India-Canada Conflict: Canada obfuscates doctrine of Persona-Non-Grata

The expressions of psychological state of Canadian mind in respect of its allegations on India sounds a little too much confused. The question is who actually has violated the provisions of Vienna Convention on diplomatic Relations 1961 & thereby violated International Law?

On 19th October 2023, the Canadian accusation surfaced following India’s askance of Canada to withdraw more than three dozens of its diplomats from India.

Melanie Joly, Canadian Foreign Minister, accuses New Delhi for violating Vienna convention saying, ‘A unilateral revocation of diplomatic privileges and immunities do not support International Law, including the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations 1961.’

Her remarks were followed up by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau accusing India of violating fundamental principals of diplomacy.

Factually and unfortunately for Canada, they cannot blame India for violation of International Law in terms of violation of Vienna convention on diplomatic relations 1961. Obviously the reason is crystal clear. The concept of Persona-non-Grata clarifies it clearly.

The Section 4 of Diplomatic Relations (Vienna Convention) Act 1972 should also be confirmed at this juncture.  Therefore, the allegation is clearly obfuscation of the doctrine of Persona-Non-Grata.

Foreign policy & diplomacy of India has always been conforming to International Law since it’s the International Law only, which grants Immunity & Privileges to Foreign Diplomats. In fact, it also grants Persona-Non-Grata right to the foreign diplomats.

Talk about Persona-Non-Grata. It means, the receiving state has a right to vat any time without assigning any reason that the head of the diplomatic mission or the staff member/ members are not acceptable.

Acting upon this the sending state has two options – either to recall or to terminate his functions with the mission. Or say, here Persona-Non-Grata is a declaration made by a receiving state which tends the existence of diplomatic mission or term of diplomatic agent for good or temporarily.

This is a right which is granted by Article-9 of Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations 1961. It clearly says, the receiving state has a right to notify the sending state without having to explain its decision at any time, that the head of the diplomatic mission or its member/s are  persona-non-Grata, thus are not acceptable.

In such a situation the sending state may, as appropriate, either terminate the person concerned or recall from the mission. That person is thus declared Persona-Non-Grata or not acceptable  even before arriving in the territory of the receiving state.

In accordance with the Article-9, if the sending state fails or refuses within a reasonable time period for carrying out its obligations as per the paragraph 1 of this Article, the receiving state might refuse as well to recognize the person concerned as a member of the mission.