Amid rally controversy, NDP’s Singh rejects terrorism, preaches ‘love, courage’
OTTAWA — NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh issued a blanket condemnation of terrorist acts Wednesday following media reports about his attendance at a California rally three years ago that sang the praises of Sikh separatism and a violent religious leader killed during the 1984 invasion of India’s Golden Temple.
Singh issued a statement in which he condemned all acts of terrorism, regardless of who is responsible, after the Globe and Mail disclosed that he attended and spoke at the 2015 rally in San Francisco, an event billed as a commemoration of Sikhs who died during the bloody 1984 invasion in Amritsar.
Billing himself an advocate for human rights, Singh said while he believes in allowing the Sikh community the opportunity to process the feelings inflicted by the trauma of the 1984 invasion, which he calls a genocide, he does not condone violence as a response.
Many Indian-Canadian families immigrated to Canada in the years following the temple attack, fleeing the tension and anti-Sikh rioting that followed it. Singh said he has dedicated much of his work to helping the community answer how it can “move through pain and trauma in order to reach acceptance so that it can arrive peacefully” at reconciliation.