In 2007, certain provisions of Canada's Anti-terrorism Act - preventative arrest and confinement without trial and being forced to testify in secret hearings based only on suspicion - were considered so dangerous to human rights and freedoms - by everyone but the Cons - that the Libs, NDP and Bloc voted to allow them to 'sunset'.
The Cons Bill C-19 currently being debated in the HoC seeks to bring them back, albeit with certain new safeguards and protective provisions, but still allowing 12 months of detention without trial on the mere suspicion of being involved in a terrorist activity.
"The members opposite talk about protective provisions in this bill. Again, let us talk about the case of Mohamed Harkat. All those provisions and protections were in the legislation then. There was judicial oversight. There were court-appointed defence counsel for him called special advocates. There were court orders issued to CSIS to produce information to his lawyers. Did that help? Tell that to Mr. Harkat. He is the victim of a security certificate that has been in place for years, and now we find out it was probably because there was some witness testifying against him in secret and it turns out he had no credibility."
Bloc MP Thierry St-Cyr :
"Even when we pass good laws that call on the government to defend and protect people's freedoms, the government still finds a way to violate people's rights. Mr. Abdelrazik's case is a good example. The court has ordered the government to respect this Canadian citizen's rights, but the government says that it could not care less about the law and the court ruling, and that it will not act in accordance with either. If we were to wind up with laws that actually do attack our individual rights and freedoms, this government, which does not even respect existing laws, would take advantage of the situation to openly attack our civil liberties."
Exactly. And will the definition of what constitutes 'terrorism' gradually evolve to include protesters? The Libs will be voting for it on second reading regardless, saying they hope to fine tune it in committee. Bloc and NDP vehemently against. .
"Prime Minister Stephen Harper called on Parliament to pass Canada's free-trade agreement with Colombia, saying Wednesday it would "send a clear message" to Washington and around the world about the risks of protectionism.
He said Buy America sentiment growing in the U.S. Congress, as well as some states and municipalities south of the border, is of particular concern to Canada.
"It is the right thing to do for Canada, to do for Colombia, and the right thing to do for the global economy," he told reporters in Ottawa on Wednesday alongside Colombian President Alvaro Uribe.
Never mind that Colombia Senator Robeldo told the International Trade Committee on March 26 of this year that signing the CanCol FTA will effectively "absolve, pardon, and reward" Uribe for his support of human rights abuses and will condemn Colombia to even lower labour standards than they already have in order to compete with influx of subsidized Canadian foodstuffs, resulting in local farmers being unable to compete and losing their land.
"In 1997, Ottawa initiated a re-write of Colombia's mining code. CIDA worked on it with a Colombian law firm and the Canadian Energy Research Institute (CERI). The proposals became law in 2001 and offered a familiar list of goodies to mining corporations: the weakening of environmental and labor laws, reduced royalties paid to the government, tax exemptions, and added years to mining concessions.
In the resource sector, the link between profiteering and massive human rights abuses, especially forced displacement, is very obvious. Colombia's population of internally displaced persons (3 million as of 2008) is second only to that of Sudan. Engler described how two Canadian companies, BFC Construction and Agra-Monenco, contributed to human rights violations in northeastern Colombia:
"With $18.2 million from EDC [Export Development Canada] the companies' Urra dam submerged over 7,400 hectares, including old-growth forest as well as thelands and homes of 411 families, all of whom were without individual legal land titles, only having collective indigenous land rights. About 2,800 people were forcibly resettled to make way for the Canadian companies' project and a further 70,000 people were directly impacted. Predictably the community resisted the dam. According to Amnesty International, six indigenous people protesting the project were killed and ten additional members of the community were disappeared by paramilitary and guerrilla forces."
Well, at least Colombia can't be accused of a history of indulging in "protectionism". .
Justice Thomas Braidwood has warned that he may consider finding that the four RCMP "acted improperly and then tried to cover up their actions" in his final report. The RCMP are hoping to use the excuse that they are a federal department not accountable to BC to pre-empt the BC Crown from possibly reopening their case. Not that there's been any indication that that's likely.
So far, Constables Kwesi Millington, Bill Bentley, Gerry Rundel and Corporal Monty Robinson have been exonerated by :
the Criminal Justice Branch of BC, which, despite having watched the same Paul Pritchard video the rest of us saw, determined the officers were "acting lawfully and responded with reasonable force".
the Integrated Homicide Investigation Team, who also watched the vid and were so certain no charges would be laid that they didn't even bother to warn the officers first of their rights under the Charter that anything they said could be held in evidence against them or that they had a right to have their lawyers present.
the federal Department of Justice, which advised the Mounties they were not legally required to attend the Braidwood Inquiry anyway.
Additionally, the official federal RCMP watchdog Paul Kennedy has already said he is not given sufficient access to RCMP files to enable him to perform his job.
For the RCMP's lawyers to ask the BC Supreme Court to prevent a BC public inquiry from delivering on its purpose ... well that smells like shear flopsweat desperation. But who is left who has the will to hold the renegade officers of this federal paramilitary organization to account? . Update : RCMP distances itself from officers' lawsuit over Dziekanski inquiry
Sgt. Tim Shields, the RCMP's official spokesman in B.C. : "The position of the RCMP is that the RCMP will co-operate fully with the inquiry and is also recognizing the jurisdiction of the inquiry as having authority. These lawyers are representing the four officers; they're not representing the RCMP." While Shields acknowledged the lawyers are paid for by taxpayers, he said the force itself has no power to stop them from contradicting RCMP policy.
Same communications director leaves tape recorder behind in House of Commons washroom. Enclosed tape had been left on accidentally and is said to have recorded Raitt making disparaging comments about Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq. Ex-communications director is in court right now to prevent the Halifax Chronicle Herald from publishing contents of tape. Official government position : "Nothing to do with us."
Four board members at the Toronto Port Authority reported that when Lisa Raitt was its CEO, lunch could cost nearly $1000 and management approved their own expenses. ETA : Transport Minister John Baird responded by changing the TPA constitution to add two new board members the day after parliament was shut down so Steve wouldn't lose his job prorogued in December, putting the four complaining board members in a minority position. Olivia Chow alleges move was a cover-up to protect Lisa Raitt.
I have to go out for a little bit. If there are any further leaks while I'm gone, please leave me a message in comments. . 4:30 Update : The Chronicle Herald -1, Lisa Raitt's ex-aide -0 : On the now partially published tape which you can listen to at the above link, Raitt and MacDonnell discuss Raitt's political opportunities dealing with the isotope "crisis" :
"Because when we win on this, we get all the credit. I’m ready to roll the dice on this. This is an easy one. You know what solves this problem? Money. And if it’s just about money, we’ll figure it out. It’s not a moral issue."
Oh dear. Cancer and nuclear contamination as sexy career opportunities. Plus there's a bonus Oh dear for Iggy :
"Ms. Raitt tells the man driving them around Victoria that Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff had backed down from defeating the Conservative government on a budget a few days earlier because he got a message from Canadian bankers.
"They did it at the Canadian Council of (Chief) Executives, there was three presidents of major banks who stood up in the room — and this is not from cabinet so I can talk about it — stood up and said, 'Ignatieff, don’t you even think about bringing us to an election,' " said Ms. Raitt. "'We don’t need this. We have no interest in this. And we will never fund your party again.' That was very powerful. So he heard it from very powerful people in the industry. He was definitely muzzled."
Ooops. And here I thought the CCCE controlling the ConservaLiberals was supposed to be just a tinfoil hatful of bloggy conspiracy theories. January. That would put it right about when Iggy snuffed the coalition of opposition parties. .
Bill C-15, an amendment to the Controlled Drugs [and Uncontrolled Growth of the Prison Industry] Act, guarantees, among other travesties, automatic jail time for people who grow and sell five marijuana plants. Believe it or not, this is an improvement over what the Cons originally proposed - jail time for just one plant -until the Bloc and NDP managed to leverage it up to five plants in the Committee on Justice and Human Rights, where 13 0f the 16 expert witnesses called spoke against the new bill.
There's a lot of old US War on Drugs bullshit here, endorsed by the Libs and Cons just as the US begins to repudiate it.
"California, New York, Michigan, Delaware, Massachusetts are all repealing their mandatory minimum sentences with other states considering the same.
Counsel to the United States House of Representatives committee on the judiciary, Eric Sterling, stated emphatically his decision to promote mandatory minimum sentences in the United States was probably "the greatest mistake of my entire career over 30 years in the practice of law".
What the Americans found was that the goal of the legislation to reduce drug use failed. The goal of safety in the communities failed. The goal of raising the prices of drugs and lowering the purity failed. The goal of reducing organized crime failed."
Yesterday in the HoC, Keith Martin, Lib, asked why we can't "decriminalize simple possession, for example, of marijuana and allow people to have a couple of plants"?
Indeed. People receiving sentences of two years less a day will wind up in the already overcrowded provincial prisons. What to do? What to do?
The Canadian Bar Association, as quoted in the HoC :
"We believe the Bill would not be effective, would be very costly, would add to strains on the administration of justice, could create unjust and disproportionate sentences and ultimately would not achieve its intended goal of greater public safety."
Libs will have to suck it up hard to vote for this one on Monday, as they party with the Cons like it's 1969. The NDP and Bloc will vote against it.
Scott has a round-up of the Liberal blogger revolt against it; Jennifer at Runesmith is organizing an email campaign. Go, you Liberal bloggers! .
I write in support of Abousfian Abdelrazik's constitutionally and internationally unchallengeable right to return to Canada.
I write also as a Canadian citizen whose conscience has been shocked by cascading revelations, in the courts and press of the U.S., the UK, and here at home, of the role played by Western governments, among them my own, in clear and extreme violations of international law, many of those violations rising to the level of war crimes.
Anyone with an internet account can discover in minutes that continuing American claims about Mr Abdelrazik rest on testimony from the Saudi Guantanamo detainee Abu Zubaydah, who was waterboarded 83 times in August 2002, whose torture before and since has been attested to by the ICRC and the FBI. The most credible FBI witnesses have also testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee to their doubts about Abu Zubaydah's status with regard to al-Qaeda and about his mental capacity, even before he was tortured.
The UN Security Council's 1267 Committee have said that Mr Abdelrazik is free to fly home to Canada. We know that the only testimony against him is historically, tragically tainted.
I often wonder whether members of my own government or of the departments and agencies that act in the name of the sovereign citizens of Canada, all of us represented by our queen, and thus all of us more permanent than you, superior to you, have noticed the water rising about the ankles of American public servants, former and current, who seem to have grown up ignorant of the jurisprudence we inherited from Nuremberg 1945-46. Rationalizing war crimes itself becomes a crime, and I doubt that Canadians in time to come will judge anyone who committed such crimes in our name in kindly fashion.
Mr Abdelrazik has a paid airline reservation to return to Canada on 12 June, and an appointment with the Hon. Mr Justice Zinn on 7 July. I appeal to you to respect both Canadian and international law, and to end the bizarre melodrama of my government's inexplicably duplicitous dealings with another Canadian citizen.
Please just stand aside, and allow Mr Abdelrazik to fly home.
Yours sincerely, Skdadl at POGGE . A superb letter, isn't it?
Send yours to :
Lawrence Cannon Telephone: (613) 992-5516.. Fax: (613) 992-6802 Email: CannoL@parl.gc.ca
because you can bet the Cons will mount some fetid embarrassing appeal of Justice Zinn's decision on the grounds that you don't give a shit what happens to other Canadian citizens.
First they came for some brown guy based on evidence obtained by waterboarding a schizophrenic half-wit 83 times, but I did not speak out because ... .
Federal Court Judge Russell Zinn found that Abdelrazik is "as much a victim of international terrorism as the innocent persons whose lives have been taken by recent barbaric acts of terrorists" and has ordered the government to facilitate Abdelrazik's return within 30 days. He also found CSIS "complicit" in Abdelrazik's detention by Sudanese authorities six years ago.
Some quotes from Justice Zinn's decision in Federal Court June 4, 2009
"Mr. Abdelrazik lives in the Canadian Embassy in Khartoum, Sudan, his country of citizenship by birth, fearing possible detention and torture should he leave this sanctuary, all the while wanting but being unable to return to Canada, his country of citizenship by choice. He lives by himself with strangers while his immediate family, his young children, are in Montreal. He is as much a victim of international terrorism as the innocent persons whose lives have been taken by recent barbaric acts of terrorists.
I find that Mr. Abdelrazik’s Charter right to enter Canada has been breached by the respondents.
I find that Mr. Abdelrazik is entitled to an appropriate remedy which, in the unique circumstances of his situation, requires that the Canadian government take immediate action so that Mr. Abdelrazik is returned to Canada. Furthermore, as a consequence of the facts found establishing the breach and the unique circumstances of Mr. Abdelrazik’s circumstances, the remedy requires that this Court retain jurisdiction to ensure that Mr. Abdelrazik is returned to Canada.
One cannot prove that fairies and goblins do not exist any more than Mr. Abdelrazik or any other person can prove that they are not an Al-Qaida associate. It is a fundamental principle of Canadian and international justice that the accused does not have the burden of proving his innocence, the accuser has the burden of proving guilt. In light of these shortcomings, it is disingenuous of the respondents to submit, as they did, that if he is wrongly listed the remedy is for Mr. Abdelrazik to apply to the 1267 [U.N.]Committee for de-listing and not to engage this Court. The 1267 Committee regime is, as I observed at the hearing, a situation for a listed person not unlike that of Josef K. in Kafka’s The Trial, who awakens one morning and, for reasons never revealed to him or the reader, is arrested and prosecuted for an unspecified crime..
Then following a review of correspondence between officials in DFAIT and consular officials in Khartoum :
I find, on the balance of probabilities, on the record before the Court, that CSIS was complicit in the initial detention of Mr. Abdelrazik by the Sudanese. This finding is based on the record before the Court on this application. The role of CSIS may subsequently be shown to be otherwise if and when full and complete information is provided by that service as to its role.
CSIS has already denied this and asked for a review by SIRC, Security Intelligence Review Committee, the CSIS oversight body with which it has an alarmingly cosy relationship.
Justice Zinn also had a few choice words for DFAIT, with regards to this July 2004 DFAIT email in response to Abdelrazik's wife raising the possibility of chartering a private plane to return her husband to Montreal. Ms. Gaudet-Fee of Foreign Affairs :
"So, should she get a private plane, there is very little we could do to stop him from entering Canada. He would need an EP [i.e. Emergency Passport] and I guess this could be refused but on what ground. So, stay tuned."
Justice Zinn :
I find the comment of the official of Foreign Affairs very troubling. In my view, it is reasonable to conclude from the July 30, 2004 musings of the foreign Affairs official that Canadian authorities did not want Mr. Abdelrazik to return to Canada and they were prepared to examine avenues that would prevent his return, such as the denial of an emergency passport. That conclusion is further supported by the extraordinary circumstances in which the Minister made the decision on April 3, 2009 to refuse the applicant an emergency passport.
At no time however in the last five years did DFAIT admit to Abdelrazik that they had no intention of allowing him to return to Canada; in fact they repeatedly assured him that they would grant him an emergency passport.
The flight scheduled for April 3, 2009
[130] In March 2009, Mr. Abdelrazik managed to obtain and pay for a flight from Khartoum to Montreal with a stop over in Abu Dhabi. He had been repeatedly assured for years that an emergency passport would be provided in that eventuality. Notwithstanding the numerous assurances given by Canada over a period of almost 5 years, and repeated as recently as December 23, 2008, on April 3, 2009 just two hours before the flight was to leave, the Minister of Foreign Affairs [Lawrence Cannon] refused to issue that emergency passport on the basis that he was of the opinion, pursuant to Section 10.1 of the Canadian Passport Order, "that such action is necessary for the national security of Canada or another country."
I find that the only reason that Mr. Abdelrazik is not in Canada now is because of the actions of the Minister on April 3, 2009. ... the Minister waited until the very last minute before the flight was to depart to deny the emergency passport.
Had it been necessary to determine whether the breach was done in bad faith, I would have had no hesitation making that finding on the basis of the record before me.
[156] I have found that Canada has engaged in a course of conduct and specific acts that constitute a breach of Mr. Abdelrazik’s right to enter Canada. Specifically, I find: (i) That CSIS was complicit in the detention of Mr. Abdelrazik by the Sudanese authorities in 2003; (ii) That by mid 2004 Canadian authorities had determined that they would not take any active steps to assist Mr. Abdelrazik to return to Canada and, in spite of its numerous assurances to the contrary, would consider refusing him an emergency passport if that was required in order to ensure that he could not return to Canada; (iii) That there is no impediment from the UN Resolution to Mr. Abdelrazik being repatriated to Canada – no permission of a foreign government is required to transit through its airspace – and the respondents’ assertion to the contrary is a part of the conduct engaged in to ensure that Mr. Abdelrazik could not return to Canada; and (iv) That Canada’s denial of an emergency passport on April 3, 2009, after all of the preconditions for the issuance of an emergency passport previously set by Canada had been met, is a breach of his Charter right to enter Canada
[160] Accordingly, at a minimum, the respondents are to be ordered to provide Mr. Abdelrazik with an emergency passport that will permit him to travel to and enter Canada. There is any number of ways available to him to return to Canada. He once secured an airline ticket and may be able to do so again. In the Court’s view that would cure the breach and be the least intrusive on the role of the executive. If such travel is possible, and if funds or sufficient funds to pay for an air ticket are not available to the applicant from his April 3, 2009 unused ticket, then the respondents are to provide the airfare or additional airfare required because, but for the breach, he would not have to incur this expense.
In fulfilment of this judicial process, the applicant [Abdelrazik] is ordered to appear before me at 2:00 o’clock in the afternoon on Tuesday, July 7, 2009, at the Federal Court ...
Harper and Stockwell Day want the provinces to allow US corporations to be allowed to bid on contracts to supply local infrastructure to Canadian municipalities, schools and hospitals. It is their hope, they say, that this "gesture" will convince the US to repeal the "Buy American" provisions in U.S. stimulus legislation.
Not likely it will, of course, but it does provide Harper with yet another opportunity to make concessions to the US that they haven't even asked for. Currently, because provinces and municipalities are not bound by international trade laws, if they want to give the work to local Canadian joes, they are free to do so. According to Steve and Doris, this is a bad thing. An example given in the G&M is : "Ontario buys only Ontario food for its prisons."
News media reports on this are all assbackwards so I've translated part of one from the G&M for you :
The Canadian governmentCanadian Chamber of Commerce and the Canadian Council of Chief Executives are asking the provinces to join it in creating a new trade deal with the United Statesconceding even more sovereignty to the US.
Because the 1993 North American free-trade agreement does not include spending by local jurisdictions, contracts across North America involving everything from sewage systems to subway repairs are being awarded outside the framework of continental free tradeto local joes.
Mr. Harper said, "Obviously, at a time when we're trying to keep borders open internationallyconsolidate the power of corporate oligarchy via deep integration, I do think that the proliferation of domestic preferences in subnational government procurementCanadian nationalism and the "Buy Local" movement is really problematic."
Trade Minister Stockwell Day has been canvassing the provinces on the idea of opening up local spending to free tradegiving up their local authority, citing the consensus on EU free-trade talks. The Europeans would not launch the talks until Canadian provinces committed to negotiating a deal that would allow their companies to bid for provincial and municipal contracts on an equal footing. Only Newfoundland refusedstood up for Canada.
Day acknowledged the pending EU free trade talks would likely compel the provinces to commit to opening up their procurement sectorsfurther corporate globalization. "That's really opened the door to the discussion now that we're having with the provinces "Ha, ha, bet you didn't see that one coming," Mr. Day said yesterday.
You'll remember Paul Manly as the guy who shot that video of CEP union President Dave Coles exposing the 3 rock-toting Quebec police provocateurs at the MontebelloSPP protest in Aug. 2007. Paul has finally finished his full-length feature film : ‘You, Me, and the S.P.P: Trading Democracy for Corporate Rule’, exposing "the latest manifestation of a corporatist agenda that is undermining the democratic authority of the citizens of North America".
Here are a few quotes from the trailer :
Naomi Klein :
"… after the shock of Sept 11 … that crisis was expertly manipulated by our political leaders to push through a range of policies they actually had wanted to push through before Sept 11, but didn’t have the political conditions that made that possible."
Gordon Laxer, Director, The Parkland Institute, Alberta :
"…if we go along with the Americans on their military, on their human rights, on their Patriot Act, on immigration and refugee policy, on energy, on all kinds of regulations over pesticides or whatever, then they will allow us access to their markets."
Murray Dobbin, Canadian author, journalist :
"… what the SPP really represents is a parallel government, so that the important decisions are either made outside of parliament and outside of legislatures or they make it impossible for those kinds of decisions to be made in those legislative bodies, so that democracy is slowly being gutted."
with more from Peter Julian, Michael Byers, and Maude Barlow.
And here's a portion of the film I posted this morning. To purchase your own copy of the whole film - $20 well spent - and for listings of local screenings, visit Paul's website at manlymedia.com. If we want this quality of reporting from independent journalists, we're going to have to support it. If you can't afford the $20 for your own copy, get your local library to buy a copy, leave him a message of encouragement, and pass on the word. As Paul says : I made this film for all of you.
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Oct 2009 Update : Paul and his film are on a cross-country tour of 33 countries across Canada. You can see all the tour dates on the film website here Each confirmed screening date has a pdf poster, handbill and press release that can be downloaded and used to promote the screening. Please help out where you can. All of the screenings are either free or by donation.
The above clip from Paul Manly's excellent new documentary, "You, Me and the SPP : Trading Democracy for Corporate Rule", uses interviews with Maude Barlow, Peter Julian, Erin Weir, Michael Byers, Gordon Laxer, Dave Cole and others to explain how the Trade, Investment and Labour Mobility Agreement - TILMA - signed by Premiers Gordon Campbell and Ralph Klein, is really just a confidence trick - an investors' rights agreement that guts the ability of locally elected governments to enact public policy for the environment, consumer protection, health care, education, and other social services.
"The way to look at TILMA is as part and parcel of the Security and Prosperity Partnership. One major aspect of the SPP is massive deregulation and the way they put it of course is "harmonizing regulations" between the three SPP countries of Mexico, Canada, and the US. But one of the problems for Canada is that most of the regulations in this country are actually provincial and municipal, so the federal government can't actually deliver. When it sits down at the negotiating table with the US and they say "we want harmonization", Canada says well actually we're having a problem with that because we don't control most of the regulations."
When NAFTA was negotiated, the Canadian provinces refused to open their procurement markets to U. S. bidders.
"Canada's federal procurement market, excluding defence, is valued at up to $5-billion a year, and is covered under international free trade rules that prohibit discrimination against foreign firms. In contrast, the provincial sector, which includes municipalities, universities and hospitals, is far more lucrative at roughly $22-billion annually, and is not covered under World Trade Organization measures."
Murray, again : "So TILMA fills in that gap. TILMA is an essential component of the SPP. You can't complete the SPP without TILMA being signed on by every province."
"The federal government is looking to cut a deal with Washington that would persuade U. S. legislators to repeal controversial Buy American measures that Canadian firms say are costing them sales ... The key element of such a pact, however, is getting the provinces and territories to open up their procurement markets to U. S. suppliers. At present, provinces and municipalities are not bound by global trade law and are free to discriminate against U. S. companies in favour of local suppliers.
International Trade Minister Stockwell Day has been in talks with the provinces to determine their willingness.
Trade lawyer Lawrence Herman : "If we are going to do anything to try to resolve the Buy American issue, it is going to take the provinces to sign on to a deal to open up their markets."
Melisa Leclerc, a spokeswoman for Mr. Day, said in an e-mail the Minister would "solicit feedback" on procurement from provincial trade officials when they gather to meet in Yellowknife on Monday."
Well we know Gordo will be onboard, happy for any 'crisis' to deliver the deregulation a country-wide push for TILMA is just taking far too long to achieve. Who else? We should be getting our first bout of pro-deep integration spin on this from the pro-Corp media by later today.
Update : And here it comes, right on cue :
NaPo Editorial Board : "Stockwell Day, the International Trade Minister, is attempting to convince the provinces to lower procurement barriers to enable U.S. suppliers to bid on equal standing with Canadian competitors. Ottawa hopes that eliminating some of Canada’s own barriers will act as a show of good faith to the Americans, encouraging them to follow suit.
CP : " The Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters, the Canadian Chamber of Commerce and the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, say the solution is an open market in government procurement, particularly at the municipal and provincial-state levels currently not covered by the North American Free Trade Agreement".
Yes, let's roll over and see if that makes 'em treat us better.
