Two days after Canada listed India among the countries considered cyberthreat "adversaries", New Delhi on Saturday termed the move as another Canadian strategy to attack the country.
"Another category, Canada has put India into. This categorisation is as per the cyber report that they have issued. It appears to be another example of a Canadian strategy to attack India," Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said in a press briefing.
In a recent report on cyber security, the Justin Trudeau government has alleged that Indian state-sponsored actors "likely conduct cyber threat activity against government of Canada networks for the purpose of espionage".
The National Cyber Threat Assessment 2025-2026 report issued by the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security was released on October 30. India is named fifth in the list after China, Russia, Iran and North Korea.
Jaiswal noted that senior Canadian officials have openly confessed that Canada is seeking to manipulate global opinions against India.
"As I mentioned earlier, their senior officials have openly confessed that they are seeking to manipulate global opinion against India, as on other occasions, imputations are made without any evidence," he said.
Canada released the cyber security report amid a growing diplomatic tension between the two countries. Earlier in the day, India strongly protested the references made by a Canadian minister about Union Home Minister Amit Shah and said such "absurd and baseless" allegations will have serious consequences for bilateral ties between the two countries.
India also summoned a Canadian High Commission representative and the official was served a diplomatic note regarding this.
Canada's Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister David Morrison, on Tuesday, alleged that Shah ordered a campaign of violence, intimidation, and intelligence-gathering targeting Sikh separatists inside Canada.
The relations between New Delhi and Ottawa hit a new low after Trudeau's allegations in September last year of a "potential" involvement of Indian agents in Khalistan extremist Hardeep Singh Nijjar's killing.