TORONTO — Canada and India expelled six of each other’s diplomats Monday, one of the most severe actions yet in an escalating dispute over the June 2023 assassination of a Sikh activist in Canada.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Canada was expelling the Indian high commissioner and five other diplomats after police uncovered evidence of a targeted and worsening campaign against Canadian citizens by agents of the Indian government — and police identified the diplomats as persons of interest.

“We will never tolerate the involvement of a foreign government threatening and killing Canadian citizens on Canadian soil,” Trudeau said. “India has made a monumental mistake in choosing to use their diplomats and organized crime to attack Canadians.”

Shortly afterward, the Indian foreign ministry said it was expelling Canada’s acting high commissioner, deputy high commissioner and four other diplomats, adding that they were told to leave India by the end of Saturday.

The Indian ministry also rejected Canada’s diplomatic communication Sunday saying the Indian ambassador was a “person of interest” in the assassination.

Trudeau said last year that there were credible allegations that India’s government had links to the assassination in Canada of Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar.

Canada’s foreign minister, Mélanie Joly, said India was asked to waive diplomatic and consular immunity and cooperate in the investigation but refused to cooperate. She asked that India’s government support the investigation “as it remains in both our countries’ interest to get to the bottom of this.”

More Combs accusations: A new wave of lawsuits filed Monday accuses Sean “Diddy” Combs of raping women, sexually assaulting men and molesting a 16-year-old boy.

At least six lawsuits were filed anonymously in federal court in Manhattan against the hip-hop mogul, two by women identified as Jane Does and four by men identified as John Does.

The accusers are part of what their lawyers say is a group of more than 100 alleged victims who are in the process of taking legal action against Combs in the wake of his sex trafficking arrest last month.

One of the John Does, a man living in North Carolina, alleges that Combs fondled his genitals when he was 16 at one of the rapper’s famous white parties in Long Island’s Hamptons in 1998.

Until Monday’s lawsuit, Combs, 54, had only been accused in civil cases and his criminal indictment of sexual activity with adults.

War in Ukraine: Russia said Monday that it captured the village of Levadne in southern Ukraine as it probes for weaknesses along the war’s 600-mile front line, including in eastern areas that are the main focus of Moscow’s military effort before winter arrives.

Ukrainian authorities, meanwhile, reported no nighttime Shahed drone attacks on the country for the first time in about six weeks, after saying five days ago that they struck a Shahed storage facility in Russia’s Krasnodar region where around 400 drones reportedly were being kept.

Levadne, in the Zaporizhzhia region, was seized by the Russians early on during the full-scale invasion, which began on Feb. 24, 2022, but was recaptured by Ukrainian forces during a counteroffensive in summer 2023.

Ukrainian officials made no comment about Levadne’s reported capture, although they previously noted that the Russian army was assembling troops there and was conducting local assaults at the end of last week.

In his nightly address, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he was briefed on Russia’s autumn and winter plans for attacking Ukraine and said North Korea was supporting Moscow.

Russia sentences French citizen: A Russian court convicted a French citizen Monday of collecting military information and sentenced him to three years in prison.

Laurent Vinatier, 48, who was arrested in Moscow in June, earlier admitted guilt, setting the stage for a fast-tracked trial. The political scholar’s lawyers asked the court to sentence him to a fine.

In his remarks before the verdict, Vinatier, speaking Russian, reaffirmed that he fully recognized his guilt and asked the judge for clemency: “I’m asking the Russian Federation to forgive me for failing to observe Russian laws.”

France’s Foreign Ministry described Vinatier’s sentence as “extremely severe” and called for his immediate release.

Detentions on charges of spying and collecting sensitive data have become increasingly frequent in Russia and its heavily politicized legal system since Moscow sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022.

Vinatier’s arrest came as tensions flared between Moscow and Paris since French President Emmanuel Macron’s comments about the possibility of deploying French troops in Ukraine.

Military exercises near Taiwan: China employed a record 125 aircraft, as well as its Liaoning aircraft carrier and ships, in large-scale military exercises surrounding Taiwan and its outlying islands Monday, simulating the sealing off of key ports in a move that underscores the tense situation in the Taiwan Strait.

China made clear that it was to punish Taiwan’s president for rejecting Beijing’s claim of sovereignty over the self-governed island.

The drills came four days after Taiwan celebrated the founding of its government on its National Day, when President Lai Ching-te said in a speech that China has no right to represent Taiwan and declared his commitment to “resist annexation or encroachment.”

Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defense said 90 of the aircraft, including warplanes, helicopters and drones, were spotted within Taiwan’s air defense identification zone.

Taiwan’s Presidential Office also called on China to “cease military provocations that undermine regional peace and stability and stop threatening Taiwan’s democracy and freedom.”

Italy moves migrants: Italy is transferring the first group of migrants to Albania, the Interior Ministry said Monday, as part of a contentious five-year plan to process thousands of asylum-seekers outside its borders.

A naval ship departed from the island of Lampedusa with 16 men — 10 from Bangladesh, six from Egypt — who were rescued at sea after departing from Libya. The ship is expected to arrive Wednesday morning, a ministry spokesman said.

The agreement, signed last year, calls for Albania to house up to 3,000 male migrants while Italy fast-tracks their asylum claims. The migrants will retain their right under international and EU law to apply for asylum in Italy and have their claims processed there.