Article content

OTTAWA — Rhetoric is no substitute for reality, as the American social theorist Thomas Sowell said. It is the besetting sin of the Trudeau government that it has not lived up to its promises in so many fields of endeavour.

In foreign affairs, this week gave us another reminder of the gap between what Justin Trudeau said he would do — a “new era of Canadian international engagement” — and the state of affairs in the real world.

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or John Ivison: This is where Trudeau went wrong in foreign policy — romanticism over realism Back to video

The Hindustan Times reported that India has informed Canada that there is little prospect of warming the frosty bilateral relationship unless Ottawa takes action on the burgeoning activities of groups seeking an independent Sikh homeland in the Punjab region.

The relationship with India has cooled since Trudeau’s disastrous visit last year, largely because the Indians believe the Liberal government is taking a position that is deliberately ambiguous for domestic political reasons (the Sikh population being a particularly coveted voting bloc at the next election).