India’s Foreign Minister S Jaishankar has said that they will start giving visas to Canadians again if they notice improvements in the safety of Indian diplomats in Canada.
India stopped issuing visas in September because they said there were security problems at their offices in Canada.
The two countries are in the middle of a disagreement over the killing of a Sikh separatist leader in Canada.
Ottawa has previously stated that it is very concerned about the safety of diplomats.
But it has not answered India’s specific claims about dangers to its diplomats in Canada.
The relationship between the countries got much worse after the Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, said in September that his country was looking into “believable accusations that could link” the Indian government to the murder of a Sikh leader.
India completely disagreed with the accusations and thought they were ridiculous.
Hardeep Singh Nijjar, who is from Canada, was killed in his car by two people wearing masks outside a Sikh temple in British Columbia in June. Nijjar strongly supported a separate Sikh homeland called Khalistan. This was a controversial topic in India because there was a violent rebellion in the 1980s demanding it.
Who was Hardeep Singh Nijjar, the leader of Sikhs in Canada.
Why do some Sikhs want their own state.
India was worried about the safety of its officials in Canada even before things got worse. They were concerned about threats from Khalistan supporters. In July, Canada’s Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly wrote on Twitter that the country is very concerned about the safety of its diplomats. This came after a poster for a pro-Khalistan rally blamed two Indian diplomats for the death of Nijjar.
In September, the Indian government said they had to temporarily stop giving visas to Canadians. They said this was because their embassy and consulates in Canada were being threatened, which made it hard for them to work normally. The Canadian embassy also mentioned that some of the people who work for them have been threatened on different social media sites.
Canada’s foreign minister said 41 diplomats left India last week. India asked Canada to remove many of their staff, saying they would not have immunity if they stayed.
Canadian officials have said that this goes against the rules that countries have agreed upon in the world. The United States and the United Kingdom are worried about the decision.
On Sunday, Mr Jaishankar explained that India wants both countries to have equal diplomatic rights and that this aligns with the rules of the Vienna Convention on diplomatic relations.
He said that we used parity because we were worried about Canadian people interfering in our affairs often. This was mentioned at an event, and he also mentioned that the relationship between India and Canada was going through a tough period.
“But I just want to say that the issues we have are with a specific group in Canadian politics and the decisions that come from that,” he said.
Canada’s visa services are still available in India, but it has informed that it will take longer to process them due to having fewer staff after the diplomats left. Currently, both Canada and India have 21 diplomats in each other’s country.
Last week, Mr. Trudeau said that India’s strict actions towards diplomats were making life difficult for many people in both countries.
According to the 2021 census, Canada has 1. 4 million people who come from India. More than half of them are Sikhs. These Indian-origin people make up 3. 7% of Canada’s population. India sends the most students from other countries to Canada. In 2022, 320,000 of the total international students in Canada were from India, which is 40% of the total.
In 2021, around 80,000 people from Canada went to visit India. Only the US, Bangladesh, and UK had more tourists visiting India that year.
Long viewed as a multicultural and inclusive nation, Canada admitted recently that its immigration system is tinged with racism and concern has risen over high rejection rates for African students.
“I have met people who have had their visas refused more than five times,” says Serge Nouemssi, white coat and pipette in hand.
Originally from Cameroon, the 33-year-old biology student has been working on his doctorate for more than three years in a laboratory at the University of Quebec at Trois-Rivieres (UQTR).
Surrounded by greenery, the campus located halfway between Montreal and Quebec City hosts more than 15,000 students, including the largest proportion of Africans in the province — 65 percent of international students.
But “we have seen rejections of up to 80 percent of applicants coming from Africa,” says the school’s rector, Christian Blanchette, who noted it has been an ongoing problem “for several years.”
In a report quietly released at the end of September, the national immigration department said it “recognizes the presence of racism in Canada and within our own organization.”
According to federal data, Quebec is the Canadian province with the highest rejection rate of African students — around 70 percent from French-speaking African nations between 2017 and 2021.
The data says applications from France, Britain or Germany to study in Quebec are almost always accepted — approximately a 90 percent approval rate.
‘Absurd’ refusals
As well as having to pay tuition ranging on average from Can$17,000 (US$12,750) to Can$19,000 per academic year to study in Quebec and rising up to Can$50,000, African students must also provide financial guarantees.
“For us Africans, generally they (immigration officials) insist on proof of financial means” to be able to afford to live and study in Canada, explains Nouemssi.
“There are cases where we have demonstrated financial resources that were close to one million dollars,” explains Caroline Turcotte-Brule, an immigration lawyer. “The agent replied that our client did not have enough financial resources.”
“I have the impression that it’s a bit random,” she adds, specifying that the reason for refusal is often the same: “a fear that the person will not return to his country of origin after” his studies.
“It’s a bit of hypocrisy,” said Krishna Gagne, another lawyer who notes that students have the legal right to consider staying in Canada after their studies.
Ottawa has even been encouraging foreign students to do so as it rolled out incentives in recent months in order to help deal with a labor shortage.
Sitting at her desk in a small laboratory at the end of a maze of underground corridors, Imene Fahmi says that she had to try twice before being able to come and study in Quebec.
“I encountered a lot of difficulties”, explains the Algerian-born doctor, who was refused the first time because the program she’d chosen was “not related to her previous studies,” even though she had been aggressively recruited by her future research director.
She had to apply a second time and wait eight months before finally getting approvals.
“In regards to immigration, there doesn’t seem to be an understanding of the nuances and backgrounds of certain students, so we have refusals which are a bit absurd,” her research supervisor Mathieu Piche says, unable to hide his frustrations.
Refusals and delays have consequences on the students but also “on the work of the teachers,” he adds.
‘Systemic racism’?
The problem does not only affect students. In July, Canada faced a backlash over its denials of visas for hundreds of delegates, including Africans, that were to attend the AIDS 2022 conference in Montreal.
In its September report, the government promised better training for its immigration agents, consider creating an ombudsman post to manage disputes and review its much maligned case processing software.
Those efforts are welcomed by Turcotte-Brule, but she underscores that there has been “a problem of systemic racism for a long time” in Canada and that “it will not be resolved overnight.”