the groups own identity.
I think explaining the differences between groups is totally worth wile, but denying the label seem like prejudice to me.
I rather doubt that Sikhs have been accosted in the US based on being confused with Khalistanis, as few americans have ever heard of Khalistanis. The attacks I heard about all had to do with ignorant Americans not knowing the difference between Sikhs and Muslims.
Do you agree the fundamental difference with Abrahamic religions is their choice of holy books and introduction of a holy prophet? The Jews have the Torah. The Christians had Jesus and appended the New Testament to the Torah, hence new religion, Christianity. The Muslims had Muhammad and appended the Quran to the Torah, hence new religion, Islam. The Mormons had Joseph Smith and appended the Book of Mormon to the Bible. I struggle to see how that doesn't make them a different religion just like the rest, worthy of a different name.
This is the evergreen debate about what makes one a "Christian." Is it simply one who worships Jesus Christ? Is it self-labeling as Christian? Is it adherence to some arbitrary specification that mandates a "Christian" must accept specific extra-biblical doctrines?
Depending on how you define Christian, it either includes or excludes Mormons. No discussion about "Are Mormons Christian?" is productive without first agreeing on a definition.
> The Muslims had Muhammad and appended the Quran to the Torah, hence new religion, Islam.
Islam views both Old and New Testament as the word of god, but the Quran is not viewed as an appendment to them but rather as a replacement.
> I struggle to see how that doesn't make them a different religion just like the rest, worthy of a different name.
Other religions add new holy books and new holy people without transforming. The Sikhs had 10 gurus over the course of more than 200 years.
Fundamentally, it is a question of cultural identity. Here, the key point is that the Mormons claim a Christian identity. What non-prejudiced purpose does it serve to deny them that identity?
So first you present how this accusation is baseless. But why did you added how this guy was bad and dangerous? Even when he was - it is unnecessary to your original argument and looks bit suspicious.
I'm surely a giant racist. Nobody falls for that stuff anymore. If you want to understand why our politicians are acting a given way, you look at their key coalitions. In this case, there is a direct cause between the PM defecting from a close relationship with India's PM Modi, and who he needs to show alignment to in response to a political crisis affecting that community.
I do understand how this related only in a tertiary way. However, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission is a hot mess and Canada is headed towards total media control.
Brian Lilley, for some context, often writes incendiary posts for Toronto Sun, a tabloid with notoriously low journalistic standards.
He himself, who often writes glowing articles about the current provincial government, seems to frequently be privy to otherwise unknown/unreleased details from our provincial government. He is coincidentally in a long term relationship with Ivana Yelich, who works in the current Premier’s office as “ executive director of media relations”
No, it's an India problem. Insamuch as Facebook or capitalism is even at fault, it's specifically because they're either willing to comply with, or have been duped into complying with, India's attempts at censorship.
The fact that BC Sikhs was eventually uncensored would indicate the latter, but India knows that they can try again, because...
- Companies like Facebook are big, monopolistic platforms, which mean they have too much content and not enough moderators, so they have a 'shoot first, ask questions later' mentality
- India holds some Facebook employees hostage. This is part of their law, you can't run a social media network there without domestic employees, and those employees effectively become agents of India with stiff penalties for noncompliance.
The fault Facebook and other capitalists have is not immediately NOPEing out of the Indian market. They left themselves open to being used as a censorship tool by powerful-enough governments.
Could you expand a big on why Facebook is unfettered capitalist? For a while there the US president administration was communicating directly with facebook execs "flagging" posts that they wanted taken down, and demanding answers why certain posts were still up. That doesn't sound unfettered to me
Ukrainians posting about war crimes and uploading photos of war - "oh, we don't want to see such sensitive content, it is unsettling, better block it, delete it and ban users with hundreds of thousands subs, just not to see it".
A. Few. Moments. Later... "why is Facebook blocking my posts?!"
Nobody has ever suggested that Nijjar had anything to do with Air India 182 - probably because he was seven years old at the time, and I'm pretty sure seven year olds aren't masterminding airline bombings. Yet you went straight for that implication:
> But, if you have the dubious honor of master-minding the Canadian 9/11, then that puts you squarely in terrorist camp for me.
If India had evidence implicating Nijjar in terrorist activities, they should have requested extradition.
Bin Laden openly admitted his actions (in proud propaganda). I would like the same level of evidence about Nijjar that can warrant this analogy/comparison . Can you provide this evidence?
Social media censorship != governments' censorship requests
Free speech allows for a diversity of voices, some of which may express views not aligned with the government's perspective, whereas its absence leads to fewer government takedown requests.
Did you miss it when they censored all mentions of Mastodon, banned people who said to follow their Mastodon instead, and throttled links to other websites?
Yes and no. According to the Twitter Files, there was a prevailing amount of indirect censorship requests (majorly driven by democratic representatives - like it or not, this is a fact), meaning non-official government requests to shut a tweet down. This channel is now gone. Period. They no longer have the UI to do it. Prior to Elon's takeover, they had a dedicated tool to submit these kinds of requests. It's gone. Official (e.g., legal) government censorship is still present. It's not going anywhere. Since the non-official channel has been shut down, the official number of government requests has gone up, which is obvious. Overall, the amount of free speech on X has increased. Irrespective of whether you like Elon or not, this is the outcome of his leadership.
India has 25x the population of Canada, Facebook has no reason to side with Canada over any political dispute. More so after the stupidity of demanding that Facebook pay Bell for linking to 'Bell's' content.
> India has 25x the population of Canada, Facebook has no reason to side with Canada
To be super clear, if India actually assassinated a Canadian in Canada, this becomes relevant in America and Europe. (At best it means New Delhi has a rogue security element.)
This is not an editorial decision by Facebook. It’s the mindless implementation of complex policies.
Sorry, I was misled by news articles about the individual's status in Canada which were published prior to the announcement earlier today that he became a citizen in 2015.
Do you have a source for that? The reports I've read suggested he was a Canadian citizen, despite having his immigration applications rejected in the 90s.
That’s so not how things work . Facebook is a US company first of all if anything it is only liable to US laws. It has stated that it’ll respect local laws as needed, so if India wants to remove posts it should be geo restricted in India not globally at all, not that banning posts is right to begin with. But this is not right.
Also importantly: Trudeau has yet to show evidence. This could easily be misinformation and disinformation.
Trudeau is notorious for lying, dividing people, and "interpreting differently" things, especially when all the attention is on his crumbling regime and mismanagement of virtually everything in Canada.
And it should raise everyone's flags that Trudeau, who has done everything possible to obstruct and derail the inquiry into Chinese election interference which likely put him in power - including saying that the information is classified - suddenly decides to share highly classified information from Canadian intelligence.
The evidence is certainly classified and disclosure of details would probably result in unacceptable risk to Canadian and/or other Five Eyes intelligence assets. This is not a court of law, the Canadian government is not obliged to give up the identities of its sources.
Trudeau briefed the leaders of the opposition ahead of the announcement and they are all offering a united front on this. That's enough for me to infer that the intelligence on this must be rock solid.
> The evidence is certainly classified and disclosure of details would probably result in unacceptable risk to Canadian and/or other Five Eyes intelligence assets.
If Trudeau is wrong about this, and is proven wrong, his government will fall. People don't blow up bilateral relationships between countries unless they are damned sure of the facts. He is clearly certain, as are the opposition parties which are all offering a common front on the issue.
Canada is not required to burn its intelligence assets prove its assertions. Releasing the evidence in a manner that exposes sources and methods just hands India's foreign intelligence apparatus a win because they can then deny Canada and her allies access to those sources.
C-18 is a problem. We need to deal with it. That's not relevant to the issue at hand.
And to those saying "Well he was a terrorist..." we, in Canada, have something called the Rule of Law. You have to prove someone is guilty, in court, with real evidence. They serve time in prison for their crimes. They can be extradited to other countries to face court there.
If Bhai Hardeep Singh Nijjar was a terrorist, and there was sufficient evidence to convict him, the Indian government should have brought it to the Canadian Government. It's very simple really.
Murdering someone without trial because you don't like their political speech- why, I think there's a word for that.