Harjit Sajjan was caught overstating his record in the Canadian battle in Afghanistan in 2006, during his trip to India in April.
Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau defended the Sikh Canadian Defense Minister Harjit Sajjan after opposition leaders demanded his resignation, on Monday. Sajjan has faced a volley of criticisms after inflating his role in Operation Medusa, Canada’s battle in Afghanistan in 2006.
“He acknowledged his responsibility and apologized for it; that’s what Canadians expect when one makes a mistake,” Trudeau said. “The minister has served his country in many capacities, as a police officer, as a soldier, and now as minister. He continues to have my full confidence.”
However, he failed to pacify the House of Commons. Rona Ambrose, Leader of the Opposition, Conservative Party of Canada (CPC), said that Sajjan has misled the Canadians, again, and misstated the facts. “No one has questioned the defense minister’s bravery as a soldier. This problem happened when the defense minister himself intentionally misled Canadians about his own service record as a soldier, not one but twice, in 2015 and again two weeks ago,” Ambrose told the House.
The members of the House said that Sajjan’s mistake is beyond apology, and that he should step down. They said that Sajjan, who was a major at that time, was merely carrying out orders; and not the “brains behind Operation Medusa.”
“Mr. Speaker, no one will ever take away from the Minister of National Defense’s actual service record, but people in the military have a name for what he did. It is called “stolen valor” when someone takes credit for the brave actions of another,” Ambrose said. She again asked the prime minster to remove the defense minister.
Sajjan, had to apologize, repeatedly; while acknowledging his mistake. “I retract that description and I am truly sorry for it,” Sajjan said. “I in no way intended to diminish the great work that our men and women in the Canadian Armed Forces have done, and their superiors, and I am truly sorry for it.”
On April 18, during an event organized by a Delhi-based think tank Observer Research Foundation, Sajjan said that he was the “architect” of a major offensive against the Taliban. The minister said that “on my first deployment to Kandahar in 2006, I was the architect of Operation Medusa where we removed 1,500 Taliban fighters off the battlefield … and I was proudly on the main assault.”
Operation Medusa was Canada’s one of the biggest and bloodiest combat operations, in the last 50 years. Sajjan, who was serving as an intelligence officer that time, did play an important role; but not that of an “architect,” members of the House argued.