International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group
February 26, 2021
Open letter to federal leaders: Do not expand anti-terrorism laws in the name of anti-racism
The letter was co-initiated by Azeezah Kanji & the International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group. You can still sign on to the letter by clicking here.
ICLMG 22/02/2020 - More than 170 organizations and individuals with expertise in anti-racism, law, and/or human rights have signed on to an open letter to the leaders of the Liberals, the Conservatives, the NDP, the Bloc Québécois and the Greens, expressing deep concern about the use of anti-terrorism powers to address the threat of White supremacism.

"The growth, proliferation, and emboldening of White supremacist and far-right groups across Canada – numbering more than 300, according to one recent academic count – is alarming, and urgently requires a strong response. We applaud and support the intention to condemn White supremacism communicated by the recent addition of the Proud Boys, Atomwaffen, the Base, and the Russian Imperial Movement to the terrorist entities list. However, the entrenchment and expansion of problematic anti-terrorism tools threatens to further intensify racism, rather than alleviate it." Full letter & list of signatories

Please share the letter widely! Facebook + Twitter + Instagram

Mira Sucharov & Bernie Farber: Extraditing Hassan Diab a second time would be a travesty
Mira Sucharov is a professor of political science and University Chair of Teaching Innovation at Carleton University. Bernie Farber is chair of the Canadian Anti-Hate Network and the former CEO of Canadian Jewish Congress.
Globe and Mail 18/02/2021 - The freedom of one Canadian citizen is again being threatened, and with it, the integrity of Canadian democracy. With formal charges having been laid against a Canadian citizen by France, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s ability to stand up in the face of injustice – and in the face of a bullying ally – is again being put to the test. [...]

Back in 2008 when Mr. Diab’s legal ordeal began, French authorities claimed not to have any useable fingerprints on one of the key pieces of evidence: a hotel card presumed to have been filled in by the bomber. But this was a lie, since a decade later, France revealed that they had, in 2007, lifted a usable print from the card. Forensic analysis showed that the fingerprints did not match those of Mr. Diab. Lying about a key piece of evidence suggests that Mr. Diab, were he to be extradited again, would be caught in a web of injustice. [...]

We agree with Mr. Trudeau’s words that such a travesty should not happen again. Given the questionable methods of the French prosecution going back over a decade, we call on the Canadian government to protect this Canadian citizen and refuse any request for his extradition. Read more - Lire plus



Ottawa has spent $9.3-million fighting legal claims over Canadian’s alleged torture in Sudan
The Globe and Mail 15/02/2021 - Ottawa has spent more than $9-million so far to fight legal action from a Canadian who says the federal government bears responsibility for his arrest and alleged torture in Sudan, documents show. Abousfian Abdelrazik, who spent nearly six years in prison and forced exile while his attempts to come home were thwarted, returned to Canada in 2009 after Ottawa was ordered by a federal judge to repatriate the Sudanese-Canadian. Mr. Abdelrazik first filed a lawsuit seeking $27-million in compensation more than 11 years ago. He is now 58.

Canadian government records released during the litigation – marked “Secret” – say that Mr. Abdelrazik was imprisoned “at our request” when he returned to Sudan in 2003 to visit his ailing mother. In a Sudanese prison, he was interrogated by a CSIS team about suspected extremist links. Documents tabled in Parliament in response to a written question from NDP foreign affairs critic Jack Harris show the legal costs to the federal government for litigating the Abdelrazik case amount to approximately $9.3-million. This includes legal costs leading up to a 2009 Federal Court decision where a judge ruled the Canadian Security Intelligence Service was “complicit” in his detention and that his constitutional rights had been violated.

Paul Champ, one of Mr. Abdelrazik’s lawyers, said he believes the Canadian government is delaying settling the case because it wants to avoid a public backlash over a payout. “Canada is fighting this lawsuit because they are concerned about being criticized by a small but vocal segment of the Canadian population who hold bigoted views about Muslims,” he said in an interview. In September, 2018, the federal government was successful in convincing the Federal Court to adjourn this case in order to review evidence disclosed to date. Mr. Champ said he’s concerned Ottawa will spend millions more on litigation to drag out it out further. He noted Mr. Abdelrazik contracted COVID-19 last month and was hospitalized in Montreal.

“Plaintiffs are human beings, but governments are immortal. The longer the delay the longer there is a risk my client will have a health issue,” he said. “We have already seen two key witnesses die, and others are quite elderly.” Mr. Abdelrazik “is the victim of a series of gross injustices attributable directly or indirectly to Canadian state actors, including arbitrary and illegal detention, prolonged solitary confinement, torture, and forced exile and separation from his home and young children,” court documents filed in the lawsuit allege. “Many senior Canadian officials were fully aware that Canada could have ended [his] cruel and unjust ordeal at any moment by simply securing a flight home to Montreal. " The allegations have not been proven in court.

Mr. Champ said Ottawa has a lot to account for. “Canada agrees he was jailed for years without charge. Canada acknowledges that the reasons why Sudan detained him were due to allegations about his activities in Canada,” he said. “Canada recognizes Sudan is notorious for torture, and a parliamentary secretary visiting Sudan in 2008 saw the scars on his back.” The federal Department of Justice, which does not normally comment on ongoing court cases, was not immediately available to comment on the legal costs. The NDP’s Mr. Harris said he’s concerned that Ottawa is dragging its heels. “It’s clearly unjust,” he said of the delays. “It has all the hallmarks of an abuse of process and it looks like a case they are destined to lose.” Read more - Lire plus

UN, rights watchdogs urge Canada to save its 'arbitrarily detained' children in Syria
The Canadian Press 18/02/2021 - A United Nations rights advocate and Human Rights Watch Canada say the Trudeau government isn't living up to its new international campaign against arbitrary detention because it is abandoning 25 Canadian children trapped in northern Syria. Fionnuala Ni Aolain, the UN Special Rapporteur for the Protection and Promotion of Human Rights while Countering terrorism, says Canada is one of 57 countries on a "list of shame" because it won't take active steps to repatriate its foreign nationals trapped in Kurdish-controlled camps in northern Syria. Farida Deif, Canada director for Human Rights Watch, says the 58-country Declaration Against Arbitrary Detention in State-to-State Relations that Canada launched Monday is a good and necessary initiative.

But Deif says the federal government's decision not to pursue the repatriation of 46 Canadians -- 25 of them children as young as two years old -- from a squalid refugee camp in northern Syria simply undercuts the intent of the new declaration. Deif's New York-based boss Kenneth Roth helped launch the declaration, blasting China for its arbitrary detention of Canadians Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor. Deif will join Ni Aolain and other rights groups at the House of Commons foreign-affairs committee later today, where they will renew their calls for the government to do more to bring back its stranded nationals in Syria. "Their detention is undeniably arbitrary and involves no due process or protection. These declarations mean nothing unless they are implemented in practice for the most vulnerable," Ni Aolain told The Canadian Press in an emailed response to questions. Read more - Lire plus


Justin Trudeau buys drones “tested” on Palestinians
CJPME 2021 - Canada recently signed a $36m contract with Elbit Systems, Israel's largest weapons company. The contract is for the Hermes 900 StarLiner, a “civilian” version of Elbit’s lethal military drone the Hermes 900. The contract also includes services such as communication links, ground control stations, sensor packages, and more. The purpose of the drone is for surveillance in the arctic. The contract was announced in December 2020 by Transport Minister Marc Garneau (now Minister of Foreign Affairs), and the drone is expected to be delivered by December 2022. As it falls under Transport Canada’s national aerial surveillance program, the new Minister of Transport Omar Alghabra is now responsible for the contract.

Elbit Systems supplies 85% of drones used by the Israeli military to monitor and attack Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. The Hermes 900 was first tested during Israel’s assault on Gaza in 2014, when Israeli drone strikes alone killed 860 Palestinians, including 164 children. During the bombing, Elbit’s profits skyrocketed. Elbit proudly claims that the civilian drone Canada has purchased draws on the “legacy” of its military drones. In addition to drones, Elbit Systems produces white phosphorus munitions (a chemical weapon), cluster bombs (illegal under international law), sniper bullets, and components of tanks and fighter jets. Elbit Systems boasts that its products are “combat-tested,” meaning that they have effectively been used to kill and oppress Palestinians.

Some investors have distanced themselves from Elbit Systems for ethical reasons. In 2009, Norway’s government pension fund divested from Elbit Systems due to its role in supplying technology for Israel’s apartheid wall, which was found illegal by the International Court of Justice. In 2018, HSBC divested all its holdings from Elbit Systems due to its production of cluster bombs. Elbit Systems has a Canadian subsidiary in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, which produces equipment and technology for defence and surveillance. Read more - Lire plus


‘Localized harassment’: RCMP patrol Wet’suwet’en territory despite UN calls for withdrawal
The Nharwal 22/02/2021 - On Valentine’s Day, a small group of Wet’suwet’en people gathered outside a Coastal GasLink pipeline work camp in northwest B.C. to hold a ceremony to remember Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. They chose the site because of the connection between work camps and violence against Indigenous women. 

It was a Sunday and no work was happening, which they confirmed with a Coastal GasLink employee before starting the ceremony. But just moments after starting, Coastal GasLink security officers approached the group, asked them to leave and said they were going to call the police, according to Sleydo’ Molly Wickham, a supporting chief in the Cassyex House of the Gidimt’en Clan. A security officer recorded the entire ceremony, she said, and when they left, security and police were waiting on the road, watching as the group left the site. The police and security presence on Wet’suwet’en territory has been constant since last February, when heavily armed RCMP descended on the Morice River forest road to enforce a Coastal GasLink injunction against land defenders who were blocking work on the pipeline. Twenty-eight people were arrested, including matriarchs. Today, the territory is still monitored daily by police and private security officers, despite calls from the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination for police and security forces to withdraw. 

“I just get so mad and frustrated because we’re living with it every day,” said Wickham, who lives with her family in a cabin on the territory and is the spokesperson for the Gidimt’en Checkpoint, one of the sites of the police raids. “They’re patrolling all the roads. You could get pulled over at any point in time for no reason at all. If you go anywhere, they’re going to follow you.” Jeffrey Monaghan, an associate professor at Carleton University’s Institute of Criminology and Criminal Justice and co-author of Policing Indigenous Movements, told The Narwhal there’s systemic racism in the RCMP and the “localized harassment” happening on Wet’suwet’en territory is common. “I would characterize it as petty, retaliatory attacks,” he said.

The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination has been calling on Canada to withdraw police and security forces from traditional lands since 2019. It has also been calling on the government to stop construction on the Coastal GasLink pipeline — as well as the Trans Mountain pipeline and the Site C dam — until it receives free, prior and informed consent from First Nations. Before the arrests last year, the committee issued a decision statement, which is an official call for urgent action, saying it is disturbed by the “forced removal, disproportionate use of force, harassment and intimidation by law enforcement officials against Indigenous Peoples who peacefully oppose large-scale development projects on their traditional territories.” It called on Canada to “guarantee that no force will be used against the Wet’suwet’en and guarantee that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and associated security and policing services will be withdrawn from their unceded traditional lands.” Read more - Lire plus


Matthew Behrens: The hypocrisy of Canada's genocide declarations
rabble.ca 26/02/2021 - Eager to jump on the Canadian exceptionalism bandwagon, Conservatives in the House of Commons led with a non-binding motion February 22 to declare the Chinese government's persecution of the Muslim minority Uyghurs in Xinjiang province a genocide. While the mass surveillance, forced disappearance, forced sterilization, sexual assault, torture and murder of Uyghurs is certainly deserving of that condemnatory finding, it rang false coming from the mouth of Conservative Leader Erin O'Toole, who engaged in Canadian genocide denial last fall when he said that residential schools were created to "try and provide education" to Indigenous children, and only later became "horrible."

During the House debate on the Uyghur motion, descriptions of the plight of the long-oppressed Muslim people could have been lifted directly from the pages of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission report, which clearly explained how and why it concluded that Canada's residential schools were an act of genocide. Indeed, perhaps unconsciously echoing the similarities, Bloc Québécois MP Alexis Brunelle-Duceppe said when he heard Uyghur testimony first-hand, it's "very hard to remain indifferent when human beings are telling stories of children being taken away from their families and placed in state-run orphanages or schools. It is even harder when we know that they will be robbed of their language and culture so they can be indoctrinated and ultimately assimilated." The Conservatives have long taken a very selective, politicized approach to what constitutes genocide. Indeed, former leader Andrew Scheer engaged in his own genocide denial in reaction to the report of the federal inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls, while Conservative Senator Lynn Beyak's similarly noxious views eventually led to her long-overdue resignation.

Canada blocks Uyghur refugees
Such hypocrisy is not limited to the Conservatives. While Justin Trudeau has issued statements in support of Uyghur rights, his government is refusing to allow three former Guantanamo Bay detainees to settle in Canada, where their families now live. Ayub Mohammed, Salahidin Abdulahad and Khalil Mamut are Uyghur men who were wrongfully jailed and interrogated by both U.S. and Chinese officials for upwards of seven years in the U.S.-run concentration camp, but eventually cleared despite facing the brutally unfair military tribunal process. The three had experienced Chinese state repression while growing up, and two of them have relatives in the concentration camps branded by Beijing as "re-education" or "vocational" centres. While many Liberals did vote to support the genocide motion, any subsequent commitment to assisting Uyghur refugees and taking actions that might have an influence on Chinese repression appear elusive. [...]

A world of double standards
While China is often blamed for cyberattacks in Canada (and there is no doubt Beijing engages in such behaviour), Ottawa handed its own Communications Security Establishment (CSE) offensive cyberattack powers with its omnibus state repression bill, C-59. Everybody does it, and each government uses the tired "anti-terror" rationale to justify it. While China is notorious as an authoritarian state driven by mass surveillance, Canada's CSE cyber spies have been criticized for massive data collection of hundreds of million of Canadian emails. The respected Citizen Lab notes concerns about longstanding "problems with the CSE's foreign intelligence operations, which are predicated on ambiguous and secretive legal interpretations that legitimize bulk collection and mass surveillance activities" as well as raising questions about "the CSE's acquisition of malware, spyware and hacking tools, which may legitimize a market predicated on undermining and subverting, rather than strengthening, the security of the global information infrastructure."

Much like the Canadian government engaging in colonial violence to further its economic agenda of megadams, pipelines, and theft of so-called natural resources, so the Chinese have stepped up persecution of the Uyghurs in their traditional homeland as part of Beijing's own economic expansion. The Belt and Road Initiative is a multi-trillion-dollar project that "aims to link Beijing with some 70 countries around the world via railroads, gas pipelines, shipping lanes, and other infrastructure projects. It is considered President Xi Jinping's pet project, and an important part of his political legacy," and two-thirds of those trade routes run through the traditional Uyghur territories of Xinjiang province. Read more - Lire plus


CAUT calls for review of security agency activities on campus
CAUT 11/02/2021 - The Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) is calling for a review of protocols regarding RCMP and CSIS activities on campus following recent instances of surveillance of students and academics, in a letter addressed to the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, Bill Blair.

“The presence of the RCMP or CSIS at academic activities constitutes a serious threat to academic freedom,” says David Robinson, CAUT Executive Director. “Students and academic staff need to discuss and debate a variety of ideas, even those that challenge dominant paradigms, without fear of police surveillance.” The letter was prompted by RCMP officers attendance at a book launch at Mount Allison University and reports of CSIS activities on campus.

In the letter, Robinson notes that, in 1963, CAUT then-President Bora Laskin and Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson reached an accord to limit and provide oversight of RCMP activities on campus, in response to concerns about the impact on academic freedom and free expression. A 1997-98 review of campus investigations by the Security Intelligence Review Committee called for the renewed application of the Pearson-Laskin Accord principles. “The impacts of security agency surveillance and presence on campus has the same chill effect today as it has in the past,” notes Robinson. “It is time to renew the checks and balances on security agencies’ activities on campuses.” Read more - Lire plus
What Clearview AI Did Was Illegal, But Don't Play Down The RCMP's Role In It
HuffPost 09/02/2021 - Privacy Commissioner of Canada Daniel Therrien released a damning statement Wednesday about controversial technology company Clearview AI’s collection and analysis of facial photos of Canadians posted online. He, alongside his provincial counterparts, concluded that “What Clearview does is mass surveillance and it is illegal.” Canada is not the first country to take issue with Clearview’s technology. Similar investigations are ongoing in Britain and Australia. The Clearview scandal revealed last year that dozens of Canadian police departments — most notably the RCMP — have used the company’s software to identify suspects. While Therrien’s recent condemnation of Clearview is a step in the right direction, it does not go far enough. To date, the government’s response has narrowly focused on holding the company accountable for its unlawful data collection practices.

While an investigation into the RCMP’s use of the technology is underway, the public response from officials has sought to pin blame onto Clearview AI in a way that effectively absolves agencies like the RCMP from responsibility. Although there is a class action lawsuit currently being considered against the RCMP, the government must also take stronger action to rein in the RCMP’s use of mass surveillance. Canadian regulators must acknowledge that police departments ultimately drive market demand for private technology solutions like Clearview AI. The RCMP knew very well what it was getting into when it procured Clearview AI’s services. Surveillance technology vendors fill a market demand, and this market demand originates from the police. Read more - Lire plus


Guantanamo Bay review must ensure closure and appropriate remedies for those tortured and detained, say UN experts
OHCHR 23/02/2021 - UN experts* said today the US Administration's review of how to close the Guantanamo Bay detention centre should also address ongoing violations of human rights being committed against the 40 remaining detainees, including torture and other ill- treatment. "We welcome the goal of closing the detention facility, consistent with our previous calls to end impunity for the human rights and humanitarian law violations committed during the 'war on terror'. As the 20th anniversary of 9/11 looms, we urge a transparent, comprehensive, and accountability-focused review of the operation and legacy of the prison and the military commissions," the experts said.

US President Joe Biden announced this month that his Administration would study how it could shut down Guantanamo, as was first promised by former president Barack Obama.
The experts said many of the remaining detainees are vulnerable and now elderly individuals whose physical and mental integrity has been compromised by unending deprivation of freedom and related physical and psychological torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. "We stress the need to repudiate the policies of and practices that led to the creation of the prison and the military commissions, in order to prevent recurrence of practices that are in clear breach of international law."

The experts also said it was essential that those who had been subjected to enforced disappearance, arbitrary detention, torture and denied fundamental rights under international law, including right to a fair trial, were given adequate remedy and reparation. Experts called on the US authorities to ensure independent and impartial investigations and prosecutions of all credible allegations of violations committed in this context, such as extraordinary rendition, torture, secret detention and unfair trial. Read more - Lire plus





ACTIONS & EVENTS
NEW Tell Transport Minister to cancel the Elbit Systems drone contract now!
Canada’s Transportation Ministry recently approved a $36.16 million dollar contract for drone technology from Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest weapons company.

The money will purchase a “civilian” version of Elbit’s lethal military drone, the same one which was used to kill civilians during Israel’s assault on Gaza in 2014.

Through this purchase, Canada directly supports the profits of a weapons company responsible for ongoing human rights violations against Palestinians.

Click below to tell Transport Minister Omar Alghabra to cancel the Elbit Systems drone contract now! Your email will also be sent to the Prime Minister, other federal political leaders, and your local MP.
Share on Facebook + Twitter + Instagram
Two recent court decisions revealed the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS) engaged in potentially illegal activities and lied to the courts. This is utterly unacceptable, especially given that this is not the first time these serious problems have been raised. CSIS cannot be allowed to act as though they are above the law.

Send a message to Public Safety Minister Bill Blair demanding that he take immediate action to put an end to this abuse of power and hold those CSIS officers involved accountable. Your message will also be sent to your MP and to Minister of Justice David Lametti.
Read our full statement on the issue here for more information. Please share it on:
Protect Encryption in Canada
Our ability to use the Internet safely, securely and privately is under threat. Canada wants to create 'back doors' into encryption like some of our partner countries in the Five Eyes Alliance have already done. This weakens Internet safety for all of us. If we don’t act, Canada could be next. We need a policy that explicitly protects our right to encryption.
Repatriate Canadian Children from Syria
Official Parliamentary petition to the Canadian government:

We, the undersigned citizens of Canada , call upon the Government of Canada to immediately repatriate the 25 innocent Canadian children living in inhumane conditions in the camps of northeast Syria.
Reject Dr. Carvin's Offensive Actions and Promote Anti-Racism
On September 3, 2020, Dr. Stephanie Carvin, Assistant Professor at Norman Paterson School of International Affairs (NPSIA) at Carleton University, proudly shared on her Twitter account gruesome depictions of killings of Muslim and Brown bodies as terrorists on cakes. As members and allies of the Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour (BIPOC) community, we are denouncing her actions and we are calling on Carleton University and NPSIA to publicly denounce Dr. Carvin's actions and to commit to an anti-racist environment by offering the necessary training and resources to its faculty members.
#FreeCihanErdal #LiberezCihanErdal
Cihan Erdal, a queer youth activist and a PhD Candidate in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Carleton University, was detained in Istanbul, Turkey on September 25, 2020 along with 81 other politicians, academics and activists.

We call on Canadian and Turkish authorities to take urgent action and demand Cihan’s immediate release and Cihan’s safe return to Canada!
Pardon Edward Snowden for exposing the government's illegal surveillance
Edward Snowden exposed the U.S. government’s illegal mass surveillance programs, along with shocking collusion between large technology companies and spy agencies. He risked everything to blow the whistle and help protect all of our basic human rights. He’s been in exile for long enough. It’s time to bring him home. Everyone from the ACLU to Senator Rand Paul has spoken out in support of the embattled whistleblower, and now even President Trump has indicated his potential support for a pardon. The administration is testing the waters. If we show overwhelming support to #PardonSnowden right now, we could finally get justice for him, and set a precedent that protects whistleblowers, journalists, and defenders of human rights in the future.
Reunite Ayub, Khalil, and Salahidin with their families
Ayub Mohammed, Salahidin Abdulahad, and Khalil Mamut are three Uyghur men who left China after childhoods of discrimination, persecution, and hopelessness.

They were sold by Pakistani bounty hunters to the US military in 2001 and taken with 19 other Uyghurs to Guantanamo Bay. Despite being exonerated as early as 2003, they were kept in Guantanamo for years.

Now in forced exile - Ayub in Albania, and Salahidin and Khalil in Bermuda - their families are here in Canada; and their kids growing up without their fathers.

Despite posing no threat to Canadian national security, these men have been waiting over five years to reunite with their families and find a safe place to live.
China: Free Canadian Huseyin Celil
The Chinese authorities accused Huseyin of offences related to his activities in support of Uighur rights. They held Huseyin in a secret place. They gave him no access to a lawyer, to his family, or to Canadian officials. They threatened him and forced him to sign a confession. They refused to recognize Huseyin’s status as a Canadian citizen, and they did not allow Canadian officials to attend his trial. It was not conducted fairly, and resulted in a sentence of life in prison in China. His life sentence was reduced to 20 years in February 2016. Huseyin has spent much of his time in solitary confinement. He lacks healthy food and is in poor health. Kamila needs her husband, and the boys need their father back.
Canada must act to end Islamophobia in Xinjiang, China
There is credible evidence that up to one million Uyghurs, Kazakhs and other mainly Muslim groups in China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region are being detained in secret internment camps. Detainees are brainwashed, tortured and are forced to renounce their religion and culture.


And send a message to Chrystia Freeland demanding that Canada actively support an independent and unrestricted international fact-finding initiative to Xinjiang.
Stop CSIS from targeting everyday citizens & community groups
A recent report revealed that CSIS, Canada’s spy agency, collected over 8,000 pages of documents, spying on citizens like you, people who exercise their democratic rights by attending a community meeting at a local church or taking peaceful action for what they believe in. And CSIS shared this info with Big Oil corporations. Sign this petition to tell the govt to stop using taxpayer money to unconstitutionally spy on Canadians part of peaceful community groups.
All-in-one action page: Stop Mohamed Harkat's Deportation to Torture
Call PM Trudeau, write a letter to Public Safety Minister & your MP, and sign Sophie Harkat's petition to stop the deportation of Moe Harkat.

If sent back to Algeria, Moe faces detention, torture and death.

No one should be deported to torture. Ever.
Defund the police & the RCMP
More and more people are calling on their city councils to reduce and eliminate budgets for policing. We are no longer going to pay for police to harm our communities. These funds can be re-directed to support the recovery and provide much need improvements to public housing, transit, and food security programs among other basic needs. Please use this e-mail tool to tell your City Councillor to act now to defund the police in your communities. Together we keep each other safe.


Philippines: Junk the terror bill and uphold human rights!
The Anti-Terrorism bill is a clear and direct attack against our academic freedom, right to organize, and freedom of expression to air out our grievances towards the inefficiencies and deficiencies of the government's mandate to serve its people through government services.

This positions the government to silence the any dissenter or organizer and given the rich history of harassment of law enforcement agencies and military personnel, harassment and terror-tagging has been a step further for even more killings and silencing.
Call on Justin Trudeau to ensure justice for Abousfian Abdelrazik
In September 2003, Canadian citizen Abousfian Abdelrazik was arrested in Sudan, while he was back in the country visiting his ailing mother. Over the next three years he was imprisoned for nearly 20 months and was held under house arrest for 12 months. He was denied a lawyer, and was never charged or brought before a judge. During that time he was badly tortured in three different prisons.

Not only did Canada fail to take steps to protect him, CSIS officials frequently obstructed efforts to secure his release.
Your phone is not safe at the border
Canada’s border agents can search your phone and laptop at borders and airports, including looking through your private photos, personal messages, and call history.

These ‘digital strip searches’ are allowed because our laws are incredibly out of date. But politicians are refusing to update them for our digital age.

Fight back with us: demand updated laws, learn more about your rights, and make a complaint if your privacy has been violated at the border.
MORE NEWS - AUTRES NOUVELLES
From July to December 2020
ICLMG - 2020 has been BUSY! Click below to see what we’ve accomplished in the second half of 2020, but first here is our plan for the next year.

In 2021, we will continue fighting:
  • against facial recognition technology, governments' attacks on encryption, and online mass surveillance
  • for a review mechanism for the Canada Border Services Agency
  • to abolish security certificates and end deportation to torture
  • to repeal of the Canadian No Fly List
  • for justice for Hassan Diab & the reform of the Extradition Act

and much more! Find out how you can help here and see what we did in 2020 below:


Les opinions exprimées ne reflètent pas nécessairement les positions de la CSILC - The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the positions of ICLMG.
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