(Ottawa) As former defence minister Harjit Sajjan faces questions about his intervention with a group seeking to flee Afghanistan when the Taliban seized power in 2021, the federal Liberals won’t say whether he reached out to others.
Mr. Sajjan, now emergency preparedness minister, said he used “proper” channels to pass information to the Canadian Armed Forces about the whereabouts of a group of more than 200 trapped Afghan Sikhs.
His office cites confidentiality as the reason it cannot say whether other groups received similar treatment.
In the weeks leading up to the Taliban takeover of Kabul, Sajjan said Canada had expanded its partnership with the Alberta-based Manmeet Singh Bhullar Foundation.
The group was trying to resettle Afghan Sikhs and Hindus who were being persecuted in their home countries, according to a statement last week.
After identifying about 200 people in need of rescue but having difficulty contacting the military directly, the group “contacted me personally” to find out where they were, the minister said.
He added that he had “provided direction” to the military through the “appropriate chain of command” to assist the group, which had already been deemed eligible for evacuation under Canadian government policy.
Ultimately, he said, the military was unable to evacuate the group, but they found help through other means.
When asked how many times Mr. Sajjan contacted the military about the matter, a spokeswoman said he was in constant contact with the Canadian Armed Forces during that time.
“It is impossible to tell how many times Minister Sajjan has spoken to the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) about rescuing a particular group of people, whether they be Afghan Sikhs, interpreters, women leaders, human rights defenders, journalists, persecuted religious minorities, 2SLGBTQI+ people and others,” alleged Joanna Kanga.
Despite the list of these categories of people, Mr.me Kanga would not say whether Mr. Sajjan has directly intervened on behalf of specific groups as he did for the group of 200 Sikhs, as first reported by The Globe and Mail last week.
“Given that Afghans are part of a vulnerable population, for security reasons we cannot provide further details,” Mr.me Kanga, stressing that it is common to protect the privacy and security of vulnerable groups.
Mr. Sajjan’s office said that generally during the evacuation efforts in Canada, the minister, his staff and departmental officials received numerous requests for assistance.
When the Taliban took power, Western countries were tasked with helping their own citizens leave the country, but also sought to help groups deemed at risk of persecution by the Taliban. This included women leaders, human rights defenders, journalists and religious minorities.
“Some of those who reached out were journalists, representatives of minority groups, advocacy groups, family members and others. Many Afghans also reached out to anyone they could find in the government,” M said.me Kanga.
“These messages and information have been shared with the appropriate officials,” she said, including Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, Global Affairs Canada and the Department of Defence.
Mr Sajjan insisted that at no point did he ask the Forces to prioritise their rescue over that of anyone else.
Defence chief Gen. Wayne Eyre said in a recent interview with The Canadian Press that the military was following “lawful orders” when it tried to rescue the group of Afghan Sikhs after receiving the information from Minister Sajjan.
A parliamentary committee found that Canada’s evacuation efforts were generally poorly executed and the process was bogged down in bureaucracy.
Parliamentarians also noted that Canada was one of the first countries to withdraw its embassy staff, leaving less help for those trying to leave Afghanistan.