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International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group

Coalition pour la surveillance internationale des libertés civiles

June 3, 2022 - 3 juin 2022

ICLMG testifies at Senate Committee on Bill S-7: Proposed rules for searching cell phones at Canada's border threatens rights

ICLMG 03/06/2022 - It is imperative that senators reject the Canadian government's proposed new threshold of "reasonable general concern" to allow border officers to search the cell phones and other digital devices of Canadians and other travellers entering Canada. Such a threshold would grant border officers too broad a discretion in deciding whose devices to search and why, allowing for the violation of privacy rights. It would also allow for profiling and discrimination at the border to continue.


This was the message delivered by the ICLMG's national coordinator at the June 1, 2022, Senate committee hearing on the proposed Bill S-7.


Read the testimony - Lire la présentation + Share on Facebook + Twitter


Media coverage of our intervention: Proposed new legal threshold for cellphone searches at border is 'deeply worrisome,' senators hear


Civil liberties risks in Bill S-7: featuring ICLMG's Tim McSorley + Share on Facebook + Twitter


Globe Editorial: Ottawa wants to search your phone at the border, but its proposed rules are unreasonably suspicious


Privacy Lawyer David Fraser: The problem with Bill S-7: Device searches at the border (video)

The ‘terrorist’ smear: a settler-colonial ploy

Canadian Dimension 24/05/2022 - Next to “antisemitic,” the term “terrorist” is one of the most potent accusations that can be used against an individual or organization. If Israel and its lobby had used the terms “fervent Palestinian human rights defender,” or “Palestinian militant,” or even “anti-Israel campaigner,” to describe their activities, people like Barakat might be afforded the benefit of the doubt. But their use of the term “terrorist” is designed to totally discredit, if not criminalize, the targeted individual or organization. To be perfectly clear, we, as well as our organization, Independent Jewish Voices, do not endorse violence, whether perpetrated by Israelis or Palestinians. We champion the use of non-violent methods of protest and popular resistance, such as BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions). Having said that, several points need to be stressed in the context of this discussion.


First, International law clearly protects the right to armed resistance by populations under occupation. United Nations resolution 37/43, dated December 3, 1982, “reaffirms the legitimacy of the struggle of peoples for independence, territorial integrity, national unity and liberation from colonial and foreign domination and foreign occupation by all available means, including armed struggle.” Moreover, the resolution’s preamble makes clear that it refers not to a hypothetical situation, but specifically to the rights of Palestinians. It refers to “…the denial of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people to self-determination, sovereignty, independence and return to Palestine and the repeated acts of aggression by Israel against the peoples of the region constitute a serious threat to international peace and security.’” While Israel rejects the accusation that it is illegally occupying Palestinian territory, the overwhelming international consensus is that Israel is doing precisely that.


Second, Israel indiscriminately labels Palestinian resistance organizations as “terrorist.” Recently it used this specious accusation to attack six organizations, including the well-respected human rights organization Al-Haq, the Addameer prisoners’ rights group, Defence for Children International-Palestine (DCIP), the Bisan Center for Research and Development, the Union of Palestinian Women’s Committees and the Union of Agricultural Work Committees. Israel’s wielding of the terrorist designation against of these organizations has been widely rejected as baseless by the world community.

Israel and the pro-Israel lobby attempt to label even non-violent resistance campaigns as nefarious. Hence they falsely claim that BDS aims to end the presence of Jews in the Holy Land.


Third, Israel’s use of the label “terrorist” is frequently based on “guilt by association.” The process goes like this: get Palestinian human rights organizations listed as “terrorist,” first by Israel, then by other states, as well. Once thus designated, anybody who has anything to do with them is also guilty, by implication; there is no need to provide evidence of crimes or wrongdoings. Indeed, anyone (like the authors of this article) who defends the rights of the accused or demands they be considered innocent until proven guilty is also guilty by inference.


Fourth, the Arab Canadian Lawyers Association has condemned the wanton use of the term “terrorist” as anti-Palestinian racism: “defaming Palestinians and their allies with slander such as being inherently antisemitic, a terrorist threat/sympathizer or opposed to democratic values.” [...]


Canada’s pro-Israel lobby seems to shun any approach to peace in Palestine short of abject Palestinian surrender. In contrast, we urge the Canadian government to see past the lobby’s accusations of terrorism, which are clearly levelled for tactical purposes. International solidarity movements and eventually most of the world community have resisted being distracted by such accusations elsewhere. Eventually many of these conflicts ended through negotiation. In these cases as well as the case of Israel, the cause of the violence was oppression. When colonialism was defeated, the nature of the tactics used to oppose it was no longer deemed an issue. Canada played an important role, albeit tardily, in helping marshal the international pressure that ended apartheid in South Africa. We urge Ottawa to reject attempts to label Palestinian activists as terrorists and instead to play a peacemaking role vis-à-vis the conflict in Israel-Palestine by helping to end apartheid there. Read more - Lire plus

Dr. Monia Mazigh Calls on Trudeau: Free Jack Letts, Free ALL the 44 Canadians Detained in Northern Syria

Homes Not Bombs 21/05/2022 - Today I am standing here in the stairs of the Prime Minister office with a group of Canadian citizens who are worried about the rights of other Canadian citizens. We are worried to see the rights of Jack Letts and 43 other Canadians being disregarded ignored and abandoned. Since 2017, there are 44 Canadian citizens who are held in Northern Syria by the Kurdish forces. They are held in conditions similar to torture. It is  estimated that there are two dozen Canadian children, most age 7 and under, unlawfully detained in these camps and prisons. This is what Human Rights Watch said in their report: “Canada has an obligation under international law to take necessary and reasonable steps to assist nationals abroad facing serious abuses including risks to life, torture, and inhuman and degrading treatment. International law also grants everyone the right to return to their country of nationality, without their government throwing up direct or indirect barriers.”

 

Why is the government of Canada doing nothing to bring back its own citizens home? Worse, why is Canada putting obstacles for families of Canadians who are trying to bring their loved ones back home? Where is Madame Mélanie Joly, Canadian foreign affairs minister? Why doesn’t she stand up for the rights of Canadian children? Where is Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who once declared “a Canadian is a Canadian is a Canadian”? Why doesn’t he stand up to bring home Jack Letts and 43 other Canadians detained in Northern Syria? Twenty years ago, my husband, Maher Arar, was also detained in Syria. He was never charged with any crime and still the Canadian government didn’t help him to come back, and similarly they put all the obstacles to stop his repatriation. If it wasn’t for the will, determination and activism of people like the ones who are standing here, my husband would have died in his Syrian prison.

 

In the last twenty years, Canadians Muslims have been surveilled, spied upon, harassed in their workplaces and campuses, put under house arrest, had to wear electronic bracelets in their ankles to watch their movements, rendered to torture, kept for more than 10 years in Guantanamo, sent to prisons to disappear. Canadian legislation was brought to criminalize Canadian Muslims. Very few courageous politicians and engaged citizens stood up against this systemic Islamophobia. Today, we have 44 Muslim Canadians detained in Northern Syria. They were never charged with any crimes. Their Canadian families want them back home but the Canadian government is stopping them. How come an American former diplomat, Peter Galbraith, is able to do more than the whole Canadian government? And still the Canadian government refuse to cooperate with him?

 

Today as a Canadian Muslim woman who went through Islamophobia and still suffer from what the Canadian government did to my husband, my children and myself, I am asking Prime Minister Trudeau to walk the talk and fulfill his promises of fighting hate and Islamophobia:

- Bring Jack Letts home to his mother Sally Lane and his family.

- Bring all the 43 other Canadians detained abroad including the children who can’t go to school, learn and live in healthy and safe environment.

- Listen to what  organizations like Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International had mentioned in their report about the urgent need to provide consular services and repatriation assistance to these Canadians detained abroad.

- Listen to Fionnuala Ni Aolain, the UN Special Rapporteur for the Protection and Promotion of Human Rights while Countering Terrorism, who put Canada 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.

 

As a country, we have no credibility when on one hand we champion the rights of Uyghurs detained in Chinese concentration camps but on the other hand we leave other Canadians detained by Kurdish forces. Prime Minister Trudeau is probably scared of losing any political capital in returning home Muslim Canadians. But this is not leadership. Leadership isn’t a popularity contest. It is about applying the laws and stopping the arbitrary detention and the abuse of human rights of ALL Canadians. Free Jack Letts, free all the 44 Canadian detained in Northern Syria. Source


Maldives: UN expert cautiously welcomes government commitment to bringing nationals home from Syria but urges more action on repatriation and reintegration

BC Prosecution Service will apply criminal contempt charges against 15 people arrested last fall under the Coastal GasLink pipeline injunction

Twitter 01/06/2022 - BC Prosecution Service will apply criminal contempt charges against 15 people arrested last fall under the Coastal GasLink pipeline injunction, including one Hereditary Chief. These are the first criminal charges in relation to anti-pipeline activities on Wet'suwet'en territory.


The Crown is still considering criminal charges against 10 people arrested in November. Two people arrested will not face criminal charges because of the way police delivered the injunction. CGL could still pursue civil contempt under the injunction. Court has been adjourned until July 7. I believe that's when Crown will make a decision about whether to pursue criminal charges against the remaining 10.


Chief Dsta’hyl, who was arrested in September, says he was confiscating CGL equipment under Wet'suwet'en law. The company and RCMP have called it vandalism. Chief Dsta'hyl's arrest took place on Likhts'amisyu Clan territory, where the Office of the Wet'suwet'en and BC Environmental Assessment Office recently reported CGL had breached its environmental certificate for water quality violations. Source

Colby Cosh: A huge, but unnoticed, win for an age-old constitutional principle

The National Post 24/05/2022 - In 2017, the Liberal government passed a law creating the national security and intelligence committee of parliamentarians (NSICOP). NSICOP is a strange hybrid animal bred to perform the task of parliamentary oversight of the occult activities of Canada’s various security agencies — the Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), the Border Service Agency, the Mounties and other spook factories. After 9/11, it had eventually become clear throughout the world that making such instruments somehow accountable to legislatures was more important than ever, and Canada, being Canada, was slow to make the necessary reforms.


The solution, devised by an interim committee and made law with all-party support, was a permanent “committee of parliamentarians.” This is not the same thing, mind you, as a parliamentary committee. If you freely trusted sensitive national security material to an actual committee of Parliament, MPs or senators could not legally be stopped from mentioning it or reading it aloud on the floor of Parliament. So NSICOP is a creature of the executive pretending to provide accountability to the legislature. Under the law creating NSICOP, material shown to members can still be pre-edited to a more or less arbitrary degree on national security grounds. And the law also states that members must agree to surrender their parliamentary privilege when it comes to anything they’ve seen or heard in the course of their NSICOP duties. It specifies that these parliamentarians can be prosecuted for publicizing NSICOP secrets inside Parliament, and that their traditionally unrestricted right of parliamentary free speech doesn’t apply.


Lots of lawyers, and a few politicians, were nervous about this feature of the NSICOP statute at the time it came into being. One person, Lakehead University law Prof. Ryan Alford, was more than nervous: he was freaked out. Alford is an important scholar of the deep constitution going back to the Magna Carta, and is known for his 2020 book, “Seven Absolute Rights,” which argues that Canadians have some civil rights that are so old and fundamental to the rule of law that they are totally non-derogable, even for the highest reasons of state. [...]


Parliamentary privilege, Alford thinks, is also part of that underlying framework of the rule of law. Parliament can’t very well prevent drone pilots, spies or assassins from committing unconstitutional outrages if it doesn’t have the power to be informed of their behaviour. The NSICOP statute’s exposure of members of Parliament to prosecution for words uttered in Parliament is, to Alford, a fundamental break with the essential premises of our Constitution. Parliament is entitled to grant itself new privileges under Sec. 18 of the Constitution Act, 1867 (the British North America Act), but nothing in that section implies that parliamentary privilege, routinely called “absolute” then and now, can be nerfed willy-nilly.


What’s a panicked law professor to do? What any lawyer would: sue. It took a while because Alford had to show standing to bring a suit on a pure question of law. Although the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA) backed Alford as an intervener, no MP would agree to join the case as a party. Alford had to sue in his own name. An Ontario Superior Court judge told him to shove off back to the wilderness in 2017, but in 2019, the Ontario Court of Appeal agreed that his plea should be heard, and the matter was sent back to a different judge, John Fregeau. On May 13, Alford learned that he had won in Alford v. Canada. This is probably the first you’re hearing of it. Judge Fregeau agreed with Alford that Parliament can’t remove privileges from some members without amending the Constitution explicitly. The part of NSICOP Act allowing parliamentarians to be prosecuted for illegal parliamentary speech has been declared ultra vires.


The attorney general is bound to appeal Fregeau’s ruling. But if it holds up, and that is clearly possible, the whole idea of a security-shielded “consisting of parliamentarians but not parliamentary” committee becomes untenable. Some means of letting our House and Senate review the actions of Canadian agents may have to be found that actually respects Parliament’s supremacy and that isn’t a double-talking nat-sec snow job on its face. If this can happen, Prof. Alford — who didn’t get much help from anybody but the CCLA — deserves the highest praise in our power. Read more - Lire plus


National security committee violates MPs’ parliamentary privilege: Ontario court


Prime Minister announces two new members of the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians

Editorial: Ottawa is trying a third time to set up a watchdog for powerful border cops. This time it must not fail

The Toronto Star 26/05/22 - In February of 2013, Ebrahim Toure, an apparently stateless man from the Gambia, was detained by the Canada Border Services Agency in Toronto. He spent the next five-and-a-half years in detention, mostly in a maximum security prison. During this period, his mental health declined to the point where he contemplated suicide. Toure was released from prison only when the Ontario Superior Court of Justice held that his detention amounted to unconstitutional cruel and unusual treatment. Nonetheless, the CBSA decided that Toure should be deported, and the agency re-detained him in late 2020. According to Human Rights Watch, a CBSA officer told a detention hearing that he was relying on a confidential informant known only to him, that he didn’t keep notes of meetings with Gambian officials, and that he hadn’t read CBSA policy on confidential informants.


Believe it or not, Toure is one of the lucky ones. Luckier, at least, than Lucia Vega Jimenez. Originally from Mexico, Jimenez was working as a cleaner in Vancouver when the CBSA detained her in late 2013 at Vancouver International Airport. According to the International Human Rights Program at the University of Toronto, she was transferred to a women’s prison for 16 days and then back to the airport. At her detention hearings she was visibly distraught, but the CBSA didn’t discuss her mental health with the private security guards who managed the airport detention. Just 19 days after being detained, Jimenez committed suicide in the detention washroom. Unbelievably, the CBSA covered up her death for more than a month. A 2014 B.C. Coroner’s Inquest issued a long list of recommendations, most of which have been ignored. Chief among them was a call for the establishment of an independent, civilian-led commission to provide oversight for the CBSA. That recommendation, too, has yet to be implemented, though Ottawa has twice tabled bills to create the commission. Both bills died on the order paper, which means the CBSA remains the only major law enforcement entity in Canada without any independent oversight. And the CBSA is not just any law enforcement agency. Unlike most other law enforcement, it possesses enormous powers of search, seizure, arrest and detention without a warrant. And as the Toure and Jimenez cases show, the abuse of those powers by CBSA officers can have life-threatening consequences for vulnerable people on the CBSA’s radar.


Last week, Parliament introduced a third bill to establish the commission, and this time it must not fail. The bill grants the commission the authority to investigate and adjudicate complaints about the service provided by the CBSA and the conduct of its employees, as well as to handle detention-related complaints. Those are welcome developments but Parliament must also ensure that members of the public, and particularly those in detention, are apprised of their ability to make complaints and to be represented by counsel. This is a crucial element since the CBSA has failed to advise some detainees of their rights, including Lucia Jimenez. Furthermore, since those in detention are highly vulnerable and often don’t understand Canada’s legal system, the commission should be granted the authority to investigate complaints launched by third parties. Currently, the bill does allow for complaints from third parties who have received written authorization from detainees, but that will only prove effective if detainees are apprised of that provision. Most important, though, is that the bill passes this time — for all the vulnerable people in detention now and in the future. For Ebrahim Toure, who can tell you what it’s like. And for Lucia Vega Jimenez, who can’t. Read more - Lire plus

Former Guantanamo detainee explains why he's suing Canada

MEE 27/05/22 - Mohamedou Ould Slahi hoped his release from Guantanamo in 2016 would mark a new stage in his life, one where he could finally live freely after decades of imprisonment and torture. But years later, without a passport and the ability to travel free of restrictions, Slahi is now suing the Canadian government for C$35m ($28m) over its alleged role in helping the US send him to Guantanamo. Speaking to Middle East Eye, Slahi said he filed the lawsuit out of necessity, adding that it was the only path he had left in order to truly prove his innocence. "I never wanted to sue anyone, because I chose forgiveness," he told MEE. "I want Canada to tell the world this was a mistake… I want to clear my name. This is very important to me." After the 9/11 attacks and the subsequent US "war on terror", Slahi was arrested in his native Mauritania in 2001 and then taken to Amman, where he was held in solitary confinement for more than seven months. The US later moved him to the Bagram air base in Afghanistan, and then to Guantanamo Bay in 2002, where he would be incarcerated for more than a decade.


In US detention, guards tortured Slahi in a number of ways, including through sleep deprivation, stress positions, and being exposed to long bouts of excruciatingly loud heavy metal music. While Slahi's story outlines America's notorious use of torture after 9/11, it also reveals how the US and other governments around the world collaborated and shared intelligence - and participated in extraordinary renditions - in the name of national security. "The Canadian government swallowed all the erroneous intelligence that the American agencies passed on to them," he said. "Without the Canadian government, I would never have been kidnapped. Without the Canadian government, I would never have been selected for the torture programme. "Instead of the protection I was seeking, I was literally thrown under the bus." During his time in detention, Slahi wrote an autobiography that would go on to become the best-selling memoir, Guantanamo Diary, which was later adopted into a Hollywood film.


Originally from Mauritania, Slahi travelled to Germany and graduated there with an electrical engineering degree. While in Germany in the 1990s, he had - for three weeks - interrupted his studies to join the ranks of the US-backed Mujahideen against the Soviet-backed communist government in Afghanistan. He then broke off ties with the group. Slahi has stated that he had never been an enemy combatant against the US. Slahi was unable to obtain permanent residency in Germany, and moved to Canada in 1999. But his time in Afghanistan had caught the eye of US and Canadian authorities, and he fell under the surveillance of the Canadian government after being allegedly linked to the Millenial Plot, a plan to bomb tourists at millennium celebrations in 2000. While living in Montreal, Slahi made a phone call in which a friend asked to come over for tea. Slahi replied asking him to bring over "tea and sugar", which Canadian officials had believed was code for explosives. Slahi told MEE that because his friend, whose name he said was Rauf, was being tracked by Canadian authorities, Ottawa thought they had violent plans.

"But I was only planning to make tea," he said.


Canadian officials have never discussed their investigation into Slahi, but the Toronto Star revealed that Ottawa had provided information to Washington - and also that Canadian Security Intelligence Service agents travelled to Guantanamo in 2003 to question him. Last year, FBI agent Fred Humphries told La Presse that Canadian authorities had "exaggerated the importance" of the intelligence they shared with the US, such as the "tea and sugar" call. At the time of the interview, Canada's attorney-general had not commented on Slahi's allegations against the government, and Slahi's court case is still ongoing. Slahi, now 51 and working for a Dutch theatre company, told MEE that the lawsuit was not just about seeking compensation for Ottawa's role in his detention and torture, but also because he wants to be able to travel to Canada. "My lawyer said the only way for the Canadians to answer us is if we hit them with a lawsuit," he said. "I just wanted an apology and I want them to give me back my papers that they took away, because I need a life - because my country won't give me a passport.


"I want to be able to go to Canada freely, and meet my readers and meet my supporters, and do my talks in all the cities in Canada. Because I love the Canadian people." But he also said that his case was a part of a pattern of Islamophobia, with the Canadian government having a history of targeting individuals based on their religion. Canada has been hit with multiple lawsuits over its role in contributing to the detention of individuals in Guantanamo, as well as countries in the Middle East, such as Jordan, Egypt and Syria. In 2007, Maher Arar was given C$10.5m ($8m) in compensation and an apology from then-prime minister Stephen Harper for Ottawa's role in his detention and torture in Syria. Canadian Omar Khadr, who was sent to Guantananmo at the age of 15, was also given C$10.5m ($8m) in a settlement and an apology for breaching his charter rights while he was held as a juvenile in Guantanamo. Three other Canadians, Abdullah Almalki, Ahmad El Maati and Muayyed Nureddin, also split C$31.3m ($24.5m) compensation over a settlement for Canada's role in their detention and and torture in Syria and Egypt. Source

Christopher Parsons: Justice Mosley on a request from CSIS to retain a pair of Canadian datasets

Twitter 30/05/22 - There are many noteworthy details:

* a helpful outlining of how dataset retention processes actually occur

* a warning “it is difficult to see how any collection of personal information [in an approved class of dataset] might be excluded given the breadth of their scope” [11] 

* an appreciation the Federal Court will get direct notification of NSIRA’s audits of CSIS dataset activity rather than having to rely on public reports which “are necessarily vague, for national security reasons” [16]

* a question about what parts of the CSIS’ legislation the Court is specifically worried/thinking about when it comes to not knowing how the Service may execute judicial orders in excess of the dataset regime [16]


* a detailed discussion of how CSIS fulfils its duty of candour 

* pushback against “the proposals by the Service on how the datasets might be updated and edited by additions, deletions and corrections on an ongoing basis. It appeared that the Service sought carte blanche to revise the database without further authorization from the Court ...” 

* also “…information could be queried or exploited” w/o “reference to the particular context in which it had been collected. This could have implications for the privacy interests of the individuals concerned, particularly if” info “was to be shared with foreign agencies.” [40] 

* the amici process worked by serving a challenge function + worked to draft conditions attached to how the Service could exploit/communicate about the datasets [39-46]

* NSIRA, not the courts, was found as the better party to review/report on dataset exploitation [43-44] 


* 2 conditions added: 1) CSIS must notify the Court of any determination that an update, other than an update pertaining to contact information, is to be made and places a hold on the update should the Court require further information or submissions regarding …” 

the proposed change” [45]

2) “a text be applied to any report querying or exploiting the dataset which describes the context in which the dataset was obtained including the circumstances of the individuals to whom the information pertains.” [46] 


Takeaways:

1) CSIS is, as expected, acquiring datasets. In this case two Canadian datasets from government institutions. 

2) The authorization regime leads to approved classes of datasets being “exceptionally broad in scope” and make it hard to “see how any collection of personal information might be excluded given the breadth of their scope. [11] 

3) The Court’s regular, and well publicized, findings of the Service not meetings its duty of candour (and, perhaps, NSIRA’s review into this topic as well) is leading to changes in how the Service appears/works when before the Court. Source

Turkish airstrike kills at least two children in Iraqi Kurdistan

Medya News 27/05/22 - A Turkish armed drone has bombed the countryside in Duhok, Northern Iraq, killing at least two young children and injuring two others, local sources reported on Thursday evening. Villagers from Bamerne in the Amadiya district were outside in the plains of the countryside for a wedding when the Turkish drones attacked, according to witnesses.


“First, Turkish forces shelled the mountains,” the father of one of the boys, 13, told local media. The other boy was 6 years old. Drones armed with missiles struck the area between 17.00pm and 18.00pm local time, the father said. Duhok Governor Eli Teter told Rudaw that the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) was responsible for the attack on the picnic area, while eye-witness statements contradicted his statement. Read more - Lire plus


Women Defend Rojava: With united strength we oppose the Turkish occupation and defend the women’s revolution


TAKE ACTION: Biden: Stop Turkey's Invasion

War as Terrorism: Conflicts We Can’t Win, Suffering We Don’t See

Counterpunch 02/06/22 - As a Navy spouse of more than 10 years and a therapist who specializes in treating military families and those fleeing foreign wars, I believe that the post-9/11 wars have finally begun to come home in a variety of ways, including how we think about violence. Conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq, and beyond have reached U.S. shores in all sorts of strange, if often indirect manners, starting with the surplus small arms and tactical equipment (some of it previously used in distant battle zones) that the Pentagon has passed on to local law enforcement departments nationwide in ever increasing quantities. Our wars have also come home through the “anti-terror” grants of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), itself a war-on-terror creation, that have funded local law-enforcement purchases of armored vehicles and other gear. Such weaponizing programs have helped embolden police officers to see themselves as warriors and citizens like George Floyd as enemy combatants, which helps explain the increased use of force during police encounters in these years. [...]


Honoring troops on national holidays like the Memorial Day just past helps obscure a grim reality of our time — that wars are won (or in the case of this country, it seems, never won) only by making it impossible for the communities we oppose to carry on with their daily lives. I once helped conduct research compiled by 10 major human rights and humanitarian organizations for the publication Education Under Attack. It showed how armed conflict impacted the lives of students and teachers in more than 93 countries. The most recent 2020 report found that government militaries and sectarian armed groups carried out more than 11,000 attacks globally on schools, school buses, students, and teachers between 2015 and 2019. Fighters and troops bombed and occupied schools, and kidnapped students and teachers, sometimes using them for sex or commandeering them into armies and militias. And many of those attacks were all too deliberate. (For reasons I won’t go into here, unlike the Costs of War Project, Education Under Attack did not specifically investigate war deaths at the hands of the U.S. military, though most of the countries profiled in its report were those our military arms, aids through intelligence, trains, or fights alongside.) An eight-year-old child in Yemen, a country where an estimated 12,000 civilians have died due to air strikes in a nightmarish ongoing war, survived when her bus was hit. That strike was carried out by Saudi forces to which the U.S. endlessly sells arms. Here’s how she responded to the experience: “My father says he will buy me toys and get me a new school bag. I hate school bags. I don’t want to go anywhere near a bus. I hate school and I can’t sleep. I see my friends in my dreams begging me to rescue them. So from now on, I’m going to stay home.” This is suffering that numbers can’t capture, but it should remind us that war is a form of terrorism. [...]


I only hope, as the children in my family and my community grow up, they come to understand that war crimes aren’t just a byproduct of recklessness but of an all-too-human decision to “solve” problems through armed conflict rather than the range of alternatives available to us. I also hope that ever more of us accept how important it is to teach younger generations about the horrific suffering of civilians who live through war.

Here’s the truth of it: if we lack empathy for those who suffer in our wars, we endanger humanity’s future. The kids who ask pointed and graphic questions or wake up from nightmares spurred by playing Call of Duty are saner than parents who thank soldiers for their service or celebrate Ukrainian holidays. Purchasing Ukrainian flags is no substitute for trying to investigate the nightmare really underway in that conflict. We should be supporting organizations that protect local journalists. Instead of buying guns ourselves or voting for lawmakers bent on sending our troops all over the world to fight “terror” (and, of course, cause terror), we should be sending money to organizations that document war’s casualties or the humanitarian agencies that aid refugees, displaced people, and survivors of violence. And it’s time, above all, to ask ourselves what stories we’ve been missing in all these years that our military has been fighting abroad. In such a world, the true costs of war should be endlessly on our minds. Read more - Lire plus


Yemeni Man Maimed in U.S. Drone Strike Raises Funds Online for His Surgery as Pentagon Refuses Help

Progressives Need to Resist the Domestic “War on Terror”

Jacobin 22/05/22 - The Domestic Terrorism Prevention Act of 2022 sailed through the House on a strict party-line vote last week, with not a single Democrat voting against and only one Republican, Illinois representative Adam Kinzinger, voting in its favor. [...] But there are good reasons to oppose the bill. For one, the leading progressive concerns about the license granted to the state by the original war on terror remain with this version of the bill. The powers authorized by this legislation can easily be turned on anyone — not simply the odious groups that are invoked for the bill’s passage.


The Biden administration’s official domestic counterterrorism strategy explicitly “makes no distinction based on political views” and name-checks supposed domestic terrorists motivated by a “range of ideologies,” including animal rights, environmentalism, anarchists, and anti-capitalists. In practice, the FBI has already imprisoned one Florida anarchist over what amounted to a series of public social media posts. Domestic terrorism prosecutions have exploded since 2020, now far outnumbering cases defined as international terrorism, and many of those have been racial justice protesters that the Biden administration has continued to prosecute as terrorists.


Even if, despite all this, one believes that a Democratic administration can be trusted to responsibly pursue a domestic “war on terror,” we would do well to remember that the United States is a two-party democracy where power regularly changes hands. Are progressives happy to hand ever-growing national security powers to Donald Trump, who mobilized the DHS for a campaign of repression against the George Floyd protests? Would they be comfortable entrusting them with Ron DeSantis, who just passed yet another law attacking protest rights, this time banning pickets outside private homes? Do they trust GOP-appointed federal agencies not to fudge the numbers and steer prosecutions toward threat categories that aren’t related to the far right?


Beefing up law enforcement and security powers is an understandable response to horrors like Buffalo, but there’s not much evidence that the increase of these powers will succeed as measures of prevention as the bill’s sponsor claims. Attacks like this are happening on a depressingly regular basis even though the United States is already operating the largest, most expensive national security bureaucracy in its history. Such attacks have continued, even in the teeth of the country’s vast surveillance state that effectively sweeps up and stores information about the private activities of most adults. This is the very same surveillance state that has already given the FBI sweeping authority to go after whoever it defines as extremists — which it has mostly used to, again, go after racial justice activists. This is largely why only a few years ago, both leftists and liberals rejected the idea of passing a domestic terror statute in the wake of the horrific El Paso shooting. Read more - Lire plus

International women call on UN to stop Turkey’s attacks on Kurds

Amnesty International 24/05/22 - Immoral Code documentary contemplates the impact of killer robots - autonomous weapons in our increasingly automated world - one where machines could make decisions over who to kill or what to destroy. It examines whether there are situations where it’s morally and socially acceptable to take life, and more importantly - would a computer know the difference? Read more - Lire plus


TAKE ACTION: Stop Killer Robots

The faces from China’s Uyghur detention camps

BBC 24/05/22 - Thousands of photographs from the heart of China’s highly secretive system of mass incarceration in Xinjiang, as well as a shoot-to-kill policy for those who try to escape, are among a huge cache of data hacked from police computer servers in the region. The Xinjiang Police Files, as they’re being called, were passed to the BBC earlier this year. After a months-long effort to investigate and authenticate them, they can be shown to offer significant new insights into the internment of the region’s Uyghurs and other Turkic minorities. Their publication coincides with the recent arrival in China of the United Nations Human Rights Commissioner, Michelle Bachelet, for a controversial visit to Xinjiang, with critics concerned that her itinerary will be under the tight control of the government.


The cache reveals, in unprecedented detail, China’s use of “re-education” camps and formal prisons as two separate but related systems of mass detention for Uyghurs - and seriously calls into question its well-honed public narrative about both. The government’s claim that the re-education camps built across Xinjiang since 2017 are nothing more than “schools” is contradicted by internal police instructions, guarding rosters and the never-before-seen images of detainees. And its widespread use of terrorism charges, under which many thousands more have been swept into formal prisons, is exposed as a pretext for a parallel method of internment, with police spreadsheets full of arbitrary, draconian sentences. The documents provide some of the strongest evidence to date for a policy targeting almost any expression of Uyghur identity, culture or Islamic faith - and of a chain of command running all the way up to the Chinese leader, Xi Jinping. Read more - Lire plus


West demands publication of UN’s long-awaited Xinjiang report


The Guardian view on the UN in Xinjiang: a grave error

US Surveillance of Americans Must Stop

Brennan Center 20/05/2022 - Inform­a­tion about Section 702’s oper­a­tion can be gleaned from offi­cial disclos­ures, court opin­ions, and a 2014 report by the Privacy and Civil Liber­ties Over­sight Board, an inde­pend­ent govern­ment watch­dog. These sources show that, rather than “minim­ize” the shar­ing and reten­tion of Amer­ic­ans’ commu­nic­a­tions, the NSA regu­larly shares raw Section 702 data with the FBI, the CIA, and the National Coun­terter­ror­ism Center, and these agen­cies keep that data for at least five years. In addi­tion, each agency engages in the prac­tice of search­ing Section 702-aqcuired data for Amer­ic­ans’ commu­nic­a­tions. The FBI routinely conducts such searches in purely domestic cases having noth­ing to do with foreign intel­li­gence, often at the “assess­ment” stage — namely, before the FBI even has a factual basis to open a crim­inal invest­ig­a­tion. In other words, having obtained the commu­nic­a­tions without a warrant by certi­fy­ing that it does­n’t intend to target any Amer­ic­ans, the govern­ment — as a matter of policy — runs searches that expli­citly target Amer­ic­ans.


This bait-and-switch itself isn’t news. What the DNI report reveals is how often these back­door searches happen: 3.4 million times in 2021 alone. The report notes that the figure likely over­states the number of Amer­ic­ans affected, in part because there could be multiple searches relat­ing to a single indi­vidual. But even if the figure is off by an order of magnitude, that still means that every day, nearly a thou­sand Amer­ic­ans are subject to a warrant­less search of their personal commu­nic­a­tions. Small wonder that the FBI resisted produ­cing this number for so many years. This stag­ger­ing figure, even with all the govern­ment’s caveats, makes clear that there’s noth­ing “incid­ental” about Section 702’s impact on Amer­ic­ans. Warrant­less access to Amer­ic­ans’ commu­nic­a­tions has become a core feature of a surveil­lance program that purports to be solely foreign-focused. True, the Foreign Intel­li­gence Surveil­lance Court — which over­sees the govern­ment’s use of foreign intel­li­gence surveil­lance author­it­ies — has blessed this prac­tice. But the same court also endorsed the NSA’s bulk collec­tion of Amer­ic­ans’ phone records. That didn’t stop three regu­lar federal courts from ruling the prac­tice illegal. Nor did it stop Congress from banning it.


The most recent report, however, has not gener­ated the same public uproar as the Snowden disclos­ures. Indeed, the media cover­age of the report largely missed the signi­fic­ance of this disclos­ure. That could be because the “back­door search” scan­dal — unlike the Snowden revel­a­tions — has unfol­ded in incre­ments and through muted offi­cial disclos­ures, rather than all at once through a spec­tac­u­lar leak. It could also stem from the relat­ive complex­ity of the stat­ute and its oper­a­tion. But we should not let the form obscure the substance: The govern­ment is conduct­ing warrant­less searches of the most sens­it­ive inform­a­tion we gener­ate — our private commu­nic­a­tions — on a dizzy­ing scale. If anything, that’s an even greater intru­sion on Amer­ic­ans’ privacy than the NSA’s bulk collec­tion of phone records. Congress must once again act to stop the govern­ment from using foreign intel­li­gence surveil­lance author­it­ies to make an end run around Amer­ic­ans’ consti­tu­tional rights. Section 702 comes up for reau­thor­iz­a­tion next year. When it does, Congress should require govern­ment offi­cials to obtain a warrant any time they wish to search Section 702-acquired data for Amer­ic­ans’ commu­nic­a­tions. Such a meas­ure has twice passed in the House but failed to become law. The govern­ment’s report should erase any doubt that it is neces­sary. Enact­ing this sens­ible solu­tion will leave the govern­ment ample author­ity to collect inform­a­tion on foreign actors, while preserving vital Fourth Amend­ment safe­guards for Amer­ic­ans. Read more - Lire plus

The Rise and Fall of America’s Environmentalist Underground

The New York Times 26/05/2022 - [...] The plea comes at a moment when the story of the Earth Liberation Front seems more relevant than ever. After decades in which America’s environmental movement confined its activities largely to rallies, marches and other lawful forms of protest, frustrated activists have begun taking a more confrontational approach. Younger groups like the Sunrise Movement and Extinction Rebellion have blockaded roads and occupied the offices of lawmakers. During the Standing Rock protests of 2016, thousands of demonstrators sought to physically impede construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline. Tim DeChristopher, a founder of the Climate Disobedience Center, which supports protesters who engage in nonviolent resistance, told me that, in the 2000s, such direct action was championed mostly by a fringe group of anarchists. (DeChristopher himself was sent to prison after placing winning bids at public auctions for oil and gas leases and then refusing to pay.) Now, even staid Washington-based environmental groups, sensing an increasingly unruly mood among their base, have slowly started to embrace more radical tactics. In 2017, the Sierra Club formally lifted its 120-year ban on civil disobedience after its executive director and other senior members were arrested for strapping themselves to a gate outside the White House. [...]


A week later, Chelsea Gerlach was sitting in a hotel room, preparing to reconnoiter a potential target, when she saw on TV that a pair of planes had crashed into the World Trade Center. Hours after the towers fell, Representative Don Young, a Republican from Alaska, suggested there was “a strong possibility” that radical environmentalists were behind the hijackings. The attacks transformed the F.B.I. overnight. The bureau had been founded in the early 20th century as a law-enforcement agency, but after Sept. 11, its central mission, underwritten by expansive new congressional funding, became counterterrorism. Over the next few years, the F.B.I. turned ever more attention to property destruction committed by environmental activists. While most of this pressure was directed toward radical environmentalists, it also opened terrorism investigations into members of mainstream groups like Greenpeace and PETA for their potential involvement in ecological sabotage. In 2002, James Jarboe, chief of the F.B.I.’s domestic-terrorism division, declared to Congress that the investigation of animal rights extremists and eco-terrorists was the bureau’s highest domestic-terrorism priority. This period in the environmental movement — marked by aggressive police tactics and tough new punishments for crimes ostensibly committed in defense of the earth — was one that some activists would come to call the Green Scare.


Exactly why the F.B.I. made eco-terrorism a central concern remains a subject of debate. Some have speculated it was because of corporate pressure. According to the reporting by The Intercept, industry trade groups had been directly pushing the Justice Department to pursue eco-sabotage cases since the 1980s. Yet F.B.I. officials contend that the fixation on the ELF stemmed, in part, from the trauma of Sept. 11. Fearful of being blindsided a second time, the bureau sought to make up for the failure of imagination that had led them to miss signs of an imminent attack from Al Qaeda. There was a conviction that, even if the ELF had so far only targeted buildings, it was just a matter of time before the group began attacking people.[...] The backlash against environmental sabotage, meanwhile, was continuing to intensify. In 2006, the House of Representatives passed a bill that meant environmental activists could spend up to 20 years in prison for property destruction, based on language provided by the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, a group known for drafting laws with the input of major industries and lobbying for them in Congress. Later that year, a version of the bill passed the Senate with bipartisan support. By 2007, 30 state legislatures had passed statutes specifically addressing eco-terrorism, many also drafted by ALEC. Republicans used the attacks to scold and chasten mainstream environmentalists. [...] Read more - Lire plus

Facebook Anti-Terror Policy Lands Head of Afghan Red Crescent Society on Censorship List

The Intercept 22/05/2022 - Amid a historic and ever-worsening humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan, Facebook recently added the head of one of the country’s most important domestic aid groups to its Dangerous Individuals terror blacklist, The Intercept has learned. Internal company materials reviewed by The Intercept show that Matiul Haq Khalis — head of the Afghan Red Crescent Society, or ARCS; son of a famed mujahedeen commander, Mohammad Yunus Khalis; and a former Taliban negotiator — was added to the company’s stringent censorship list in late April, joining a group of thousands of people and organizations deemed too dangerous to freely discuss or use the platform, including alleged terrorists, hate groups, drug cartels, and mass murderers. But Facebook’s designation now means that the list, ostensibly created and enforced to stop offline harm, could disrupt the work of a globally recognized organization working to ease the immiseration of tens of millions of civilians.


After the collapse of the U.S.-backed government and withdrawal of American military forces, Khalis was named president of the organization, which helps provide health care, food, and other humanitarian aid to civilians there since its founding in 1934. In a country where half the population is going hungry and American sanctions threaten a total economic collapse, the ARCS is a bulwark against even greater suffering. Following Khalis’s addition to the Dangerous Individuals list under its most restrictive “Tier 1” category for terrorists due to his Taliban affiliation, the over 2 billion Facebook and Instagram users around the world are now barred from praising, supporting, or representing Khalis; this means even an anodyne photo of him at an official ARCS event, quotation of remarks, or positive mention of him in the context of the organization’s aid work would risk deletion, as would any attempt on his part to use the company’s platform to communicate, either in Afghanistan or abroad.


“The Afghan Red Crescent continues to provide lifesaving assistance across the country, to the most vulnerable people in the country, working in all provinces,” said Anita Dullard, spokesperson with the International Committee of the Red Cross. “They’re dealing with a range of things including severe drought, Covid, economic hardship, and working to support the healthcare system in Afghanistan. We work closely with Afghan Red Crescent to ensure that we can deliver humanitarian assistance.” Read more - Lire plus

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ACTIONS & EVENTS

Join the Rural Refugee Rights Network in Ottawa for an evening of music, film and vital updates on one of the most unbelievable human rights violations in Canadian history.


Register to attend via Zoom


Sign the petition: Help Stop My Husband's Deportation to Torture

DETAILS
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Free Jack Letts and all Canadian Detainees in NE Syria

Canada must immediately act to free four dozen Canadian men, women and children left to rot in one of a series of notorious Northeastern Syrian prisons and detention camps described as “Guantanamo on the Euphrates.” 

The longest held detainee is Jack Letts, 26, who has been imprisoned for almost 5 years without charge under conditions the United Nations has described as meeting the “threshold for torture, cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment under international law.”


Send an email and call!


Mother’s Day to Father’s Day Chain Fast to Free the Canadian Captives

ACTION

Write a Letter: Stop the Smear Campaigns against Palestinian Advocacy

Recently, we have witnessed an intensified campaign by the pro-Israel lobby in Canada to smear Palestinian activists and their supporters. Last week, the National Post (NP) ran an online article about Palestinian-Canadian writer Khaled Barakat and the advocacy organization Samidoun. On April 30, the same article was splashed across their front page of their paper and has since been referenced in the Canadian Senate and the Jerusalem Post.


Send your letter to Canadian PM Justin Trudeau and Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino to tell them that you join with the 80 organizations that have called to “Stop the Smear Campaigns against Palestinian Advocacy”.

ACTION
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Urgent Action to Stop the Deportation of Mohamed Ibrahim and his Family

Mohamed Ibrahim, an Egyptian national, alongside his wife, Shaimaa, and 5 children - the youngest of whom a toddler who was born in Canada - have been given a removal order by the CBSA and are facing deportation back to Egypt where Mohamed will be facing a high risk of human rights abuses by the current Egyptian regime as a result of his peaceful political activism in Egypt. Mohamed and his family arrived in Canada in 2017 and applied for asylum. However, his claim was rejected due to a legal error of his lawyer.


We call on the Minister of Immigration to give Mohammed Ibrahim and his family protection on humanitarian and compassionate grounds pursuant to section 25(1) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

ACTION

Tell Trudeau: Stop Arming Apartheid!

As revealed in CJPME's "Arming Apartheid" analysis, Canada is selling almost $20 million in arms to Israel each year – its highest level in 30 years! At the same time, Israeli forces continue to violently raid Al-Aqsa and across occupied Palestine, and human rights organizations – including Amnesty International – have all recently concluded that Israel imposes an apartheid regime against Palestinians!



There is no excuse for Canada to continue exporting arms to a country practicing apartheid and other abuses. Help us push the Canadian government to suspend arms exports to Israel, and investigate whether Canadian-made weapons have been used against Palestinian civilians! Canada must end its complicity now!

ACTION

Canada must protect encryption!

Canada’s extradition system is broken. One leading legal expert calls it “the least fair law in Canada.” It has led to grave harms and rights violations, as we’ve seen in the case of Canadian citizen Dr Hassan Diab. It needs to be reformed now.



Click below to send a message to urge Prime Minister Trudeau, the Minister of Justice and your Member of Parliament to reform the extradition system before it makes more victims. And share on Facebook + Twitter + Instagram. Thank you!


Regardez la vidéo avec les sous-titres en français + Agir

ACTION
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Reform Canada's extradition law + Justice for Hassan Diab!

Canada’s extradition system is broken. One leading legal expert calls it “the least fair law in Canada.” It has led to grave harms and rights violations, as we’ve seen in the case of Canadian citizen Dr Hassan Diab. It needs to be reformed now.



Click below to send a message to urge Prime Minister Trudeau, the Minister of Justice and your Member of Parliament to reform the extradition system before it makes more victims. And share on Facebook + Twitter + Instagram. Thank you!


Version française: Le Canada doit réformer la loi sur l'extradition! + Partagez sur Facebook + Twitter + Instagram


Phone PM Justin Trudeau


TAKE ACTION: Justice for Hassan Diab!


Just Peace Advocates' action: Write a letter to Prime Minister Trudeau: Say “No" to a second extradition of Hassan Diab

ACTION
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Email your MP – No more weapons to Saudi Arabia

Canada has blood on its hands. Now approaching its seventh year, the war in Yemen has killed over a quarter of a million people. Over 4 million people have been displaced because of the war, and 70% of the population, including 11.3 million children, are in desperate need of humanitarian assistance. The Saudi-led coalition has bombed Yemeni markets, hospitals, and civilians, and yet Canada has exported over $8 billion in arms to Saudi Arabia since 2015, the year the Saudi-led military intervention in Yemen began. Send a letter now calling on the Canadian government to stop sending weapons to Saudi Arabia and stop arming the horrific war in Yemen.


+ Write letter: Canada’s silence on Saudi mass executions deeply troubling

ACTION

Canada: End the Safe Third Country Agreement

The Safe Third Country Agreement (STCA) between Canada and the United States puts refugees at risk. Under the STCA, refugees who arrive at official ports of entry to seek protection in Canada are sent back to the US, where some have suffered serious rights violations in detention. This encourages refugee claimants to cross the border into Canada between ports of entry, sometimes in perilous conditions.

Despite the constitutionality of the STCA being in question, reports suggest that the government is attempting to expand this agreement. 



Take Action now and send a message to Minister Fraser to respect refugee rights by rescinding the Safe Third Country Agreement.

ACTION
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Tell President Biden: Close Guantanamo

Now, with growing support in Congress, President Biden has an opportunity to end these ongoing abuses by closing the detention center. Help us close Guantánamo and ensure the transfer of all cleared detainees to countries where their human rights will be respected. 


Act Now to tell President Biden to shut down the Guantánamo Bay detention facility!

ACTION
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Canada: Condemn Israeli Silencing of Palestinian Groups

Send an email urging Canada to:

1) Condemn Israel’s wrongful designation of these human rights groups, and

2) Demand Israel rescind such labels over the Palestinian organizations


Protect Human Rights Defenders in Palestine!

ACTION
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Free Cihan Erdal

Cihan Erdal is a Canadian permanent resident, queer youth activist, doctoral student, and coordinator of the Centre for Urban Youth Research at Carleton University in Ottawa. He was unjustly detained in Turkey on unfounded charges in September 2020, after being swept up in a mass arrest of politicians, activists, and academics in Istanbul. Send a message to Canadian officials now the Canadian government can take to help bring Cihan safely home.

ACTION
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How to Help Afghans in Afghanistan and Canada

Muslim Link - The people of Afghanistan are in dire need of humanitarian aid and Canada has committed to accepting 20,000 Afghan refugees.


How can you help? Click below for a list of ways you can support the people of Afghanistan at home and abroad.


Demand action from Canada in response to the humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan

ACTION
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Protect our rights from facial recognition!

ICLMG - Facial recognition surveillance is invasive and inaccurate. This unregulated tech poses a threat to the fundamental rights of people across Canada. Federal intelligence agencies refuse to disclose whether they use facial recognition technology. The RCMP has admitted (after lying about it) to using facial recognition for 18 years without regulation, let alone a public debate regarding whether it should have been allowed in the first place.

Send a message to Prime Minister Trudeau and Public Safety Minister Bill Blair calling for a ban now.

Take action to ban biometric recognition technologies

ACTION
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Trudeau: 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.

ACTION
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Stop Mohamed Harkat's Deportation to Torture

No one should be deported to torture. Ever. For nearly 19 years, Mohamed Harkat has faced the ordeal of being place under a kafkaesque security certificate based on secret evidence and accusations he cannot challenge, and facing deportation to torture in Algeria.

Please join us and send the letter below to Prime Minister Trudeau and Minister of Public Safety Marco Mendicino, urging them to stop the deportation to torture of Mr. Harkat.



  • Your letter will also go to your Member of Parliament, along with the ministers of Justice & of Immigration.
  • And don't hesitate to also sign and share this petition!
ACTION
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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

+ Urge China to stop targeting Uyghurs in China and abroad

ACTION

OTHER NEWS - AUTRES NOUVELLES

Anti-terror legislation

Législation antiterroriste


Mozambique Approves Tough Anti-terror Bill: Clauses on misinformation could be used to crack down on media

Criminalization of dissent

Criminalisation de la dissidence


India sentences Kashmir rebel Yasin Malik to life imprisonment

Freedom of expression and the press

Liberté d'expression et de la presse


'They were shooting directly at the journalists': New evidence suggests Shireen Abu Akleh was killed in targeted attack by Israeli forces


Israeli Official Claims Anger at Killing of Shireen Abu Akleh Is Rooted in “Anti-Jewish Racism”


James Risen: The FBI tried to ambush my source. Now I'm telling the whole story.


Arrests of lawyers, activists, journalists under national security law in Hong Kong deeply worrying: UN rights chief


Ethiopia’s ‘vicious cycle’


UN Concerned About Situation In Restive Tajik Region After Deadly Protests


Myanmar: Freelance reporter Soe Yarzar Tun faces up to 7 years in prison under anti-terror law


It Looks Like Russia Is Bringing Its State-Owned Telecom Provider Into Its National Security Apparatus


Egyptian Dissident Alaa Abd El Fattah’s Hunger Strike Reaches a Critical Phase. Will the U.S. and U.K. Let Him Die?

Islamophobia

Islamophobie


EVENTS across Canada to commemorate our London Family


Supreme Court rules Quebec City mosque killer to be eligible for parole in 25 years

Migrant and refugee rights

Droits des migrant.es et des réfugié.es


In limbo and in danger: Advocates fighting to bring Afghan women's rights activist to Ottawa


TAKE ACTION: "I Live in Fear": Take 2 Minutes to Write/Call to Save Afghan Women's Rights Defender Farzana Adell


ICE probably spied on you

Police


‘Disgusting’ behaviour at Canadian police undercover training course sparks inquiry


Uvalde Police Didn’t Move to Save Lives Because That’s Not What Police Do


“Doubling Down”: How Minneapolis Elites Worked to Stop Police Reform After George Floyd’s Murder

Privacy and surveillance

Vie privée et surveillance


How DHS’s massive biometrics database will supercharge surveillance and threaten rights


Human rights activists seek moratorium on spyware


Pegasus’ complex structure hinders EU spyware probe


Mexico's top court strikes down controversial cellphone registry with biometric data


Advocates urge Amazon to drop controversial DHS surveillance program


Is technology spying on you? New AI could prevent eavesdropping

Transparency

Transparence


Trudeau government has adopted dozens of secret cabinet orders since coming to power

Miscellaneous

Divers


Hundreds gather at the EY Centre in protest against the weapons and defence industry


Une foire sur la défense et la sécurité sur fond de manifestation à Ottawa


Israel used U.S. weapons to destroy U.S. assets and aid projects in Gaza


New book: Advocating for Palestine in Canada: Histories, Movements, Action


Évènement le 7 juin: Lancement de la revue de la Ligue des droits et libertés: "Le capitalisme de surveillance : menaces à la démocratie et aux droits!"

From July to Dec - De juillet à décembre 2021

Check out our biannual summary of activities: What We've Been Up To from July to December 2021.


In 2022, we plan to continue our work on the following issues:


- The Canadian government's concerning "online harms" legislative proposal, including its approach on "terrorist content," mandatory reporting to law enforcement and new powers for CSIS;


- Protecting our privacy from government surveillance, including facial recognition, and from attempts to weaken encryption, along with advocating for privacy law reform;


- Justice for Mohamed Harkat, an end to security certificates, addressing problems in security inadmissibility and establishing a long overdue independent review and complaint body for the CBSA;


- Justice for Hassan Diab and launching a video on extradition law reform;


- Greater transparency and accountability for CSIS;


- The return of the 40+ Canadian citizens indefinitely detained in Syrian camps, including 26 children;


- The end to the CRA's prejudiced audits of Muslim-led charities, revealed in our June 2021 report;


- Greater accountability and transparency for the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA), including the establishment of a strong, effective and independent review mechanism;


- Monitoring the implementation of the National Security Act, 2017 (Bill C-59);


- Advocating for the repeal of the Canadian No Fly List, and for putting a stop to the use of the US No Fly List by air carriers in Canada for flights that do not land in or fly over the US;


- Pressuring lawmakers to protect our civil liberties from the negative impact of national security and the "war on terror", as well as keeping you and our member organizations informed via the News Digest;


- And much more!


Read more - Lire plus and share on Facebook + Twitter + Instagram

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

THANK YOU

to our amazing supporters!


We would like to thank all our member organizations, and the hundreds of people who have supported us over the years, including on Patreon! As a reward, we are listing below our patrons who give $10 or more per month (and wanted to be listed) directly in the News Digest. Without all of you, our work wouldn't be possible!


Bill Ewanick

Mary Ann Higgs

Kevin Malseed

Brian Murphy

Colin Stuart

Bob Thomson

James Turk

John & Rosemary Williams

Jo Wood

The late Bob Stevenson


Nous tenons à remercier nos organisations membres ainsi que les centaines de personnes qui ont soutenu notre travail à travers les années, y compris sur Patreon! En récompense, nous nommons ci-dessus nos mécènes qui donnent 10$ ou plus par mois et voulaient être mentionné.es directement dans la Revue de l'actualité. Sans vous tous et toutes, notre travail ne serait pas possible!



Merci!