Guest list not vetted on India trip, report says

RCMP says it erred in not passing along intel on Jaspal Atwal, who had been convicted of attempting to assassinate an Indian politician

OTTAWA— A simple Google search would have revealed that a man who was convicted of attempted murder had been invited to hobnob with Justin Trudeau during the prime minister’s ill-fated trip to India, according to a new report.

But there was no security vetting of the guest list, according to a review released Monday by the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP).

Furthermore, the RCMP did not tell Trudeau’s protective detail that it had received a tip days earlier that Jaspal Atwal would attend the event.

The report says the RCMP now “recognizes that it erred” by not passing along the information about Atwal’s repeated brushes with the law.

That string of errors led to Atwal attending the event, even though one officer concluded that his presence “significantly increased the risks” to the prime minister and other attendees.

The committee’s findings, while heavily censored, paint the most detailed account yet of how Atwal — who was convicted of attempting to assassinate an Indian politician in the 1980s — found himself posing for pictures with Sophie Gregoire Trudeau at the Mumbai event on Feb. 20.

The Canadian High Commission in India had drawn up guest lists in preparation for the high-profile event in Mumbai with Trudeau and his delegation, and for another in Delhi. Less than a week before the trip, the prime minister’s office added 423 names to the list, including Atwal’s.

The report found there was no systematic security review of the guest list.

The names were not shared with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service or the Mounties responsible for protecting Trudeau.

“(A) name check even on Google would have identified and flagged this individual if the guest list would have been accessible to security,” the RCMP officer in charge wrote in a report after the event.

Yet Mounties in B.C. had been tipped to Atwal’s possible attendance on Feb. 13, the report revealed, which prompted a search of criminal databases, revealing information that should have been passed to the prime minister’s protective detail and senior officials but wasn’t, the report said.

The RCMP says the information was shared the information with CSIS, which says it has no record of that happening.

When officials in RCMP headquarters in Ottawa were informed, they left a voicemail with B.C.’s national security team to figure out Atwal’s whereabouts — but because the officer was on leave, that voicemail was missed.

The high-profile nature of the trip had already made security officials nervous. An RCMP threat assessment noted that the travel itinerary was well-known and said the prime minister, his family and the delegation “may be perceived as an extremely attractive target.”

It said the RCMP and Global Affairs took extra steps to mitigate the possible risks and enlisted the help of Indian security services.

Senior members of Canada’s intelligence and law enforcement community suggested that they would not have barred Atwal from attending the event, but would have flagged his attendance to the Mounties on the ground responsible for protecting Trudeau and his family.

But the committee concluded that Atwal’s “repeated” brushes with the law “should have raised security concerns.”

When the issue hit the headlines, Daniel Jean, then Trudeau’s national security adviser, took the largely unprecedented step of briefing journalists about what he saw as a “misinformation” campaign taking advantage of the gaffe.

Some news outlets reported that Jean — who was not named at the time — suggested “rogue elements” within the Indian government may have been responsible for such a campaign. While Jean later disputed that characterization, he told the committee that senior intelligence officials need to be able to brief the media about “foreign interference.”

“Foreign interference, whether from private individuals acting on their own or with some support of foreign governments, is more and more manifest,” Jean told the committee on March 1.

The committee questioned Jean’s public rationale for his intervention — to address the crisis, to answer media questions, and to protect the reputation of agencies like CSIS and Global Affairs Canada.

Atwal’s attendance at the invitation of the prime minister’s office became a huge black eye for the Canadians at a time when, behind the scenes, they were trying to reassure doubtful Indian officials that they took the issue of Sikh extremism seriously.

It was a concern that was raised with “great regularity” in meetings between Canadian and Indian officials, the committee report said. In early 2018, India requested a formal “national security dialogue” that saw Jean visit before just days before the prime minister touched down.

“This request is a key part of joint Canadian-Indian efforts to address more effectively India’s growing concerns regarding the rise of extremism,” according to a Privy Council Office briefing note. The report’s finding related to allegations of foreign interference were censored. But it recommended that MPs and senators get regular briefings on the risks of foreign interference and extremism in Canada. And it said that cabinet ministers need to be reminded to “exercise discretion” about who they met and associated with.

It urged the prime minister to review the role of the national security adviser in the area of countering threats.

Chantal Gagnon, a spokesperson for Trudeau, said the government would be “carefully considering” its recommendations.