Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney on Friday extended an invitation to Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the G7 summit in Kananaskis, Alberta, on June 15 and 17, ending weeks of speculation as Ottawa delayed the invite till the eleventh hour amid strained relations between the two capitals.
In a post on X, Modi announced that he had decided to accept the invitation, along with the fact that Carney had called him.
“Glad to receive a call from Prime Minister @MarkJCarney of Canada...” Modi posted.
Modi’s post added: “...Congratulated him on his recent election victory and thanked him for the invitation to the G7 Summit in Kananaskis later this month. As vibrant democracies bound by deep people-to-people ties, India and Canada will work together with renewed vigour, guided by mutual respect and shared interests. Look forward to our meeting at the Summit.”
The Modi dispensation had earlier sought to brush off the perceived slight in Canada’s delayed invitation by asserting that the Prime Minister was unlikely to attend the summit, given the space that Ottawa allowed Sikh separatist groups.
In Alberta, Modi is likely to meet US President Donald Trump for the first time since the latter claimed he had intervened and leveraged trade to get India and Pakistan to end military hostilities in May. Trump repeated the claim for the eleventh time on Thursday, this time in the presence of the visiting German Chancellor at the White House.
Though India and Canada have slowly sought to dial down tensions since Carney was elected the Prime Minister last month, not much has changed on the ground, with both countries functioning without a high commissioner.
India had withdrawn the high commissioner in Ottawa last October after Carney’s predecessor Justin Trudeau’s administration named him and five other Indian diplomats “persons of interest” in the murder of Khalistaniseparatist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in June 2023. Canada followed suit, and bilateral relations have since remained frosty.
India has been invited as a guest to the G7 and its previous incarnate, G8, since 2005 when the UK decided to invite emerging economies to this summit of “advanced democracies”. G8 became G7 in 2014 after Russia’s membership was suspended following its annexation of Crimea.