by Justin Podur, 1 March 2009

On February 20, the Federal Court of Canada dropped most of the conditions it had placed on one of the prisoners of its “security certificate” regime, Adil Charkaoui. While much of his life is still lived in the rights-free zone widened under the “war on terror”, his struggles over the years have won him back some parts of his life. (For the decision see here)

Dark Days By Kerry Pither
 
Andrew Duffy, The Ottawa Citizen, 31 August 2008

On the morning of May 29, 2006, two senior members of Canada's security services appeared before the Senate committee on national security and defence. Jack Hooper, then deputy director of operations for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, sat beside RCMP Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli at the witness table.

COLIN FREEZE, Globe and Mail, 12 August 2008

A federal commission's report on the issue of Canadian complicity in a round of overseas imprisonments and interrogations is to be released by late October.

The report from former Supreme Court justice Frank Iacobucci had been due on Sept. 2, but his highly secretive commission announced yesterday it has been granted another extension.

Nearly two years in the making and a follow-up to the dramatic findings of the Maher Arar commission, the new report is several hundred pages long. Translation and production issues, however, have delayed the release until mid-fall.

Based on a recommendation from the earlier federal inquiry, Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper ordered a wider probe into the roles of the RCMP, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and the Department of Foreign Affairs in the cases at hand.

Several Canadian citizens of Arab heritage who had never been arrested or charged with anything in Canada were taken into custody during foreign travels after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

SHEEMA KHAN, Globe and Mail, August 7, 2008

Canada fully understands and appreciates and shares the United States' concerns with regard to security. However, the Canadian government has every right to go to bat when it believes one of its citizens has been treated unfairly by another government. - Stephen Harper, 26 Jan. 2007

These words, spoken after settlement of the Maher Arar affair, were crafted to allay suspicions about Mr. Harper's willingness to stand up to the Bush administration on matters of Canadian sovereignty. However, in view of Ottawa's defence of the gulag that is Guantanamo, and its fear of upsetting Washington by allowing Canadian citizen Abousfian Abdelrazik to return from Sudan, we can be forgiven for suspecting that our PM is indeed beholden to George W. Bush.

For many immigrants to this great land, the post-9/11 era is one of insecurity, in which they wonder: What value is my Canadian passport when travelling abroad? Will my government stand up for my basic rights, or trade them to curry favour with certain regimes?

By placing politics above principles on the Omar Khadr and Abdelrazik files, our government has brought into question the value of citizenship, and raised the ugly spectre of discrimination against Arabs and Muslims.

Co-workers reported man to RCMP as 9/11 terror suspect
 
Gerry Bellett and Allison Cross, Vancouver Sun, 24 July 2008

A Muslim Canadian employed at a biotech company on the University of B.C. campus has been awarded nearly $12,000 after the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal found he was a victim of racial profiling by colleagues. The profiling led to him being reported to the RCMP as a suspect in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

In June 2005, shortly after Charkaoui was released from prison in Montreal, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), issued a three-page report called, "Islamic Extremists and Detention: How Long Does the Threat Last?".

Short on facts and long on generalizing assertions, the report speaks volumes about the kind of assumptions made by the Canadian spy agency, not to mention the kind of slipshod work that passes muster in this agency.

John Norris, one of the lawyers for the Toronto security certificate detainees, showed in court that one of the sentences from the reported is in fact lifted directly from an article that was published in the Washington Post, "Released Detainees Rejoining the Fight" (22 October 2004).

Not only was the word-for-word quote unattributed, it had been taken out of context in an entirely misleading way.

We were disgusted and angered to see yet another attack on the reputation of Adil Charkaoui published in several media outlets last week.

Since his victory in the Supreme Court in February 2007, and since the Supreme Court agreed to hear a second challenge, this time aimed at the investigative practices of CSIS in security certificate cases, a steady stream of ‘revelations’ about Charkaoui has appeared in the media. Though not one of these has been backed up by proof, they have all tended to discredit Charkaoui, an eloquent and powerful defender of the rights of immigrants and of elementary justice in Canada.

Group no major threat

Ian MacLeod, The Ottawa Citizen, 7 March 2008

Canada's biggest case of alleged homegrown terrorism -- the "Toronto 18" -- is turning out to be little more than a bunch of "wannabe jihadists" who posed little real danger, says a national security adviser to the federal cabinet.

David Charters, an expert on modern warfare and terrorism, and a member of the Advisory Council on National Security to the Harper cabinet, says what initially appeared to be a frightening plot to bomb Toronto landmarks and storm Parliament by a group dubbed the "Toronto 18," appears to be something far less sinister.

Open letter published in Vancouver by a dozen community organizations

On December 15th, the Vancouver Sun published an article with a quote from a Sikh religious leader that was clearly homophobic. The framework and premise of the article, however, was clearly racist, implying- including through its headline- that immigrants are eroding Canadian values. It attempts to relegate homophobia to immigrant communities only and also attempts to stereotype an entire community based on the statements of one individual.

    by Sherene H. Razack, Professor, OISE, University of Toronto.
 
Abstract

In this article I examine three categories of people for whom race and national security considerations have come together to result in their eviction from political community. These groups are exiled to spaces in law where fundamental rights are suspended. The three categories are: security certificate detainees, "security delayed" non-citizens, that is, those kept in a formally indeterminate status due to the suspicion that they may present a danger to Canada, and finally individuals cast into a state of permanent suspicion who are either deported, branded as potential terrorists, or shipped to their countries of origin where they are tortured.