Singh warned about potential death threats

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh was among the Sikh Canadians who were warned about potential threats against their lives after the killing of a Sikh activist in B.C. last year, the foreign interference inquiry heard Tuesday.

The warning, which followed Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s allegation that the Indian government was connected to the shooting death of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, surfaced during testimony before the Hogue commission from Liberal, Conservative and NDP campaign operatives, who detailed their experiences with state meddling during the last two federal election campaigns.

The threat against Singh was raised by a lawyer for a group of Sikh organizations granted standing at the inquiry.

Anne McGrath, Singh’s principal secretary, said she could not comment for national security reasons. Asked whether the threat against Singh is why he now has a security detail, McGrath again said she couldn’t comment.

The revelation about Singh added detail to allegations about the potential threat foreign states may pose to Canada’s democratic systems and its politicians — a threat Canada’s senior security officials have warned about for years, and that’s now under scrutiny at the public inquiry headed by Justice Marie-Josée Hogue.

The inquiry is probing how much security agencies knew — and, in turn, what senior bureaucrats, campaign operatives and senior political leaders were told — as well as how that information was handled during the last two federal election campaigns, and what the implications are for the political process.

While the revelation about Singh focused on India, much of the discussion Tuesday centred on China.

The commission heard while the Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections (SITE) task force believed China had targeted ridings and candidates in the 2019 campaign, and would likely do so again in 2021, the political parties were not told of that assessment.

Had they been, they would have done something with it, said Walied Soliman, co-chair of the federal Conservatives’ 2021 campaign.

“I think any political party would have would have been alarmed by that statement and would have, in the very least, engaged further and asked a lot of questions, or try to develop some sort of strategy to at least institutionalize the monitoring of this,” he said.

After the 2021 campaign, the Conservatives believed the races in 13 ridings may have been subjected to interference campaigns led by China. When they brought their examples and concerns to the task force, Soliman alleged, it wasn’t taken seriously.

The party representatives said they were not allowed to take notes in their SITE meetings, weren’t shown briefing documents that would later be tabled with the commission, and often questioned the point of even attending the briefings, which the NDP’s McGrath characterized Tuesday as a “boxchecking” exercise.

Among the documents presented to the panel Tuesday was a briefing note from the Privy Council Office, the non-partisan office which oversees the machinery of government.

The note summarized the concerns the Conservatives raised after the 2021 campaign, which Soliman said were collated and passed along because the party felt they deserved a close look by security agencies.

Conclusions in the memo suggesting the Conservatives were about to go public with their concerns because they lost the election were upsetting, Soliman said.

He said his party handed over the materials because it believed something had gone wrong, and that for the health of the democratic system, security agencies should be made aware.

The warning surfaced during testimony before the Hogue commission from Liberal, Conservative and NDP campaign operatives, who detailed their experiences with state meddling during the last two federal election campaigns