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International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group

Coalition pour la surveillance internationale des libertés civiles

May 13, 2023 - 13 mai 2023

Des associations juives canadiennes et françaises sont solidaires avec Hassan Diab

Déclaration jointe de Voix juives indépendantes Canada (VJI) et de l’Union juive française pour la paix (UJFP)

IJV 04/05/23 - Pour la deuxième fois en dix ans, la France cherche à extrader le Dr Hassan Diab pour un crime qu’il n’a pas commis et qu’il n’aurait même pas pu commettre. Le mois dernier, un tribunal français l’a reconnu coupable du meurtre de quatre personnes et des blessures infligées à 40 autres personnes lors d’un attentat à la bombe perpétré à l’extérieur d’une synagogue de Paris en 1980. La justice française souhaite faire purger à M. Diab une peine de réclusion à perpétuité.

Ce n’est pas la première fois qu’Hassan Diab, un citoyen canadien, risque d’être extradé vers la France. Le Canada a déjà autorisé son extradition vers une prison française en 2014, dans l’attente d’une inculpation et d’un procès. Il n’y a jamais eu l’ombre d’une preuve pour l’inculper, mais malgré les doutes exprimés par le juge de la Cour supérieure de l’Ontario, Robert Maranger, M. Diab a été extradé vers la France à l’issue d’une bataille juridique de six ans. Certains juristes ont d’ailleurs critiqué le système d’extradition canadien, le jugeant à la fois inefficace et inéquitable.

M. Diab a été incarcéré en 2014 pendant que deux juges français menaient une enquête approfondie étalée sur trois ans. En 2018, ils ont déterminé qu’aucune preuve ne justifiait l’inculpation de M. Diab, et encore moins la tenue d’un procès. Ainsi, en 2018, après avoir passé plus de trois ans en prison, principalement en isolement, Hassan Diab est rentré au Canada. Après qu’on l’ait privé de sa liberté et éloigné de sa famille pendant des années à la suite d’une flagrante erreur judiciaire, le premier ministre Trudeau avait déclaré que « ce qui [lui] est arrivé n’aurait jamais dû se produire ».

Espérons que M. Trudeau se souviendra de ses paroles et refusera d’autoriser cette deuxième extradition de M. Diab. Les enjeux sont cette fois-ci bien plus graves : un tribunal français l’a condamné – encore une fois sans la moindre preuve – à purger une peine d’emprisonnement à perpétuité. Hassan Diab, âgé de 69 ans, marié et père de deux jeunes enfants, aujourd’hui professeur de sociologie à temps partiel à Ottawa, est depuis 15 ans considéré comme le seul suspect de l’attentat de 1980. 

Les faits de l’affaire révèlent pourtant que M. Diab a été pris pour cible à tort :

• L’attentat à la bombe s’est produit il y a 42 ans, et aucun témoin oculaire n’a identifié Hassan Diab.
• Une signature a été griffonnée sur une fiche de registre d’hôtel, mais les spécialistes en graphologie désignés par le tribunal ont écarté l’hypothèse qu’il s’agit de l’écriture de M. Diab.
• L’empreinte du pouce prélevée par la police française sur la fiche d’hôtel ne correspond pas à celle de M. Diab.
• Au moment de l’attentat, M. Diab était étudiant à l’université et passait ses examens à Beyrouth, au Liban. Plusieurs de ses compagnons d’études de 1980 ont témoigné qu’ils passaient leurs examens avec lui à Beyrouth à cette époque. 
• Rien ne prouve qu’il a pris le train ou l’avion ni qu’il se trouvait à Paris ce jour-là.

En 2014, le juge Maranger avait autorisé l’extradition de M. Diab vers la France sur la base du témoignage d’un spécialiste français en graphologie. Mais cet expert a été discrédité depuis. Le tribunal français a nommé deux autres spécialistes en graphologie qui ont juré que la signature figurant sur la fiche d’hôtel n’était pas celle d’Hassan Diab.

Si l’affaire Diab avait été portée devant un tribunal pénal canadien, il n’aurait jamais été condamné. Il n’y a aucun témoin ni aucune preuve circonstancielle. Mais la justice française est pressée de trouver un coupable, car durant les 27 ans qui se sont écoulés depuis l’attentat odieux contre la synagogue, la France n’avait encore inculpé personne. La justice française a fait d’Hassan Diab son seul suspect, sans en chercher d’autre et en s’acharnant sur lui. L’avocat canadien de M.  Diab, Donald Bayne, fait remarquer que si les victimes et leurs familles méritent d’obtenir justice, « rien ne justifie qu’on sacrifie un bouc émissaire ou qu’on commette une erreur judiciaire… Ce qui est en jeu ici, c’est la condamnation injustifiée d’un citoyen canadien ».

Voix juives indépendantes Canada (VJI) et l’Union française juive pour la paix (UFJP) soutiennent le Dr Hassan Diab sans réserve. De concert avec d’autres organisations progressistes, nous demandons au gouvernement canadien de ne pas céder à la demande d’extradition de la France. Nous voulons qu’Hassan Diab reste au Canada, car sa place est ici. M. Diab souffre de cette affaire depuis maintenant 15 ans. Il a d’abord été accusé à tort, puis il a perdu son emploi et sa carrière, avant d’être séparé de sa famille pendant 38 mois, alors qu’il était incarcéré à des milliers de kilomètres de son foyer. Aujourd’hui, de retour au Canada, il risque une condamnation à perpétuité dans une prison française pour un crime qu’il n’a pas commis et qu’il n’aurait pas pu commettre. Source

English version: Canadian and French Jewish Groups Stand with Hassan Diab

CALL Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Urging Him to Protect Hassan Diab

LETTER: Canada must protect Hassan Diab!

Please share the action on Facebook + Twitter + Instagram

Lettre: Le Canada doit protéger Hassan Diab

SVP partagez l'action sur Facebook + Twitter + Instagram

Take Action to Prevent Another Wrongful Extradition of Hassan Diab! (all actions, one link)

UJFP: Encore un déni de justice: Le gouvernement canadien doit refuser l’extradition

EVENT May 15, 7PM ET: "We're with you, Hassan!" Online and in-person in Ottawa

Call to prevent any extradition of Dr. Hassan Diab

CarletonU 08/05/23 - The Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Carleton University calls on Prime Minister Trudeau and Minister of Justice Lametti, to use their discretionary powers to declare that Dr. Hassan Diab will not be extradited in response to an extradition request from France. [...]

In Canada a guilty verdict requires proof of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. France and other continental justice systems have historically allowed for conviction based on the belief of the judges in the guilt of the defendant. This feature is called intime conviction. France is one of only two countries in Europe currently maintaining this practice, despite a Directive from the European Court of Human Rights which required member states to adopt the standard of the “burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt” by 2018.

In a brief 3-week trial which concluded on April 21, 2023, the trial judges overturned the 2018 conclusions of two French judges with extensive expertise in terrorism cases, whose 3-year investigation had found no evidence upon which to base a trial. These investigative judges testified during the trial, reiterating their findings. The trial brought forward no new evidence, rather relying on evidence and secret intelligence previously critiqued by the investigative judges as problematic. The handwriting analysis which formed the core of the 2014 extradition request from France was removed from consideration by the trial judges after it was discredited, making the case even weaker.

While a lack of evidence should be sufficient for a legal finding of not guilty, there is much evidence to support Hassan Diab’s innocence. The university attended by Diab provided documentation that he was writing exams in Lebanon at the time of the bombing. The hotel registration clerk (now deceased) where the suspected bomber signed a registration form, testified in the original investigation that the suspect was in his 40s. (Hassan Diab was 26 at the time.) No fingerprints collected by police matched Hassan Diab’s.

Canadians might ask how did there ever come to be a trial without evidence? Hassan Diab’s ordeal began with the desire of a French prosecutor to close old terrorism cases. It was supported by a Canadian Extradition Act amended in 1999 to enable easier extradition, and at the current time under review by a non-partisan parliamentary committee, as the Act is now acknowledged to allow the extradition of Canadian citizens without evidence of guilt. This review has in part been prompted by the case of Hassan Diab.

Dr. Diab has been caught in a political nightmare in which the existence of an accusation has become the foundation for a guilty finding in a trial with no official transcripts and no opportunity for appeal. While our hearts go out to the victims, families and communities hurt by this act of anti-Semitic terror, causing further damage to the life of an innocent man and continued harm to his family will not heal their pain. Canada must refuse to extradite Hassan Diab and end his 15-year long ordeal. Source

NDP MPP Joel Harden sends letter to PM Trudeau in solidarity with Hassan Diab

Rush to wrongful judgement: The case of Hassan Diab

Michelle Weinroth: An analysis of the sham trial of Hassan Diab

Podcast: Hassan Diab convicted and sentence to life despite no new evidence - with Alex Neve

ICLMG supports new bill to increase CSIS accountability

ICLMG 10/05/23 - ICLMG joins member of Parliament for Scarborough Centre, Salma Zahid, in a press conference announcing the tabling of Bill C-331, An Act to amend the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act (duty of candour). The bill aims to ensure greater transparency and accountability when CSIS misleads the courts and breaches its duty of candour. ICLMG’s intervention starts at 9:08.

Bill C-331 An Act to amend the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act (duty of candour), which follows a public consultation process launched last summer, consists of three elements:

• Include in the annual report by the Director of CSIS to the Minister of Public Safety information on the number of breaches of the duty of candour to the courts, a description of each breach, and any remedial action taken. This classified report is also provided to the National Security and Intelligence Review Agency.
• Require the Minister to table annually in the House of Commons an unclassified copy of the information described above related to breaches and remedial action taken.
• Amend the Oath of Office sworn by the CSIS director and employees to include duties owed to the courts, such as the duty of candour.

For more information on the bill, click here. Read more - Lire plus

ACTION: CSIS is not above the law

Open Letter: Protect our rights to privacy, free expression and press freedom

ICLMG is one of the letter's signatories

Fight for the Future 03/05/23 - On World Press Freedom Day, we, the undersigned organisations and companies — a global network of over 40 organisations have united to defend the right to privacy. We are writing this open letter to urgently appeal to governments to publicly pledge your support to protect encryption and ensure a free and open Internet.

Encryption is a critical tool for user privacy, data security, safety online, press freedom, self determination, and free expression. Without encryption, users’ data and communications can be accessed by law enforcement and malicious actors. Government attacks on encrypted services threaten privacy and puts users at risk. This might seem like a distant problem primarily faced in authoritarian countries but the threat is just as real and knocking at the doors of democratic nations. 

Many in the EU, the USA, UK, Canada and Australia would like to force encrypted services to backdoor their encryption or otherwise block access to encrypted tools and services such as Tor, Signal, or Tutanota. Encrypted services are at the forefront of the battle for online privacy, freedom of the press, freedom of opinion and expression. Many journalists, whistleblowers and activists depend on secure, encrypted solutions to protect their data as well as their identity. Access to these tools can be literally life or death for those who rely on them.

Today, on World Press Freedom Day, we urge democratic leaders not to follow the path of authoritarian governments like Russia and Iran, who actively limit their citizens’ access to encrypted services. Protect encryption and uphold the human right to privacy. This is key to ensuring safety online, free and secure identity development, self-determination, free expression, freedom of the press, and other rights that are at the core of democracy. [...]

Taking away the right to privacy online limits the ability to exercise fundamental human rights such as freedom of expression and opinion, press freedom, and freedom of speech.

As organisations that believe in the power of the right to privacy as an enabler of free speech and freedom of the press, we call on all governments to:

• Ensure that encryption is not being undermined via overreaching legislative initiatives.
• Ensure that technologies providing secure, encrypted services are not being blocked or throttled.
• Revisit any bills, laws and policies that legitimise undermining encryption or blocking access to services offering encrypted communication, particularly the Surveillance Legislation Amendment Act in Australia, the EARN IT Act in the US, the Online Safety Bill in the UK, Bill C26 in Canada, India’s Directions 20(3)/2022 – CERT-In and the proposed version of the rules to prevent and combat child sexual abuse in the EU. Read more - Lire plus

ACTION: Tell the US: Don’t attack online encryption! Protect free speech and reject the dangerous EARN IT Act

30 years of "crypto wars“: The EU chat control is the final enemy in the battle over encryption

Citizenship was a right. Is it now a privilege?

CBC Radio 02/05/2023 - Guests in this episode of Ideas: 

• Sally Lane is the mother of Jack Letts who is currently in prison in northeast Syria.
• Audrey Macklin is a professor of law, Chair of Human Rights, and the director of the Center for Criminology and Socio Legal Studies at the University of Toronto.
• Nisha Kapoor is an associate professor of sociology at the University of Warwick.
• Asiya Hirji is a lawyer with Downtown Legal Services and represents two non-Canadian mothers and their Canadian children currently detained in northeast Syria.

In September 2014, Jack Letts called his parents with a shocking update: he was in Syria. He told them he'd gone to see how he could help in the "protests against Assad," according to his mother. A few short months prior, Sally Lane and her husband, John, had said goodbye to their son so he could further his study of Islam and Arabic. They paid for his ticket to go first to Jordan to visit a friend, and then on to Kuwait to take his courses. That September phone call kicked off an almost-decade-long fight to get Letts out of Syria — a fight that still has no resolution.

Letts was born and raised in Britain. When it became clear that he was in Syria, the British government ultimately stripped his citizenship in 2019. But because he's a dual British-Canadian citizen, Letts retains the right to return to Canada. Lane says the British Foreign Office told her, "there was no point in speaking to them anymore. I should speak to the Canadians." Letts is part of a group of 23 Canadians whose request to come back to Canada from detention in Syria brings up a key question: what does the Canadian government owe its citizens? Critics have argued that citizenship rights that were once strong and robust have weakened significantly. 

"I think the place to start with this is really post-9/11 when we first saw, what I'll call, the securitization of immigration," said Audrey Macklin, a professor of law at the University of Toronto. She says the framing of immigration as a potential threat to national security of the nation has always been present but that it really "came to the fore" in those early years. There was an accompanying narrative shift: citizenship is not a right — it's a privilege. Nisha Kapoor, who teaches sociology at the University of Warwick in the UK, says "it was quite a shift" from how citizenship was ordinarily understood in liberal democratic countries. "One of the things that's happened through the war on terror is the normalization of the idea that citizenship is a more precarious institution and should be dependent on the behaviour of individuals." 

Macklin says citizenship feels like a privilege in the sense that people often feel proud to belong to a country and feel lucky to have the advantages that come with being a citizen. But she added there's another understanding of privilege that makes citizenship more vulnerable. "In law, a privilege is something that belongs to the sovereign, not to you as the individual. And it's something that can be granted, withheld, offered, and taken away, in some sense, almost arbitrarily." Macklin says this understanding of privilege in a legal sense — that citizenship is something that belongs to the state and not the individual — is "a really dangerous idea." And it results in making everybody vulnerable to being stripped of their fundamental and basic entitlements as a citizen.

Canada, like many other countries after 9/11, stepped up the use of immigration laws to pursue non-citizens it deemed a threat. But it also weakened the institution of citizenship itself by changing citizens into non-citizens. In 2014, the government passed a law to strip citizenship from individuals who were deemed a threat to national security, thus paving the way to removing them from Canada. The citizenship revocation law in Canada was itself repealed in 2017 making Canada part of a small minority of countries bucking the trend of expanding state powers to denationalize their citizens. But some argue the spirit of that law lingers on.

Asiya Hirji is a Toronto lawyer and represents a group of Canadian children and their non-Canadian mothers in Kurdish detention camps. "I think the example of what's happening in northeast Syria shows that in some ways these sanctions are still actually being applied, but silently and subtly." She says that while for the government revocation is no longer possible, repudiation is still an option. And citizens can retain their citizenship but they effectively lose their citizenship rights. Listen & read more - Écouter et lire plus

ACTION: Canada must repatriate all Canadians detained in NE Syria now!

ACTION: Call/Write to Ensure Ottawa Obeys Court Order to Bring Canadian Detainees Home from Syria ASAP

Faisal Kutty: The CRA’s biased approach to Eid celebrations

The Toronto Star 29/04/2023 - Last week, Muslims across the world celebrated Eid al-Fitr with prayers, cultural foods, and festivities. As Muslims across Canada celebrated Eid, it was heartening to see dignitaries, including federal members of Parliament, joining in to share their best wishes. However, the irony of this situation is not lost on many in the Muslim community. While federal politicians celebrate Eid with Muslims, the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) has been targeting Muslim charities with biased audits, attempting to define Islam for Canadian Muslims through a narrow lens of understanding faith.

One of the most dominant examples of this bias is the CRA’s belief that Eid celebrations as Muslims know and practice it is not religious but rather social. According to the CRA, charities that organize Eid beyond the minutes spent on actual prayer should be scrutinized for possible violations of the Income Tax Act. This bias can be contrasted with the way churches organize Christmas celebrations, which I assume are considered religious by the CRA. This view ignores the deep religious significance of Eid for Muslims. Eid al-Fitr, or the “Festival of Breaking the Fast” and Eid al-Adha, or the “Festival of Sacrifice,” marking the end of the annual pilgrimage to Mecca, are the two major holidays celebrated by Muslims.

Eid is celebrated with morning prayers, formal embraces, and greetings of “Eid Mubarak” or “have a blessed Eid.” It is a time when family and friends come together to enjoy the celebrations, exchange gifts, and prepare special meals, often as a community. The community building aspects of religious rituals cannot and must not be stripped of spiritual significance if religious freedom is to have any real value beyond lip service. Many federal politicians have committed to addressing this systemic Islamophobia in the CRA, while the government for two years has offered no substantial resolution to this issue except for a failed investigation of the CRA by the taxpayer ombudsperson.

However, it is important to remember that the CRA does not have the right to define what is and what is not religious. The Supreme Court of Canada is clear that religion involves more than just beliefs, but also traditions and relationships and defined a protected religious practice to be a sincere belief that an action has religious significance for an individual or a community. It is a well-established tradition of the Islamic faith, following the example of the Prophet Muhammad (Peace be upon him), to celebrate Eid as a community and rejoice together, bringing happiness to families on this special day. The CRA’s attempt to diminish Eid to just a social event is misguided, just like its attempt to undermine the importance of youth activities in nurturing religious values and ideals within a community.

Muslims have the right to celebrate their religious festivals without fear of discrimination. This is why the Muslim Association of Canada (MAC) has launched a charter challenge in the Ontario Superior Court to demonstrate that the CRA audits of Muslim charities violate our freedom of religion. For years, MAC has organized the largest Eid festivals across the country, bringing together thousands of Canadian Muslims to celebrate their religious holiday. These events have seen federal MPs and Prime Minister Trudeau himself joining in. The CRA’s prejudice toward Muslim charities like MAC for facilitating rituals to advance its religious ideals raises the question of who has the wrong understanding of religious rights: the Supreme Court, the federal legislature or the CRA? It is time for the Canadian government to take concrete actions to ensure that the CRA does not continue to violate the rights of Muslim charities and to demonstrate that Canada is a country where all religions are respected and protected. Source

New book: Manufacturing Threats: Case Studies of State Manipulation and Entrapment in Canada

Leftwingbooks 2023 - Manufacturing Threats tells the story of police provocateurs going back to the time of Canadian Confederation. Whether against communism or the FLQ, the Black Liberation Movement or the Muslim community, Alexandre Popovic documents the role Canada's secret services have played in repressing marginalized communities and movements for social change. From bombings and harassment campaigns, to setting up fake urban guerrilla cells and leading invasions from the US, there seem to be no limits to what the operatives of the Canadian state will do to stoke fear and justify their own ever-growing budgets.

Beyond just documenting these nefarious and shocking misdeeds, Manufacturing Threats shows the perennial failures of attempts to rein in or reform these agencies. Popovic argues that the entire concept of repressive apparatuses whose actions must be hidden from the public and even elected politicians—which has remained the untouchable assumption of these reform efforts—is itself the problem, and that these sorts of outrages will continue unless real transparency and accountability can be achieved.

Different chapters detail the 19th-century origins of Canada's secret police in countering the Irish nationalist Fenians, many of whom were based in the United States, and the Métis Red River Rebellion led by Louis Riel. Popovic goes on to show the role of entrapment and provocation in countering the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and Communist Party in the 1920s and '30s, and then in attempting to entrap Black and Indigenous activists and in successfully infiltrating and manipulating the nationalist Front de Libération du Québec (FLQ) in the 1960s and '70s. Examining the work of the provincial and federal governments' Keable and McDonald Commissions, which came about following disclosures of RCMP dirty tricks (arson, break-ins, kidnappings...), and which led to the establishment of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), Popovic then details three major examples of CSIS informants (Marc-André Boivin, Grant Bristow, and Joseph Gilles Breault) who were allowed to carry out acts of violence and intimidation in the service of their government paymasters.

This book is an important introduction to the subject of Canada's repressive agencies and the legislation and lack of oversight that have structured their use of agents provocateurs and informants over the years. First published in French as Produire le menace (Sabotart, 2017), this first English-language edition includes updated information as of 2022. Source

Intelligence watchdog questions cyber agency's approach to international law, CSE insists it was above board

CBC News 28/04/2023 - One of Canada's intelligence watchdogs has scolded the country's cyber security agency over its approach to international law. The National Security and Intelligence Review Agency reviewed the Communications Security Establishment's activities in 2019, the first year after it received new powers. While the review was completed in 2020, its report was made public only this week. The CSE insists it never violated international law and is calling the matter a "philosophical" disagreement with its oversight body. "CSE, because we are the ones who deal with foreign cyber operations, did not violate international law. We did not even come close to violating international law," Nabih Eldebs, CSE deputy chief of authorities, compliance and transparency, told CBC News. "This was not in our ethos, this was not in our thinking."

CSE is empowered to gather foreign signals intelligence and defend Canada's national security, including government of Canada servers and networks. It also has a growing role in protecting Canada's critical infrastructure, such as banks, telecommunications and the energy industry. To do all that, the agency was granted the ability in 2018 — with ministerial consent — to launch "active cyber operations" to disrupt threats from terrorist groups, hostile intelligence agencies and state-sponsored hackers. As an example of what this power allows it to do, CSE says it can prevent a foreign terrorist group from communicating or planning attacks by disabling their communication devices. In its report, NSIRA wrote that when it asked CSE to explain its legal obligations when launching such operations, the agency's response was lacking. "CSE has not sufficiently examined its obligations under international law," said the intelligence review body in its heavily redacted report. [...]

While CSE won't share details of the active operations it has run in other countries, the disagreement between the two bodies calls attention to how Canada behaves in the cyber world. "International law applies to what we do in cyberspace, just like it applies to anything we would do if we were sending troops over to engage in an offensive operation," said Leah West, a professor of national security law at Carleton University. "International law governs how states can engage in other states. And there'll be questions about whether or not CSE's actions or Canada's actions violate the other states' sovereignty, violate the principle of non-intervention." The stakes are high, she added, given the opportunity for retaliation. "Once you violate international law, states potentially have a right to respond to your violations," said West. Read more - Lire plus

Documents related to Canadian Forces propaganda program have disappeared — investigation is under way

Ottawa Citizen 11/05/2023 - Documents related to a controversial military propaganda program designed to influence and change the behaviour of the Canadian public have disappeared.

The Canadian Forces spent $1.2 million on behaviour modification training used by the parent firm of Cambridge Analytica, the company that was the centre of a scandal in which personal data of Facebook users was provided to U.S. President Donald Trump’s political campaign.



At the time, the Canadian Forces justified the cost in 2019 and 2020 to train 40 military and civilian public-affairs staff by pointing out that the fee also covered the purchase of the rights to the courseware, production of various reports and a test scenario of the behaviour modification techniques. But National Defence now admits the detailed course curriculum, progress reports and a live case study conducted by Canadian Forces personnel using the behaviour modification techniques can’t be found. “We do not currently have access to these documents,” spokesperson Dan Le Bouthillier confirmed.

Details about the two contracts to a company called Emic Consulting were revealed in October 2020 in a report by Emma Briant, a Fellow at Bard College in the United States and a specialist in researching military propaganda. Briant noted the training the Canadian military staff received was a direct descendent of SCL Group’s “behavioural dynamics methodology,” which promises to help military clients analyze and profile groups to find the best strategy to effectively influence a target audience’s behaviour.

SCL, a strategic communications firm, had been linked to propaganda campaigns used by various militaries, having drawn on psychological and social science research to distill techniques aimed at manipulating group behaviour. Its subsidiary, Cambridge Analytica, was at the centre of a scandal where personal data of more than 30 million Facebook users was obtained and later provided to Republicans Donald Trump and Ted Cruz for their 2016 political campaigns.

The contract to Emic came at a time when the Canadian Forces was ramping up its skills in “influence operations,” propaganda and data mining for campaigns that could be directed at either overseas populations or Canadians. This newspaper produced a series of reports detailing how information was culled by the Canadian Forces from social-media accounts of members of the public in Ontario and data was compiled on peaceful Black Lives Matter gatherings. Military commanders also proceeded with a plan to use propaganda techniques employed during the Afghanistan war, claiming that was needed to head off civil disobedience by Canadians during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In addition, there was a September 2020 incident where military personnel forged a letter from the Nova Scotia government warning about wolves on the loose in a particular region. The letter, part of a military test of propaganda techniques, was inadvertently distributed to residents, prompting panicked calls to Nova Scotia officials who were unaware the Canadian Army was behind the deception. A series of internal investigations in 2021 concluded that military commanders violated federal rules and acted without authority when they ordered intelligence teams to collect information on the public and to use propaganda techniques against Canadians. [...]

The Information Commissioner of Canada is also investigating. It was launched after National Defence responded to an access to information request from the Canada Files website requesting the curriculum, progress reports and the live case study. The Canada Files, which describes itself as a socialist platform conducting investigations and analysis into Canada’s foreign policy and the military-industrial complex, was informed no records could be found. The Canada Files submitted a complaint to Information Commissioner Caroline Maynard and the investigation started in 2022. Read more - Lire plus

Brandi Morin: Stranded on the dark roads of Wet’suwet’en territory with CGL security

Indiginews 24/04/2023 - [...] His colleague soon pulled up, in another white pickup truck, CGL’s standard vehicles, and the two attempted to remove my tire and put on the spare. They didn’t have the right tools, so his colleague offered to drive me the rest of the way to Unis’tot’en.



Just then, another white pickup truck came around the corner. The driver started to slow down. I saw it was an RCMP officer — when the CGL security waved them off (signalling it was ok and I was not impeding anything) the cop waved back, grinning ear to ear. I thought it was strange the two had such a friendly rapport, but they are working together to keep order (and suppress dissent) along these isolated roads. 

What made me shiver was the thought of these lands being unjustly controlled — it was just like the old days, when the colonizers first arrived. They showed up, herded our people onto tracks of land called reserves, then stole the land and did what they wanted with it. If any Indigenous person stood in their way, they were arrested and jailed.

I snapped back to the present day, but realized the forced, militarized colonization of Indigenous lands and people is still alive and well. And what a shuttering, sad situation, given we are supposedly in an era of reconciliation. 

[...] I asked Tait how she’s been doing since the drilling under Wedzin’ Kwa started. 

Wedzin’ Kwa is the sacred river system parallel to the Unis’tot’en Healing Centre and the community’s sole source of drinking water. It’s the river the Unis’tot’en matriarchs and other land defenders have battled so hard to protect from the pipeline. Tait, her mother and Huson have all been arrested for standing in its way. 

“Honestly,” she sighs, then adjusts her eyeglasses. “It’s really hard to confront that reality. And I think we’ve been focused on maintaining our space and trying to maintain our wellness and our health. And realizing the vision of this space and the work we want to do here. So, if anything, I’ve probably been trying to avoid a lot of updates [about the drilling] and following in depth because it’s distressing and hard to confront.”

Earlier that morning, Tait took me on a tour of the healing centre grounds. We walked a narrow path through the snow to the banks of Wedzin’ Kwa and drank the ice-cold fresh water. Tait, Freda and others believe the water has healing properties because it is uncontaminated and carries essential minerals from the glaciers. While standing on the rocky shoreline, Tait fixed her gaze on a truck crossing a bridge that connects Unis’tot’en territory to Gidimt’en, another Wet’suwet’en clan. The truck stops alongside a CGL security truck that’s parked at the end of the bridge to the south, facing Unis’tot’en, 24/7. Tait looks annoyed. 

“We deserve to exist here. We deserve to be undisturbed and at peace and to live as our ancestors did and to protect what’s left for future generations,” she said, while shaking her head in frustration. “As Indigenous people, when our rights are eroded in this way, over what are our sacred responsibilities to protect and steward our territory, we need to stand together on those things and push for justice.” She kneels on the rocky shoreline, cups her hand, and sips more from Wedzin’ Kwa. A peaceful expression appears across her face. [...]

“People are reluctant to send folks to our space on the land to heal when they know the police are going to come and harass and re-traumatize folks. That we’re going to be watched by CGL security, which is disgusting and abhorrent.” When young mothers with children fleeing domestic violence or individuals struggling with trauma come to stay at Unis’tot’en, the staff let them know they’re being surveilled.

“And there’s no one to hold them (CGL) accountable because the bodies that are supposed to protect us, we’re never designed to protect us in the first place,” said Tait, adding that in the past couple of months, they’ve noticed multiple drones in the sky surrounding the healing centre at night. Tait gifted Oyate a telescope on her ninth birthday recently. “We’re trying to go stargazing at night and are surrounded by drones, so, It’s really sad and laughable in some ways. Like some nights we’ll go and see if it’s a good night to see the moon and it’s like, oh, well the brightest objects in the sky right now (are the drones).”

It used to be pitch black out at night other than the stars and moon in the sky — now a massive dome of unnatural light illuminates the horizon. It’s from the drill zone. “There’s constant noise (from the drill), there’s constant light,” shrugged Tait. “We used to have perfect starry lights out here with zero light pollution, now look at it. And we have security parked aiming their headlights at our centre much of the time.” This night was foggy but the moon and stars were still visible. Within 15 minutes Tait found a drone far off in the sky and then another not long afterward. I looked through the telescope and saw a small, multi-coloured object moving around. “That’s it. That’s one of them,” said Tait.

Again, I was shocked. That this was happening in so-called Canada in 2023. That unarmed, peaceful Indigenous citizens were being stalked and surveilled in their own lands. After leaving Unis’tot’en, I inquired with CGL as to if it was operating drones to spy on Unis’tot’en, which it denied. The RCMP did admit to using drones, but only during daylight hours and during active police enforcement. Read more - Lire plus

ACTION to support the Unist'ot'en camp

ACTION: Abolish CIRG

Experts want Canada's proposed law to include stronger privacy and human rights protections

CBC News 06/05/2023 - Luke Stark, an assistant professor of information and media studies at Western University in London, Ont. who researches the social impacts of technologies such as artificial intelligence, is among the signatories [alongside the ICLMG] of an open letter critical of the federal government's proposed legislation on artificial intelligence, Bill C-27. The letter argues the government's Artificial Intelligence and Data Act (AIDA), which is part of C-27, is too short on details, leaving many important aspects of the rules around AI to be decided after the law is passed.

The legislation, tabled last June, recently completed its second reading in the House of Commons and will be sent to committee for study. In a statement, a spokesperson for Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada said "the government expects that amendments will be proposed in response to testimony from experts at committee, and is open to considering amendments that would improve the bill." Experts say other jurisdictions, including the European Union and the United Kingdom, have moved more quickly toward putting in place strong rules governing AI. They cite a long list of human rights and privacy concerns related to the technology, ranging from its use by law enforcement, misinformation and instances where it reinforces patterns of racism and discrimination.

The proposed legislation wouldn't adequately address such concerns, said Maroussia Lévesque, a PhD candidate in law at Harvard University who previously led the AI and human rights file at Global Affairs Canada. Lévesque described the legislation as an "empty shell" in a recent essay, saying it lacks "basic legal clarity." In an interview over Zoom, Lévesque held up a draft of the law covered in blue sticky tabs – each one marking an instance where a provision of the law remains undefined. "This bill leaves really important concepts to be defined later in regulation," she said.

The bill also proposes the creation of a new commissioner to oversee AI and data in Canada, which seems like a positive step on the surface for those hoping for greater oversight. But Lévesque said the position is a "misnomer," since unlike some other commissioners, the AI and Data appointee won't be an independent agent, heading a regulatory agency. "From a structural standpoint, it is really problematic," she said. "You're folding protection into an innovation-driven mission and sometimes these will be at odds. It's like putting the brakes and stepping on the accelerator at the same time."

Lévesque said the EU has a "much more robust scheme," when it comes to proposed legislation on artificial intelligence. The European Commission began drafting their legislation in 2021 and is nearing the finish line. Under the legislation, companies deploying generative AI tools, such as ChatGPT, will have to disclose any copyrighted material used to develop their systems. Lévesque likened their approach to the checks required before a new airplane or pharmaceutical drug is brought to market. "It's not perfect — people can disagree about it. But it's on the brink of being adopted now, and it bans certain types of AI systems." 

In Stark's view, the Liberal government has put an emphasis on AI as a driver of economic growth and tried to brand Canada as an "ethical AI centre." "To fulfil the promise of that kind of messaging, I'd like to see the government being much more, broadly, consultative and much more engaged outside the kind of technical communities Montreal, and Toronto that I think have a lot of sway with the government," he said.

The Canadian Civil Liberties Association is among the groups hoping to be heard in this next round of consultations. "We have not had sufficient input from key stakeholders, minority groups and people who we think are likely to be disproportionately affected by this bill," said Tashi Alford-Duguid, a privacy lawyer with CCLA. Alford-Duguid said the government needs to take a "hurry up and slow down" approach. "The U.K. has undertaken much more extensive consultations; we know that the EU is in the midst of very extensive consultations. And while neither of those laws look like they're going to be perfect, the Canadian government is coming in at this late hour, and trying to give us such rushed and ineffective legislation instead," he said. "We can just look around and see we can already do better than this." Source

Rideau Institute: Alarms sounded on growing AI risks

AI Regulation Should Not Be a Blank Cheque for Government

Michael Geist: Why the Government Should Hit the Regenerate Button on its AI Bill

Bianca Wylie: ISED’s Bill C-27 + AIDA. Part 4: Calling on Federal MPs For a Necessary Defense of Democratic Process

AI company is silent on ChatGPT’s use by the Pentagon despite an explicit ban in its ethics policy

The foreign influence registry could fail a Charter challenge

Rideau Institute 12/05/2023 - We first considered the potential dangers of a foreign influence transparency registry for Canada in our blog post of 21 April. Our concerns have only increased since then. [...]

In the CBC article, Intelligence is not truth’: Why prosecuting foreign election interference is rare” (cbc.ca, 2 Mar 2023), on the government’s intentions to move forward with the registry, its authors write:

Under a foreign agent registry, people who act on behalf of a foreign state to advance its goals would have to disclose their ties to the government employing them.

The article goes on to say that Canada is seeking to ‘learn from the US’, which has had a Foreign Agent Registry Act since 1938. But the scope of the American registry goes far beyond people “employed by a foreign state to advance its goals”, as the International Center for Not-for-Profit Law (ICNL), in its extensive work on the dangers to civil society from this legislation, has repeatedly demonstrated. In their website introduction to their work, they state:

Amidst concern about foreign influence, the Justice Department has ramped up enforcement of the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA). While it is understandable that policymakers want to protect U.S. politics from foreign interference, FARA is overly broad and vague. It has been repeatedly “weaponized” to target nonprofits, activists, and others. To address this problem, ICNL has called for better targeting of FARA’s provisions.

In their short briefer on the danger of FARA to U.S. civil society, (March 2021), they include the following astonishing examples of the scope of entities that must register:

• A U.S. religious organization to register as a “foreign agent” for helping prepare banners for foreign attendees to a March for Life rally because in printing banners for a foreigner it acted as a “publicity agent” under the Act. 19, 2019, advisory opinion.
• A U.S. environmental nonprofit to register because it received a grant from a foreign government to improve multi-national corporations’ product sourcing practices to reduce the effect on the environment in tropical countries. March 13, 2020, advisory opinion.
• A consultant of a foreign non-governmental foundation to register for helping the foundation educate members of the U.S. public about development, democracy, and good governance issues abroad. 6, 2019, advisory opinion.

The extent of the problems with the American legislation we are apparently seeking to emulate is further elaborated in detail in the following articles by Nick Robinson, the Senior Legal Advisor, for the U.S. Program of ICNL:

• Fixing the FARA Mess, Just Security, March 16, 2022 and
• The Foreign Agents Registration Act Is Broken, Foreign Policy, July 22, 2019

And then there is the key role that FARA plays in justifying laws that target civil society around the world. An ICNL brief, available in PDF format here, on this issue begins:

The past decade has witnessed a rise in authoritarianism and tightening space for civil society worldwide. Foreign agent laws have been a key part of that trend, with governments weaponizing both their overbreadth and ambiguity to target civil society and dissent.

See also “Foreign Agents” in an Interconnected World: FARA and the Weaponization of Transparency, Duke Law Journal (2020)

Ceasefire.ca comments: There is no mention in the CBC article of any concerns over the American registry. [...]

Quite aside from its potentially grave effects on civil society groups, the proposed registry has a potential chilling effect on the freedom of expression of all Canadians, particularly diaspora communities who risk being stigmatized by the very tool that is meant to shield them from foreign interference.

Given the extraordinary damage that could be caused to the fundamental freedom of expression by overreach (even if inadvertent) in the proposed Foreign Influence Transparency Registry, we call on the Government of Canada to forthwith indicate its intention to refer its draft registry legislation to the Supreme Court of Canada for an advisory opinion. Read more - Lire plus

ACTION: Canada should reconsider its proposed Foreign Influence Transparency Registry

Canada is set to name foreign labs and universities that pose risk to national security

230+ groups oppose the EU foreign interference law: Civil society is at risk

Israel Kills 13, Including Women & Children, in Airstrikes Targeting Militant Leaders in Gaza

DemocracyNow! 09/05/2023 - This is a horrific example once again of Israel, in a long history, not only since this new extraordinarily far, far extremist right-wing government has taken power — this has been the case before in the willingness to attack Gaza, to attack civilians. And this was an attack on a residential apartment building. It was no surprise, in the middle of the night, that children were among the dead, that people were killed in their beds. And the fact that three of them are alleged to have been commanders of the Islamic Jihad organization does not give Israel the right to carry out this kind of extrajudicial killing, this kind of assault, this kind of murder by bomb, when there is knowledge that there will be civilian casualties.

There is a desperate need to go back, first of all, to the ceasefire. Israel’s violation of it was clear and unequivocal. This was a complete violation of international law, international human rights law and international humanitarian law. As the occupying power, Israel has the obligation to protect the civilian population. That’s across the board. It doesn’t matter what other forces are negotiating with it, whether there are negotiations underway or not. That is Israel’s obligation as the occupying power. Instead, we’re seeing the expansion of an apartheid regime, and one which is prepared to use violence at extraordinary levels without a moment’s hesitation. And it’s a complete violation, and the U.S. should stop its military support as a result. Read more - Lire plus

Amnesty International: Israeli authorities are using facial recognition technology to entrench apartheid

Foreign Affairs Committee: Support the Motion to Study Canada’s Role in Israel-Palestine!

How Canada Helped Israel Whitewash Its Killing Of A Palestinian Journalist

EVENTS: Nakba at 75 – Jews Say Enough is Enough! End Israeli Apartheid

Human rights experts alarmed over ‘imminent executions’ in Saudi Arabia

UN News 03/05/2023 - On Wednesday, a large group of UN-appointed independent human rights experts expressed concern over the possibly imminent execution of three members of the Howeitat tribe in Saudi Arabia, urging authorities to stop the process. “Despite being charged with terrorism, they were reportedly arrested for resisting forced evictions in the name of the NEOM project and the construction of a 170km linear city called The Line,” the UN experts said.

NEOM is a futuristic urban development project backed by the Saudi Public Investment Fund. Shadly Ahmad Mahmoud Abou Taqiqa al-Huwaiti, Mr Ibrahim Salih Ahmad Abou Khalil al-Huwaiti and Mr Atallah Moussa Mohammed al-Huwaiti were sentenced to death on 5 August last year, and their sentences were backed by Saudi Arabia’s Specialised Criminal Court of Appeal, on 23 January. Three other members of the Howeitat tribe were sentenced to “severe prison terms” said a press release issued on behalf of the experts: Abdelnasser Ahmad Mahmoud Abou Taqiqa al-Huwaiti received a 27 year sentence; Mahmoud Ahmad Mahmoud Abou Taqiqa al-Huwaiti, 35 years; and Abdullah Dakhilallah al-Huwaiti was sentenced to 50 years in jail.

“Under international law, States that have not yet abolished the death penalty may only impose it for the ‘most serious crimes’, involving intentional killing,” the experts said. “We do not believe the actions in question meet this threshold.” The UN Human Rights Council-appointed experts urged the Saudi authorities to investigate allegations of torture and other mistreatment involving the men, promptly and impartially. They also asked authorities to review the sentences imposed, and, if appropriate, to retry them according with the norms and standards of due process. “Any statement that is proven to have been made as a result of torture is inadmissible in any proceedings,” the human rights experts said. “All six individuals have been charged under the overly vague 2017 Saudi law on combating crimes of terrorism and its financing,” the experts said, warning that this law does not appear to be in line with international law, as raised several times by Special Procedures.

The authorities have reportedly made several moves to evict members of the Howeitat tribe from their homes and traditional lands, in three villages, all related to the NOEM project development, since January 2020. Despite promises that they would be involved in the process and receive fair compensation, many have allegedly been evicted and their homes demolished without suitable compensation, the experts said. During the initial protests, one member of the tribe was reportedly killed in his own home by members of the Saudi Special Forces. Read more - Lire plus

Suit by Renowned Saudi Human Rights Activist Details Harms Caused by Export of U.S. Cybersurveillance Technology and Training to Repressive Regimes

‘The forever prisoner’: Abu Zubaydah’s drawings expose the US’s depraved torture policy

The Guardian 11/05/2023 - A detainee held in the US prison camp at Guantánamo Bay who was used as a human guinea pig in the CIA’s post-9/11 torture program has produced the most comprehensive and detailed account yet seen of the brutal techniques to which he was subjected. Abu Zubaydah has created a series of 40 drawings that chronicle the torture he endured in a number of CIA dark sites between 2002 and 2006 and at Guantánamo Bay. In the absence of a full official accounting of the torture program, which the CIA and the FBI have labored for years to keep secret, the images give a unique and searing insight into a grisly period in US history.

The drawings, which Zubaydah has annotated with his own words, depict gruesome acts of violence, sexual and religious humiliation, and prolonged psychological terror committed against him and other detainees. They were sketched from memory in his Guantánamo cell and sent to one of his lawyers, Prof Mark Denbeaux. Together with his students at the Center for Policy and Research at Seton Hall University law school, Denbeaux compiled Zubaydah’s images and words into a new report. The Guardian is posting the report, American Torturers: FBI and CIA Abuses at Dark Sites and Guantánamo, for the first time along with a set of never-before-seen sketches. “Abu Zubaydah is the poster child for America’s torture program,” Denbeaux said. “He was the first person to be tortured, having been approved by the Department of Justice based on facts that the CIA knew to be false. His drawings are the ultimate repudiation of the failure and abuses of torture.” [...]

Zubaydah’s sketches provide a unique visual record of the US government’s use of torture in the wake of 9/11. Videotapes of Zubaydah being tortured were filmed by the CIA but then destroyed in violation of a court order, while a 6,700-page torture report by the Senate intelligence committee remains secret almost a decade after it was completed. Though the full Senate report has never been made public, its conclusion is known: that the abuse of Zubaydah and other detainees failed to elicit any new intelligence. In other words, torture does not work.

Zubaydah, 52, was captured in Pakistan in March 2002 and renditioned to several CIA dark sites in Poland, Lithuania and elsewhere. He was the first victim of what was to become the widespread use of torture by the US against terror suspects. He was transferred to Guantánamo in 2006, where he has been held ever since. The US initially claimed he was a top al-Qaida operative but was forced to concede he was not even a member of the terror group. “Everybody agrees, they tortured the wrong guy; they went ahead anyway so they could get permission to torture other people,” Denbeaux said. Zubaydah’s depictions are so accurately rendered that the faces of the CIA and FBI agents have been redacted to protect their identities. They reveal the extent to which the US government violated international laws and even its own guidelines on what it euphemistically called “enhanced interrogation techniques”. Read more - Lire plus

‘Crimes against humanity’: UN body calls for release of Guantánamo inmate

The Guardian 28/04/2023 - A UN body has declared that the detention of a long-term Guantánamo inmate, Abu Zubaydah, has no lawful basis and called for his immediate release, warning that the systemic deprivation of liberty at the camp may “constitute crimes against humanity”.

The UN working group on arbitrary detention (UNWGAD), also declared the UK, among other countries, was “jointly responsible for the torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment of Mr Zubaydah” over his more than 20 years in detention. The UNWGAD finding released on Friday specifically addresses the case of Zubaydah, a 52-year-old Palestinian captured in Pakistan in March 2002, and held and tortured in a series of CIA black sites, before being transferred to the Guantánamo Bay prison camp in 2006. The US initially claimed he was “number three” in al-Qaida but later conceded he was not a member at all.

The finding went further to address detention at Guantánamo in general, and “expresses grave concern about the pattern that all these cases follow and recalls that, under certain circumstances, widespread or systematic imprisonment or other severe deprivation of liberty in violation of fundamental rules of international law may constitute crimes against humanity”. The UN working group is a quasi-judicial body, issuing legal judgments on behalf of the international community, but they are not binding, nor does it have the power to enforce its findings. It is made up of five legal experts from around the world: the current panel consists of lawyers, law professors and former judges drawn from Malaysia, New Zealand, Ukraine, Ecuador and Zambia.

Friday marks the first time an international body has referred to the 21-year-old prison camp as a potential crime against humanity, the first time such a body has ruled against the US for Abu Zubaydah’s detention, and the first international case finding against the UK, Morocco, Thailand and Afghanistan, all of whom are deemed complicit in arbitrary detention, rendition and torture. The decision also found Pakistan, Poland and Lithuania to be part responsible: Pakistan for participation in his arrest and rendition, and Poland and Lithuania for hosting black sites. The European Court of Human Rights has previously ruled against Poland and Lithuania for their participation in the web of secret detention facilities and rendition flights. [...]

Helen Duffy, Zubaydah’s international legal representative stated: “We need to reckon with the fact that the ‘war on terror’, as waged for 20 years, has failed. But we cannot pretend to learn lessons from it while perpetuating its most notorious wrongs.” There are 30 inmates left at the Guantánamo camp, of which only one has been convicted of a crime; 10 are involved in military tribunal proceedings, although in most cases, the trials have not even started; 16 have been recommended for a transfer to another country, pending security guarantees; and the Biden administration has been in quiet negotiations with foreign governments to persuade them to accept transferred inmates. Zubaydah is one of three “forever prisoners” who have not been charged and not been recommended for transfer. Read more - Lire plus

Emptying Guantánamo Is Not the Same as Closing Guantánamo

Snopes: Did Ron DeSantis Observe Guantanamo Force-Feeding as Navy JAG?

Guantánamo detainees may start dying if the US does not act

War Court Proceedings Stream to Guantánamo From a Secret Chamber in Virginia

Former Guantanamo Bay Inmate Showcases 20-year Ordeal In Paintings

U.S. Domestic Terrorism Prosecutions: The Reality Behind the Government’s Inflated Numbers

Just Security 08/05/2023 - Since the 9/11 attacks, counterterrorism has been the top priority of the Department of Justice (DOJ). Its initial single-minded focus on international terrorism has shifted in recent years to encompass domestic terrorism. Over the last decade, the department has asked Congress for more than $500 million to pay for terrorism-related prosecutions. These funds support more than 300 positions in the U.S. Attorneys Offices around the country, which claim to have won more than 2,000 domestic terrorism-related convictions in this time. Unfortunately, data released by DOJ in litigation that we brought some five years ago shows that these numbers are wildly inflated. As the United States struggles to come to grips with white supremacist violence, it is critical that policymakers and the public understand the actual extent, nature, and efficacy of these prosecutions.

For years DOJ has withheld the information necessary to see behind the domestic terrorism convictions it claims. Data on prosecutions from U.S. Attorneys is compiled in a government database, which includes several categories relevant to domestic terrorism, but identifying information (e.g., docket numbers) about the cases is redacted. Seeking to understand which political leanings were targeted in domestic terrorism cases and the type of conduct that rose to the level of terrorism in the eyes of prosecutors, we filed a Freedom of Information Act request for this data. When our request was denied, we sued the department to obtain identifying information about the roughly 4,000 cases that were tagged as relating to terrorism for the period from January 2006 to September 2020. 

Initially, we won the right to see this information for cases that had resulted in convictions. District court Judge Randolph Moss found that information about “how and when the Department categorizes cases as terrorism cases and following trends relating to these prosecutions” would inform policy debates on immigration, national security, and prosecutorial priorities. This benefit, the judge ruled, overrode defendants’ interest in keeping their criminal convictions private. DOJ re-opened the matter, arguing that while an individual’s criminal conviction was no secret, the fact that they were suspected of engaging in terrorist activity was not necessarily public, and the stigma associated with such an allegation raised privacy stakes.

Judge Moss agreed. He ordered the department to review case files tagged as terrorism and release identifying information on those that had been publicly linked to terrorism or met the statutory definition of domestic terrorism. The department has thus far reviewed some 1,140 dockets. According to its monthly releases of docket numbers, in only 71 (roughly 6 percent) did the DOJ make a clear connection to domestic terrorism (e.g., in charging documents, sentencing memoranda, requests for sentence enhancement, and press releases). Information on the vast number withheld is sparse. It appears that over a quarter of the cases were included in the National Security Division’s list of international terrorism cases. Of the remaining cases, around 70 percent began as terrorism investigations but may have turned into something else, although the DOJ continued classifying them as terrorism related. The DOJ claimed there was insufficient information about 100 or so outstanding cases to come to any conclusion. 

Surprised by the low number of cases that met the criteria for disclosure, we asked Judge Moss to conduct an in camera review of documents relating to a sample tranche of 20 cases withheld by the DOJ. He found that 19 out of 20 cases he reviewed did not involve terrorism but were mostly personal disputes, concluding that the government’s representation of its counterterrorism efforts is “vastly overstated.” While some inaccuracies and changes in direction are to be expected, this level of error is striking, especially since the DOJ claims the full number as terrorism-related in its annual statistical reports. Unfortunately, it is a problem of long standing. The need to update the government’s terrorism databases to reflect changes was first flagged in 2003 by the Government Accountability Office and by the DOJ inspector general in 2007 and again in 2012 and 2013. The last report recommended that the department implement a system for promptly re-coding any case that “began as a terrorism or national security investigation” but turned out to be a different type of case. But extreme inaccuracies in the government’s data persist.

Congress has repeatedly sought information from DOJ and the Department of Homeland Security on their domestic terrorism efforts, most recently by adding an extensive reporting requirement in the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). But recent reports from the GAO and from the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs found that the agencies have failed to fulfill this mandate. Instead of providing reliable and comprehensive information, the agencies’ NDAA report offered information on handpicked cases. For example, while the FBI’s open domestic terrorism investigations have more than quadrupled to 9,049 since 2013, the list of “FBI-Designated Significant Domestic Terrorism Incidents” appended to the 2021 report contains only 85 examples of cases in the period 2015-2019, of which almost 90 percent involve militias, sovereign citizens and other anti-government groups, and attacks motivated by racial animus. Only seven are tagged as “Animal Rights/Environmental Extremism.” 

This contrasts with the historical record exposed in our litigation. Out of the 71 domestic terrorism cases for which the department has released information, under 40 percent involve the types of actors and ideologies that make up the bulk of the FBI’s list, while most of the remaining cases involve environmental activism. While differences between different data sets prevent an apples-to-apples comparison, these discrepancies show how easily incomplete information can create an impression that may not be supported by more fulsome reporting. This level of obfuscation and confusion undermines confidence in the Justice Department’s domestic terrorism efforts. As Judge Moss put it, “many millions of dollars… are being appropriated to fight this thing, whatever it might be. It would really be good to know what the Government thinks it is.” We agree. Source

DHS Rebrands and Expands Biased, Ineffective Countering Violent Extremism Program

BCJ 27/04/2023 - The Brennan Center analyzed the grant applications for the Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention (TVTP) grant program for the 2020 and 2021 fiscal years and found that the funded projects fail to enhance security against terrorism, instead putting innocent Americans and minority communities at risk.

Although DHS has marketed recent initiatives as a response to white supremacist violence, the projects it has funded are almost never specifically targeted at white supremacists. Similarly, the department’s claim that it is using a so-called public health model is undermined by its continued and expanded funding of law enforcement. In fact, the TVTP programs offer more of the same flawed assumptions and weak outcomes as previous iterations.



The Brennan Center has repeatedly called for DHS to abandon these ill-conceived violence prevention efforts, and nothing in the rebranded program changes this conclusion.

The Obama administration created the countering violent extremism (CVE) initiative at DHS, aiming to decrease the risk of terrorism by awarding grants to organizations that claimed to be working to prevent it. A 2018 Brennan Center analysis showed that recipients of these grants often targeted minority communities, including American Muslims, Black Lives Matter activists, and LGBTQ+ people. Their efforts, which relied on federal funding and training, framed religious and political activities protected by the First Amendment — especially those of American Muslims — as indicators of terrorist activity. Many other supposed indicators of violence were so broad or common as to invite bias and speculation.

Despite superficial changes, the fundamental premise and tools of the CVE program remain largely the same. The Trump administration rebranded it as the Office of Terrorism and Targeted Violence Prevention (TVTP) in 2019 and changed the name of the grant program to TVTP as well. These changes aimed to make the program more sustainable in light of the rarity of actual terrorism and to respond to criticisms of bias, especially after the office rescinded the few grants that focused on white supremacists.

As a candidate, President Joe Biden promised to end this biased program. DHS instead rebranded it once more as the Center for Prevention Programs and Partnerships (CP3) in May 2021 and continues to administer the TVTP grant program with a purported pivot to white supremacist violence, an assertion not supported by the 2021 grants.

Meanwhile, the department has remained dedicated to the false notion that people who commit mass violence can reliably be identified in advance, while “radicalizing.” Indeed, millions of Americans who never go on to commit violence share the same “warning sign” characteristics that these programs have consistently used to flag potential perpetrators. DHS has consistently framed people who are experiencing adverse socioeconomic conditions, may need mental health treatment, or are engaged in political expression as possible national security threats.

Research has shown that this premise is false. Perhaps forced to acknowledge this reality, DHS has begun messaging a “behavioral threat assessment model” that declares that no one pathway to violence exists, so instead potential subjects must be monitored by community leaders, educators, and health care professionals — often working with law enforcement — for extended periods of time. Brennan Center research has found that these programs almost invariably end up falling back on the bogus behavioral indicators built into the radicalization theory, changing little about this harmful program. And for 82 percent of the funded projects across the two grant cycles, the aim of some or all their proposed activities is to identify potentially threatening individuals and intervene, largely based on these indicators.

The department also claims that this new model provides “alternatives to investigation and/or prosecution,” yet its actual grants tell an entirely different story, with law enforcement involved throughout an overwhelming majority of them. Despite scant evidence that these programs provide any security benefits, Congress continues to fund the TVTP grant program, allocating $10 million for fiscal year 2020 and increasing funding to $20 million for 2021. Congress also allocated $20 million for each of fiscal years 2022 and 2023, though those grants are not yet available. Read more - Lire plus

Government of Canada announces more than $25 million for projects to counter radicalization to violence

Australian terrorism prediction tool considered autism a sign of criminality despite lack of evidence

US ‘war on terror’ feeding global anti-Muslim feelings - scholar

AA 08/05/2023 - The US rhetoric on its so-called war on terror is responsible for the global proliferation of anti-Muslim sentiments, a respected scholar and author has said, terming the growing religious hatred against the community as a “neo-colonial project”.

Prof Khaled Ali Beydoun’s recently-published book The New Crusades: Islamophobia and the Global War on Muslims has been hailed as a pathbreaking study on the subject for its minute examination of the issue. “Islamophobia is a tool and a weapon used by the US to advance its global power and to seize coveted natural resources such as oil in Iraq,” says Prof Beydoun, a faculty at Wayne State University Law School in the US. He was speaking to Anadolu Agency exclusively.

“I chose the title because the term ‘crusade’ is used to describe the historical conflict between Islam and Christianity,” he says. “...When the war on terror was launched 21 years ago, then US President George Bush called it a ‘crusade’. So I drew on these two events to give the title to the book.” Beydoun says that besides extensive research for the book, he interviewed people exposed to anti-Muslim hatred in many countries such as India, China, France and Canada.

While writing the book, he aimed to understand the feelings and thoughts of the Muslim community struggling for existence in different countries. He says that anti-Muslim sentiment is not the same in every country. “Islamophobia is not experienced by Muslims in a similar way. It really depends on where they are, which country they live in, what their identity is. The Islamophobia that Uyghur Muslims experience is strikingly different from the one that we experience.” Read more - Lire plus

Explainer: Hong Kong’s national security crackdown – month 34

Hong Kong Free Press 01/05/2023 - In April, a planned Labour Day march was cancelled after one of its organisers was said to have gone missing for four hours. Several government-registered media outlets were barred from covering a National Security Education Day event attended by Xia Baolong, Beijing’s point man for Hong Kong affairs.

The Chinese official told Hongkongers that protesting was “not the only way” for expressing views. He also warned against a “resurgence of street violence,” saying local authorities must remain vigilant about national security threats. In response, the city’s leader vowed to crack down on “hostile forces,” adding Hong Kong would always remember the “alarm bell” of the 2019 mass protests.

Director of Public Prosecutions Maggie Yang cited the cases of Tong Ying-kit and Ma Chun-man to explain why people would be found guilty of inciting succession under the Beijing-imposed national security law in an RTHK programme aired last month: “Some offences are so serious that we have to nip them in the bud. In fact, I always tell people that ‘words are weapons’… If what a person says leads other people to commit serious offences, it is impossible for them to be unscathed by the law,” Yang said.

Hong Kong’s Department of Justice (DoJ) is planning to amend the law to allow appeals against not-guilty verdicts in national security cases tried at the city’s High Court, local media reported last month. To date, no one tried under the national security law has been acquitted of their charges. Hong Kong government auditors called on the department managing the city’s public libraries to “step up efforts” to make sure library materials do not threaten national security.

The application form for holding charitable flag day fundraisers in Hong Kong was updated to warn organisers not to use proceedings for acts or activities contrary to national security, otherwise they risk having their permits revoked. The high-profile national security trial concerning 47 pro-democracy figures who stand accused of conspiring to commit subversion continued in April. China should conduct a “review and reconsideration” of Hong Kong’s national security law to ensure it is “in compliance with China’s international human rights obligations,” United Nations human rights expert Margaret Satterthwaite said last month. And much more. Read more - Lire plus

Lasso's Anti-Terrorist Operations Raise Concern in Ecuador

Telesur 04/05/2023 - Citizens expressed concern about the ongoing military "strategy" because, in practical terms, it is not clear how the government will define who "terrorists" are. On Wednesday, President Guillermo Lasso signed a decree allowing the Armed Forces to carry out military operations throughout Ecuadorian territory "to confront and counter terrorist organizations and individuals."

This decision was announced as part of a strategy that tries to put an end to the increasing number of violent acts, murders, robberies, and assaults that Ecuador has experienced since Lasso came to power in 2021. The decree establishes that the military operations are aimed at guaranteeing sovereignty and territorial integrity as well as the full validity of the rule of law. It also sets that these operations must respect both "international instruments" and domestic laws. Within the current strategy, the Armed Forces Joint Command must coordinate with the National Police and initiate actions "to repress the terrorist threat with all the means at its disposal."

Lasso also ordered that the institution in charge of the prisons provide for the security of soldiers and agents who could be "subjected to criminal legal proceedings" for participating in the anti-terrorist operations. The Ecuadorian president commissioned the Finance Ministry to provide the Armed Forces and the Police with all the necessary resources to fulfill the entrusted mission. Citizen reactions to the de facto militarization of the country did not wait.



Progressive politicians, human rights advocates and intellectuals expressed concern about the ongoing "strategy" because, in practical terms, it is not clear how the Lasso administration will define who "terrorists" are. In recent days, the Ecuadorian far-right spokesmen accused the Indigenous movement of "harboring terrorists and possessing paramilitary forces." These baseless accusations and the decree occur at a time when Congress will have to decide whether President Lasso is subject to impeachment in a highly publicized corruption case, in which his brother-in-law and the Albanian mafia are apparently involved. Source

Widespread protests in Sri Lanka highlight unified opposition to Anti-Terrorism Act

Amnesty International 02/05/2023 - In response to increasing protests throughout Sri Lanka in response to the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA), the proposed replacement legislation to the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA), Amnesty International USA Asia Advocacy Director Carolyn Nash said:

“The ATA poses an urgent threat to human rights in Sri Lanka. If enacted, the law could be used to levy charges of terrorism against people simply for exercising their human right to protest peacefully. The outcry from the Sri Lankan people is evidence that this bill is just as or even more dangerous than the draconian law it aims to replace. If the ATA is enacted, the Sri Lankan authorities will still be empowered to suppress dissent, as they currently do using the PTA. We call on the government to substantially revise or drop entirely this new law, to repeal the PTA, and to issue an immediate moratorium on use of the PTA in the interim. These laws are an affront to human rights.”

“From the Bar Association of Sri Lanka to student groups – Sri Lankans across the country fear that the ATA will empower the president to name anyone a terrorist and target anyone who challenges state authority. The dangers posed by the ATA have united so many groups in their stance against this effort to suppress peaceful protestors and curtail free speech.” “The ATA must be substantially revised or dropped and the PTA must be repealed. In the interim, an immediate moratorium must be placed on the use of the PTA to prevent further attacks on the human rights of the people of Sri Lanka.” Source

UN Special Rapporteurs write to President on Anti-Terrorism & Rehabilitation Bills

UN Human Rights Chief urges UK to reverse ‘deeply troubling’ Public Order Bill

UN 27/03/2023 - The Public Order Bill, which has now been passed by Parliament in the United Kingdom, is deeply troubling legislation that is incompatible with the UK’s international human rights obligations regarding people’s rights to freedom of expression, peaceful assembly and association, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk warned on Thursday.

“This new law imposes serious and undue restrictions on these rights that are neither necessary nor proportionate to achieve a legitimate purpose as defined under international law. This law is wholly unnecessary as UK police already have the powers to act against violent and disruptive demonstrations,” Türk said. “It is especially worrying that the law expands the powers of the police to stop and search individuals, including without suspicion; defines some of the new criminal offences in a vague and overly broad manner; and imposes unnecessary and disproportionate criminal sanctions on people organizing or taking part in peaceful protests,” he added.

The High Commissioner drew particular attention to Serious Disruption Prevention Orders introduced by the law that allow UK courts to ban affected individuals from being in certain places at certain times; being with particular people; or using the internet in certain ways, and could lead to the individual in question being electronically monitored to ensure compliance. It is especially concerning that such orders can be made against people who have never been convicted of any criminal offence. “Governments are obliged to facilitate peaceful protests, while, of course, protecting the public from serious and sustained disruption. But the grave risk here is that these orders pre-emptively limit someone’s future legitimate exercise of their rights,” the High Commissioner said.

“I am also concerned that the law appears to target in particular peaceful actions used by those protesting about human rights and environmental issues. As the world faces the triple planetary crises of climate change, loss of biodiversity and pollution, governments should be protecting and facilitating peaceful protests on such existential topics, not hindering and blocking them,” Türk stressed. “The passage of this Bill regrettably weakens human rights obligations, which the country has long championed in international fora. I call on the UK Government to reverse this legislation as soon as feasible,” he said. Read more - Lire plus

EVENT June 14: Free Webinar - Public Order Act: Where are we now?

Tunisia: Move to Dismantle Country’s Largest Opposition Party

Human Rights Watch 11/05/2023 -  Tunisian authorities have intensified their attack on opponents of President Kais Saied’s 2021 power grab, moving to neutralize the country’s largest political party, Ennahda, Human Rights Watch said today. Since December 2022, the Tunisian government has arrested at least 17 current or former members of the party, including its leader, and shut its offices across the country. The authorities should immediately release all those arbitrarily detained and end restrictions on freedom of association and assembly.

The arrests have continued following a wave in mid-February that targeted figures of various political affiliations, bringing the number of public figures deemed critical of Saied behind bars to at least 30. Most have been accused of “conspiring against state security.” The Ennahda-linked detainees include four former ministers and several former parliament members. The party President and former speaker of parliament Rached Ghannouchi and two party vice presidents, Ali Laarayedh and Nourredine Bhiri, are among them. None has been formally charged.

“After demonizing the Ennahda Party and making serious accusations without proof, President Saied’s authorities have moved to effectively dismantle it,” said Salsabil Chellali, Tunisia director at Human Rights Watch. “Tunisian authorities’ latest tactic to muzzle critical voices consists of tossing around conspiracy charges left and right against all those who challenge the president’s increasingly authoritarian bent.” The authorities have accused most of the detainees of “conspiracy against state security” without clarifying the criminal acts that constitute the alleged conspiracy. Seven Ennahda-related cases for which Human Rights Watch has been able to get additional information show the political nature of the arrests, the reliance on flimsy evidence, and disregard for due-process rights. At least four of these cases amount to barring peaceful expression. [...]

Said Ferjani, another Ennahda leader who was in the Parliament dissolved by Saied in March 2022, was arrested in Tunis on February 27 as part of an investigation into the digital content production company Instalingo, one of his lawyers said. The state prosecutor has accused the company, whose customers include Arabic-speaking media organizations critical of Saied, of inciting violence and slandering Saied. Ferjani is accused of “money laundering,” attempting to “change the nature of the state,” “undermining external State security,” and inciting violence, among other charges – including under the 2015 Anti-Terrorist law – some of which are punishable by death. An investigative judge questioned Ferjani on March 1 about his relationships and finances. His family and lawyer told Human Rights Watch that he has no link with the company. He is in Sousse prison and he has not been further questioned by a judge.

At least two other Ennahda members are detained in the Instalingo case: the former Investment Minister Riadh Bettaieb, his lawyer told Human Rights Watch, and Ghannouchi, who was placed under a detention warrant in this case on May 9. Mohamed Mzoughi, Ennahda’s head of public relations in the city of Beja, was arrested on March 9. The following day, Mohamed Saleh Bouallagui, Ennahda’s general secretary in Beja, was arrested. They remain in detention, accused of “conspiracy against state security” including through “contacts with a foreign power,” “insulting the president” and terrorism-related charges for their alleged role in managing social media pages critical of Saied’s rule, their lawyers said. Documents filed by the state prosecutor indicate that Bouallagui and Mzoughi are being investigated under the 2015 Anti-Terrorist law for offenses punishable by up to 20 years in prison, including “membership in a terrorist organization,” “using the Tunisian territory to commit terrorist offenses,” “providing weapons” and money laundering. Read more - Lire plus

No to spyware: media, civil society demand ban on tech used for human rights abuses

AccessNow 03/05/2023 - Marking World Press Freedom Day, over 70 journalists, independent experts, and civil society organizations are demanding a complete ban on commercial spyware technology that has been used to facilitate human rights abuses, and its vendors. Read the full statement launching at Secret surveillance: countering spyware’s threats to freedom of the press and expression, co-hosted by Access Now

From Mexico to India, journalists around the world uncovering corruption and investigating human rights abuses are being targeted with spyware, such as NSO Group’s Pegasus. Countries under democratic governments or authoritarian regimes are using spyware as a tool of transnational repression to track down and intimidate journalists wherever they are. This ongoing, far reaching assault is crushing freedom of the press, and hindering journalists from revealing corruption and abuse, and holding authorities to account.

Unlawful use of spyware and targeted surveillance violates the fundamental rights of freedom of expression and access to information, peaceful assembly and association, freedom of movement, and privacy. Through the open statement, journalists, independent experts, and media and civil society organizations are calling on states to:

• Implement an immediate moratorium on the export, sale, transfer, servicing, and use of targeted digital surveillance technologies until rigorous human rights safeguards are put in place;
• Where there is evidence that commercial spyware technology facilitates or enables human rights abuses, implement a ban on the technology and its vendors;
• Hold companies who develop and distribute these technologies, and their investors, accountable;
• Reaffirm protections for all journalists and media workers and safeguard press freedom; and
• Create national gender-responsive prevention and protection mechanisms to ensure journalists’ safety online.

For years, Access Now and civil society have been campaigning for a global moratorium on the export, sale, transfer, servicing, and use of targeted digital surveillance technologies until rigorous human rights safeguards are put in place as the baseline requirement to keep the industry in check. However, growing evidence shows that certain spyware companies have enabled so many abuses that their technology should be banned. A complete ban of commercial spyware found to have facilitated human rights abuses is the right step to safeguard human rights. Read more - Lire plus

Dominican Republic: Pegasus spyware discovered on prominent journalist’s phone

Spyware: MEPs sound alarm on threat to democracy and demand reforms

Ghost in the network: How a Swiss tech expert runs a global phone surveillance system

ICLMG ACTIONS & EVENTS

UPDATED CSIS isn't above the law!

In recent years, at least three 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 Marco Mendicino demanding that he take immediate action to put an end to this abuse of power and hold those CSIS officers involved accountable, and for parliament to support Bill C-331, An Act to amend the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act (duty of candour). Your message will also be sent to your MP and to Minister of Justice David Lametti.

UPDATED Canada must protect Hassan Diab!

Send an email using ICLMG’s one-click tool and share widely!

Letter in English + Lettre en français

Sign and share the LeadNow petitions to protect Hassan from further injustice

Petition in English + Pétition en français

For more information on the case of Hassan Diab, read our webcomic, watch our animated version of the comic, or visit justiceforhassandiab.org.

Canada must repatriate all Canadians detained in NE Syria now!

On January 20, 2023, Federal Court Justice Henry Brown ruled that Canada must repatriate Canadians illegally and arbitrarily detained in northeast Syria. On February 6, 2023, the Canadian government filed an appeal and asked that the Brown ruling be set aside and placed on hold while the appeal plays out. This is unacceptable. 

Every day the government fails to bring these Canadians home, it places their lives at risk from disease, malnutrition, violence, and ongoing military conflicts, including bombing by Turkey’s military. United Nations officials have even found that the conditions faced by Canadians in prison are akin to torture. Please click below to urge the federal government to repatriate all Canadians illegally & arbitrarily detained in northeast Syria without delay.

Please share on Facebook + Twitter + Instagram

20 years of fighting deportation to torture: Justice for Mohamed Harkat Now!

December 10, 2022 - ironically Human Rights Day - marked the 20th "anniversary" of the arrest of Mohamed Harkat under Canada's rights-violating security certificate regime. For Mr. Harkat, it's been two decades of fighting deportation to torture, 16 years of harassment and intrusive surveillance, arbitrary detention, solitary confinement, secret trials, PTSD: enough is enough! We call for justice for Moe Harkat now! Watch - Visionnez

TAKE ACTION: Stop Moe Harkat's deportation to torture!

ACTION: Arrêtez la déportation vers la torture de Mohamed Harkat!

Reform Canada's extradition law now!

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

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

Protect our rights from facial recognition!

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.

OTHER NEWS - AUTRES NOUVELLES

Anti-terror laws

Législation anti-terroriste

Swedish parliament adopts tougher anti-terror law

'Sweden’s new anti-terror bill won’t guarantee NATO bid' says Turkey

Martyn's Law anti-terror legislation moves closer

Brazil: Senators definte territorial control as terrorist activity

Attacks on dissent

Attaques contre la dissidence

ACTION: Peru: Alarming death toll amid repression

Guatemala: Two more CODECA activists assassinated – 27 in a row

Nicaragua: A continuum of repression and systematic human rights violations under the Ortega-Murillo government

French government steps up repression after bloody battle of Sainte-Soline

French Police Sweeping Up Protesters, Bystanders in Crackdown on Dissent

Former Pakistani PM Imran Khan Freed on Bail After Days of Mass Protests over His Arrest

The Coronation Not Seen on TV: Anti-Monarchists Arrested; Slavery & Colonization Reparations Demanded

Anti-monarchists receive ‘intimidatory’ Home Office letter on new protest laws

ACTION: Belarus: Trade union activity is not extremism!

Freedom of expression and of the press

Liberté d'expression et de la presse

Russian theater director accused of ‘justifying terrorism’ remanded in custody

75-year-old human rights activist held by Uttar Pradesh anti-terrorism squad, says family

Activists Face Felonies for Flyers on “Cop City” Protester Killing

If you care about press freedom, make some noise about Julian Assange

International clamour to free Assange grows on World Press Freedom Day

Law and Disorder Podcast on Julian Assange

Over 160 Organisations, Political Parties, and Unions join the International Campaign Against Anti-Palestinian Repression in Germany

The campaign against the UN’s human rights official on Palestine

Migrant and refugee rights

Droits des migrant.es et des réfugié.es

She crossed 12 countries 'for nothing.' Asylum seekers rejected by Canada end up stranded in U.S.

Half of Canada’s provinces now ending immigration detention in provincial jails: Saskatchewan announces end to agreement with CBSA

UK: Joint civil society solidarity statement on the Illegal Migration Bill

Detention of children: European Court of Human Rights rules against France 11 times

As Title 42 Ends, Asylum Seekers Face Inhumane Border Conditions, New Restrictions & Fast Deportation

ACLU Podcast: Biden's Asylum Policy is From Trump's Playbook

USA border plan requires “continuous and systematic” transfers of biometric data

Privacy and surveillance

Vie privée et surveillance

Government’s efforts to introduce privacy rules for federal political parties wholly inadequate and totally cynical

Digital security tips to prevent the cops from ruining your trip abroad

Miscellaneous

Divers

Collectif Échec à la guerre: 2 % du PIB pour encore plus de guerres ?

Action: Urge PM Trudeau to reduce military spending

World Beyond War: Mapping Militarism

The Pentagon uses video games to teach "security excellence." You can play them too.

U.N. Warns Afghan Humanitarian Crisis Still Urgent as Taliban Expands Crackdown on Women’s Rights

Biden Administration Urged to Accept Afghan Families Who Have Languished in Greece for Over 18 Months

Records reveal extent of CIA's mishandling of sexual misconduct

The Intercepted: Frank Church, Deep State: The True Story of the Senator Who Took on the CIA and Its Corporate Clients

El Salvador: One year into state of emergency, human rights remain under attack

Sudan: Residents Trapped Between Warring Rival Factions as Humanitarian Crisis Escalates

David Miranda, campaigner and former Brazilian congressman, dies aged 37

PROTEST: Stop CANSEC: North America’s largest arms show and “defense industry” event - May 31st in Ottawa

ACTION: Stop Deporting Russian War Resisters

July to December 2022 - Juillet à décembre 2022

In case you missed it, we've published our biannual summary of activities last month. Here are the legislation and issues we worked on from July to December 2022:

• Bill C-20, Public Complaints and Review Commission Act
• Bill C-26, An Act respecting cyber security & amending the Telecommunications Act
• Bill C-27, Digital Charter Implementation Act, 2022
• "Online harms" proposal
• Countering terrorist financing & prejudiced audits of Muslim charities
• International Assistance and anti-terrorism laws
• Justice for Dr Hassan Diab & reform of the Extradition Act
• CSIS accountability and duty of candour
• Facial Recognition Technology (FRT)
• Canadians detained in Northeastern Syria
• Justice for Moe Harkat and abolish security certificates
• Canada’s armed drone purchase
• Listing of Iranian Canadians
• Ongoing No Fly List problems

For more details on each issue, click here. And here are the issues we plan to work on in the first half of 2023:

• Advocating for changes to anti-terror laws that prohibit Canadian organizations from providing international assistance in Afghanistan and other regions in need;
• Ensuring that the Canadian government’s proposals on “online harms” do not violate fundamental freedoms, or exacerbate the silencing of racialized and marginalized voices;
• Protecting our privacy from government surveillance, including facial recognition, and from attempts to weaken encryption, along with advocating for privacy law reform;
• Fighting for Justice for Mohamed Harkat, an end to security certificates, and addressing problems in security inadmissibility;
• Ensuring Justice for Hassan Diab and reforming Canada’s extradition law;
• The return of the 40+ Canadian citizens indefinitely detained in Syrian camps, including more than 20 children;
• The end to the CRA’s prejudiced audits of Muslim-led charities;
• Pushing for Canadian government action on behalf of Iranian Canadians negatively and unjustly impacted by the US terror listing of the IRGC;
• Greater accountability and transparency for the Canada Border Services Agency;
• Greater transparency and accountability for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service;
• 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;
• 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

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