In the News

Tensions with India put Canada’s Asian trade strategy on shaky ground

The Globe and Mail , October 16, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Excerpt: "'There’s never a good time to be getting into a trade dispute, especially with a big country like India. But of course we’re living through a very fraught geopolitical environment and time.'

"...Over the past five years, around a quarter of Canadian pension-fund investments in Asia went to India, up from 10 per cent between 2003 and 2018, according to the Asia Pacific Foundation."

What Canada's row with India means for an already underperforming trade relationship

BNN Bloomberg , October 16, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Excerpt: "Nadjibulla said the chance of India moving to restrict imports of a Canadian product... is unlikely, though not impossible.

'It would be a massive escalation and one that would also obviously hurt India’s economic interests,' she said, adding a more likely scenario would be for India to once again suspend visa services for Canadians, as it did last year as diplomatic relations soured between the two countries.

'I think that might be more the next step, rather than economic sanctions. But of course everything depends on what Canada does next, because we’ve seen India essentially engage in a tit-for-tat so far.'"

Tension between India, Canada continues after top envoys expelled

DW News, October 16, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Excerpt: These circumstances represent a "much bigger campaign of transnational repression with direct involvement from... government of India's agents. 

"...What has been extraordinary about the latest development is not just that a murder took place last year is under investigation, but according to Canadian officials... there is an ongoing threat to public safety. That in fact violence has increased over the last year and there is evidence of direct involvement from the government of India."

Le haut-commissaire indien et cinq diplomates expulsés

La Presse, 16 octobre 2024

Avec : Vina Nadjibulla, vice-présidente, Recherche et stratégie, FAP Canada

Extrait : « En matière diplomatique, c’est quelque chose [les expulsions] qui arrive très rarement entre des pays qui ont des relations amicales. Même au paroxysme des tensions entre le Canada et la Chine, on n’en était pas arrivé là.

Ce sera un exercice d’équilibre très difficile. Le Canada seul ne peut se mesurer à l’Inde. »

What Canada's row with India means for an already underperforming trade relationship

CTV News (Business), October 16, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Excerpt: "This is an extremely significant development. We are seeing a diplomatic disruption, a rupture in the relationship, on a scale that is unprecedented. 

It's maybe too soon to say what the economic consequences will be, but it will definitely have an impact"

US, UK Push Ahead With Modi Despite Bombshell Trudeau Claims

Bloomberg, October 15, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Excerpt: "This issue is not unique to Canada, although the diplomatic fallout and the way all of this has unfolded publicly is unique to Canada,"

Le Canada fait la une des médias en Inde après l'expulsion de six diplomates

Néo média, 15 octobre 2024

Avec : Vina Nadjibulla, vice-présidente, Recherche et stratégie, FAP Canada

Extrait : «La réaction des États-Unis sera celle à laquelle tout le monde prêtera attention.

«Pour que le Canada, à ce stade, obtienne une forme quelconque de coopération de la part de l'Inde et obtienne des comptes pour ce qui s'est passé, il faudrait que l'Inde ressente une certaine pression. Il faudrait que l'Inde ait une raison de coopérer.»

Canada spat leads India newspapers, as analysts await reactions from peer countries

CP24, October 15, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Excerpt: "We are in uncharted territory, with implications for the diplomatic relationship as well as for Canada's public safety and national security. 

...Canada did what it thought was necessary"

Canada spat leads India newspapers as trade minister works to reassure business

CBC News, October 15, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Excerpt: "The reaction from the U.S. is going to be the one that everybody will be paying attention to.

"...In order for Canada, at this stage, to have any kind of co-operation from India and seek accountability for what has happened, we would need India to feel some pressure, we would need India to feel some reason to co-operate. 

"...We're not dealing here with a rogue state. We're dealing here with a very important international player."

India withdraws Canada envoy named in murder probe

TRT World Now (Turkey), October 15, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Excerpt: "The relations between Canada and India are now at an extremely low point . . . today's developments and the information that has now become available both through the press briefing by our prime minister as well as our law enforcement agencies it's just a new level of escalation and it's the kind of disruption to the relationship that won't be healed anytime soon. 

"We're seeing India fully refusing all the allegations, essentially refusing to co-operate. Canada continues to call on India to engage diplomatically, to engage with our law enforcement to get to the bottom of this assassination, essentially, and other violent crimes that now the Canadian government is saying India has been involved in.

"As our prime minister said, there was no desire on the part of Canada to find itself in this huge diplomatic crisis with India, but given the seriousness of the allegations, given the fact Canada now says India was involved in a whole wide campaign of criminal activities, not just one assassination, this step had to be taken. Of course now we are in uncharted diplomatic waters."

Canada spat leads India newspapers, as analysts await reactions from peer countries

The Canadian Press, October 15, 2024

Featuring: APF Canada Vice-President Research & Strategy Vina Nadjibulla

Excerpt: "Vina Nadjibulla, research vice-president for the Asia Pacific Foundation, says she’s watching to see how Canada’s peers respond to the “unprecedented, extraordinary” news.

That could mean diplomatic moves behind the scenes, and possibly public statements of support for Canada.

“The reaction from the U.S. is going to be the one that everybody will be paying attention to,” she said.

“In order for Canada, at this stage, to have any kind of co-operation from India and seek accountability for what has happened, we would need India to feel some pressure; we would need India to feel some reason to co-operate.”

Nadjibulla said it was notable that Joly accused active diplomats of involvement in criminality, and that she said violence linked to the Indian government had only increased since Canada made its concerns public last year.

Diplomatic consequences of eroding relationship between Canada and India

The Vassy Kapelos Show, October 15, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Topic: Vina Nadjibulla joins Vassy to discuss the political impact on the relationship between Canada and India following both countries expelling diplomats over murder accusations. 

Canada, India expel diplomats as police uncover ‘campaign of violence’

Aljazeera, October 14, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Excerpt: the expulsions marked “a serious escalation in the diplomatic tensions that have been going on for over a year now between Canada and India.

“We’re seeing a diplomatic rupture,” said Nadjibulla, adding that the response of other countries, including the United States and other members of the Group of 7 bloc of nations, will likely play an important role.

“Canada is continuing to call on India to cooperate with the investigation, but India has refused to do that... What will be decisive in this is the views of our key allies and partners.”

Canada has expelled six Indian diplomats

On the Coast with Gloria Macarenko (CBC), October 14, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy APF Canada

Excerpt: "I have to stress, and I know we often say something is unprecedented, but in many years working in diplomacy and international relations, I haven't seen something evolve in this way, in this public way, a dispute with a partner. 

"India is not China, is not Russia, is not North Korea, we have relations, diplomatic as well as people-to-people as well as business ties with India, a huge Indo-Canadian community. India is seen as a strategic partner when it comes to our Indo-Pacific strategy, that's how our allies view India as well. 

"So this is an incredible development and we are now at a diplomatic low in the relationship that would have been hard to imagine just a couple of days ago."

'It's very serious': APFC CEO on India allegations

CTV News, October 14, 2024

Featuring: Jeff Nankivell, President & CEO, APF Canada

Excerpt: "This a very significant development and certainly it's been received very poorly in India and the Indian media is aflame with coverage of this. And, in fact, the India government got out ahead of the story a few hours before it was revealed to Canadian media that the six Indian diplomats, including the high commissioner, had been expelled, effectively. The Indian ministry of external affairs put out its version of the story which was that the diplomats were being withdrawn for their own safety.

"It's very serious and for the RCMP to come out in the way that they did, one assumes, its an indication that they believe they have the evidence. They talked about having made arrests and laid charges against 30 or more individuals with charges related to homicide, extortion, coercion, and intimidation. We will have to see in the days and weeks ahead the details of the individual cases but it's worth noting that this is something now that is in the realm of the justice system and is likely to go on and on regardless of what happens diplomatically between the two national governments."

How significant is the breakdown in India-Canada relations?

ABC News (Australia), October 14, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Excerpt: "Today's events are just unprecedented. This is really an astonishing set of activities that have happened throughout the day. We've seen the expulsion of diplomats but we've also heard the RCMP, as well as prime minister of Canada, note in no uncertain terms that Canada believes Indian diplomats have been engaged in criminal activities [and] acts of violence here on Canadian soil [and] that because of...public safety issues they had to come out and make publicly these statement that have led to this enormous disruption in the bilateral relationship. 

Canada expels Indian diplomats as RCMP links Indian agents to violent activity

CBC News, October 14, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Excerpt: "...What we are seeing is utterly unprecedented. This is a diplomatic disruption on a scale we have not seen before and it is all unfolding in public and there are developments every hour. There will be repercussions, both obviously for our bilateral relationship with India...but also for [Canada's] engagement in the region. 

...India is a rising power in Asia and globally...[and] we will continue to feel these repercussions for days to come. 

...For Canada, it's not just about our bilateral relationship. We will need our allies, we will need our partners with us on this. The diplomatic game has really now need[ed] to be ramped up to make sure not only our allies, but key actors in the region, are with us, that they understand what's happening... for Canada we need to get ahead of this from a narrative perspective."

Canada-India relations in ‘uncharted waters’

CTV News, October 14, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Excerpt: "What we essentially just heard the prime minister of Canada say is that Indian and diplomatic officials here in Canada have been involved in criminal activities and violation[s] of Canadian state sovereignty... we are in uncharted waters ... for this to happen with a friendly country is unprecedented and it will have implications on every dimension of Canada's engagement with India but it will also have implications for our broader engagement with the region."

Canada expels 6 Indian diplomats, RCMP alleges 'serious criminal activity'

CBC News, October 14, 2024

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Excerpt: "...There is an ongoing threat to Canadians here in Canada and that's why [the RCMP] are acting [now]...There's a national security element as well where we're looking at a wide campaign that has been going on for years of transnational aggression here in Canada. 

...There will be growing demand on India for accountability... This involves Canada but it also involves our diplomatic partners, notably the United States, which also have issues [with India] along those lines

...  No matter what the concerns are on the part of India [regarding the Pro-Khalistan movement in Canada], transitional killings and homicides in a friendly state is absolutely unacceptable."

Philippine defence: what’s so special about the Typhon missile system?

South China Morning Post, October 11, 2024 

Featuring: Vina Nadjibulla, Vice-President Research & Strategy, APF Canada

Excerpt: Vina Nadjibulla, vice-president of research and strategy at the Asia-Pacific Foundation of Canada, said the decision to keep the Typhon was likely part of a broader US strategy to enhance its presence in the Indo-Pacific amid growing tensions with China.

“It signals a strengthened US-Philippine defence relationship and could serve as a deterrent against Chinese actions in contested areas like the South China Sea and Taiwan Strait,” Nadjibulla told This Week in Asia.