Thank you very much. Good evening.
I would first like to mention that the written submission I have made has many references that have been hyperlinked.
I am not an expert on Canada-People's Republic of China relations, but I'm here to speak of another country which is integral to Canada's Indo-Pacific strategy, namely India.
We are deeply concerned that in the pursuit of containing China, Canada might turn a blind eye to a deeply distressing human rights situation in India as well as the erosion of its pillars of democracy, including the legislature, the judiciary and the free press. Canada must stand against the erosion of rights and democracy in India irrespective of its China policy, because a compromised India at war with itself cannot make a reliable partner in the Indo-Pacific.
The most severe threat that I see on the horizon is the possibility of mass violence. India is home to over 200 million Muslims. Continued escalation of hate speech and home demolitions as well as calls for ethnic cleansing and genocide raise the spectre of horrific mass violence in the subcontinent. Genocide Watch and the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum have both declared India at risk of mass violence.
Prime Minister Modi very recently made openly Islamophobic remarks, calling all Indian Muslims “infiltrators” during his national election campaigning just last month. By a very large majority, the European Parliament adopted a resolution last year on July 13 warning against the existence of “Hindu majoritarianism” in India. The resolution calls on the Indian government to put a rapid end to the ongoing ethnic and religious violence. The European Parliament thus joins the worldwide movement denouncing growing authoritarianism and human rights violations in India.
Even more recently, last month on April 23, the U.S. Department of State, in its human rights report, flagged a dozen different kinds of human rights abuses in India, including extrajudicial killings and forced disappearances, arbitrary arrests or detentions, torture to coerce confessions, repeated imposition of Internet shutdowns and blocked telecommunications, surveillance of civil society activists, trolling of human rights defenders and punishment of family members for alleged offences by a relative.
According to Human Rights Watch's India country report 2022, the BJP—that is the ruling party in the government, the majority government—“continued its systematic discrimination and stigmatization of religious and other minorities, particularly Muslims. BJP supporters increasingly committed violent attacks against targeted groups. The government's Hindu majority ideology was reflected in bias in institutions, including the judiciary and constitutional authorities such as the National Human Rights Commission.”
The authorities have intensified their efforts to silence civil society activists and independent journalists using politically motivated criminal charges, including terrorism, to imprison those who denounce or criticize government abuses.
The BJP government's implementation of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act in 2019 is a blatant example of discriminatory legislation providing a pathway to Indian citizenship for non-Muslim migrants from neighbouring countries while excluding Muslims.
According to the Reporters Without Borders Asia-Pacific report, violence against journalists, politically partisan media and concentration of media ownership demonstrate that press freedom is in crisis in 'the world's largest democracy, governed since 2014 by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.”
We call upon the Government of Canada to use every international forum at its disposal to hold India accountable.
For instance, India is currently undergoing its Financial Action Task Force mutual evaluation review. Canada has an opportunity to hold India to account for the misuse of FAFT recommendations and the misuse of anti-terror laws to target civil society and political opposition.