Then Minister of International Development Harjit Sajjan in London, England, on June 21, 2023.WPA Pool/Getty Images
The Bloc Québécois has asked the government to investigate the actions of former defence minister Harjit Sajjan, who instructed the military to rescue a group of Afghan Sikhs in 2021, which military sources say undermined the mission of getting Canadians and Afghans linked to Canada out of Kabul.
General Wayne Eyre on Friday spoke for the first time on the matter, saying the Forces did as they were told.
Mr. Sajjan, in an earlier interview and statement to The Globe and Mail, said he had directed Canadian special forces to rescue the Afghan Sikhs but insisted that was not an order. He also confirmed he relayed information and other details about the Sikhs to the military as elite soldiers worked to meet up with the group near Kabul international airport.
Mr. Sajjan said Thursday that his directive was in line with government policy to help vulnerable groups on the ground in Afghanistan.
In an interview with The Canadian Press on Friday, Gen. Eyre said the military was following “legal orders” when it tried to rescue this group of Afghan Sikhs during the fall of Kabul.
“We follow legal direction and the groups that were listed were part of … approved groups, so we got on with it.”
He added it’s not up to him to say “whether the government priority was right or wrong.”
In a June 28 letter to Defence Minister Bill Blair and Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly, Bloc MP Christine Normandin said the “worrying situation” requires a probe.
“The very fact that the minister claims that he only gave ‘directions’ to the Canadian Armed Forces – without, according to him, going into operational details – demonstrates that there is cause for investigation,” she added.
A spokesperson for Mr. Blair, asked about the Bloc request, declined to say Friday whether the government would open an inquiry.
The closed airport in Kabul on Aug. 31, 2021.JIM HUYLEBROEK/The New York Times News Service
The Bloc and former Conservative Party leader Erin O’Toole have already called for parliamentary hearings into the matter.
When Kabul fell to the Taliban in August of 2021, Canada and its allies scrambled to evacuate their citizens, along with Afghan interpreters who had worked for Canada.
The government did have a third priority list for Canada that included groups at risk of persecution, including feminists, human-rights defenders, journalists and religious minorities.
In a lengthy statement to The Globe this week, Mr. Sajjan said he “provided direction to the Canadian Armed Forces, through the appropriate chain of command, to assist the group of Afghan Sikhs.”
But he also acknowledged that Canadian Sikh groups, such as the Calgary-based Manmeet Singh Bhullar Foundation, “reached out to me personally” as the situation worsened in Afghanistan, telling him it was unable to connect with the military directly.
On Aug. 26, the day before Canadian flights out of Kabul ended, Mr. Sajjan was personally involved in providing details of the Afghan Sikhs to special forces, seeking to bring them to the airport. The rescue operation failed when the group became frightened and left the rendezvous point shortly before Canadian soldiers arrived.
“I relayed whatever information the [foundation] provided about the location and status of these Sikhs to the chain of command for it to use as it saw fit, in line with its operational plan on the ground in Afghanistan,” the former defence minister said in a statement to media this week.
Mr. Sajjan said he did not instruct the forces to prioritize this group above Canadians or Afghan interpreters, who aided Canadian soldiers during previous operations.
In the Canadian Press interview, Gen. Eyre said it was chaos on the ground and the military had an “expansive list” of people it was tasked to help.
“Did we have instructions to rescue, or to try and extract this Sikh group? Yes, along with a number of other groups, such as the Afghan women’s soccer team,” he said.
As The Globe and Mail reported earlier this week, military sources say they feel Mr. Sajjan was out of line in asking Canadian special forces to rescue the Afghan Sikhs. The operation involved intense planning and it meant fewer soldiers were available to screen people awaiting the last flights out of Kabul. One of the sources said the change of mission to rescue these Sikhs became a logistical nightmare at the same time that “we are still trying to hurry and process people through who have Canadian passports.”
With a report from The Canadian Press