India-Canada standoff live: Canada is not trying to provoke India by suggesting its agents were linked to the murder of a Sikh separatist leader but Ottawa wants New Delhi to address the issue properly, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Tuesday, reports Reuters.

India-Canada standoff live: The MEA in a statement called "absurd and motivated" Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's charge that it played a role in the killing of a Khalistani terrorist Hardeep Nijjar last year. Canada has also expelled a senior Indian diplomat over the issue.

Canada said on Monday it had credible information linking Indian government agents to the murder of a Sikh separatist leader in British Columbia in June and said it had expelled a senior Indian intelligence official.

The announcement marks a significant worsening of bilateral ties at a time when India is already unhappy that Canadian authorities are not cracking down on Sikh protesters who want their own independent homeland.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said any involvement of a foreign government in the killing of a Canadian citizen was "an unacceptable violation of our sovereignty".

Hardeep Singh Nijjar, was shot dead outside a Sikh temple in Surrey, British Columbia, on June 18.

Nijjar supported a Sikh homeland in the form of an independent Khalistani state and was designated by India as a "terrorist" in July 2020, India's The Tribune newspaper said.

"Canadian security agencies have been actively pursuing credible allegations of a potential link between agents of the government of India" and Nijjar's death, Trudeau said in an emergency statement to the House of Commons. "Canada has declared its deep concerns to the top intelligence and security officials of the Indian government. Last week at the G20 I brought them personally and directly to Prime Minister Modi in no uncertain terms."