CSIS Still the Cat in the Birdcage

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By Matthew Behrens

                 

                  A few years ago, Canada’s bird lovers came in for some well-deserved looks of bemusement when many wondered why their cute little bunchies and canaries kept disappearing every time a cat was placed inside their birdcages. After all, it was argued, cats were subject to significant and robust oversight mechanisms such as the Feline Activities Review Committee, to ensure the birds would be safe from purring predators.

                  That refusal to recognize the nature of the beast also infects the ongoing discussions within the “national security industrial-academic-media complex” about what to do with the fact that Canada’s spy agency, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), along with its next-door neighbor, the Communications Security Establishment Canada (CSEC), continue invading the privacy rights of people at home and abroad and violating the law (not to mention committing perjury in front of Federal Court judges and aiding and abetting acts of torture).

                  The latest round of hand-wringing arises from a late 2013 Federal Court decision by judge Richard Mosley. It may be safely assumed that Mosley’s face holds the bull’s eye position on the CSIS Ottawa office’s well-used dartboard, given he is a no-nonsense, hard-working member of the judiciary who, unlike almost all of his weak-kneed colleagues, is not coy when it comes to criticizing the antics of Canada’s scandal-plagued spy agency. His decision, a warrant application by [NAME REDACTED], noted that there “was a breach of duty of candour owed by [CSIS] and their legal advisors to the court,” and that “It is clear that the exercise of the court’s warrant issuing authority has been used as protective cover for activities that it has not authorized.”

CSIS Risks Complicity in Torture

                  In this instance, CSIS was granted permission in 2009 to spy on Canadians abroad, but Mosley discovered that CSIS had, without judicial permission, illegally asked foreign agencies to spy on Canadians overseas, even though, as Mosley noted, this “carries the risk of the detention of or other harm to a Canadian person based on that information. Given the unfortunate history of information sharing with foreign agencies over the past decade and the reviews conducted by several royal commissions, there can be no question that the Canadian agencies are aware of those hazards. It appears to me that they are using the warrants as authorization to assume those risks.”

                  The language is fairly restrained, but in essence, CSIS and its lawyers lied to the court, and “a decision was made by CSIS officials in consultation with their legal advisors to strategically omit information” in Federal Court applications “about their intention to seek the assistance of the foreign partners. As a result, the court was led to believe that all of the interception activity would take place in or under the control of Canada.” Mosley also found that in asking foreign agencies to track Canadians “CSIS and CSEC officials knew…this would involve the breach of international law by the requested second parties.”

                  Mosley sighs that an unspecified number of additional warrants on fresh or renewed applications had been issued by the court and that “in the majority of these cases, if not all, CSIS asked CSEC to task their foreign partners [REDACTED, but clearly in reference to illegal activity.].”

                  Mosley only came to the conclusion something was amiss because he is a voracious reader of various reports and, when he was going over the annual reports of the CSEC Commissioner and the Security Intelligence Review Committee (SIRC), he realized that he had been duped. He subsequently called numerous witnesses before him, with one of them, CSEC’s James Abbott, “candidly” admitting that his evidence in support of the original warrant application was “‘crafted’ with legal counsel to exclude any reference” to their plans to use second parties.

                  A special lawyer, Gordon Cameron, was appointed to assist the court, and he concluded that the serious breach by CSIS of the duty of candour to the was exacerbated by the “failure to acknowledge the lack of candour in this proceeding because it demonstrates that [CSIS] does not understand its duty when it comes before this Court ex parte.”

                  In other words, the cat does not understand it should not eat the birds in the cage, even though the Feline Activities Review Committee has repeatedly said such consumption violates the rights of the birds.

Government Lawyer Advice Breaks the Law

                  The Deputy Attorney General of Canada does not fare well in this proceeding either, with Mosley noting that one of Canada’s most powerful legal practitioners essentially argued “that the Court should be kept in the dark about matters it may have reason to be concerned about if it was made aware of them. In the circumstances under consideration that would include matters relating to the prior history of attempts to have the Court authorize the collection of security intelligence abroad and the potential implications of sharing information about Canadian persons with foreign security and intelligence agencies.” Indeed, Cameron also found that the Attorney General’s position seems to be that “CSIS can contract out interceptions of Canadians’ communications or accessing Canadians’ information without any warrant or supervision by this Court."

                  Of course, the world of national security can get blurry sometimes, especially since some parts of the CSIS Act allow spies to break the law. Indeed, Mosley points out, one section allows CSIS to seek special authority “to engage in investigative methods that would otherwise constitute a crime or a breach of the Charter  guarantee against unreasonable search and seizure.”

                  Despite this get-out-of-trouble free card, Mosley notes later that “There is nothing in the CSIS Act or in its legislative history, to my knowledge, that suggests that in enacting [the abovementioned exception]  Parliament granted express legislative authority to CSIS to violate international law and the sovereignty of foreign nations either directly or indirectly through the agency of CSEC and the second parties.” Despite this, he notes, “CSIS and CSEC officials knew, based on the legal advice that they had been given … that [tasking other parties to monitor Canadians] would involve the breach of international law by the requested second parties.”

                  The manner in which the Deputy Attorney General and CSIS are interpreting the law, Mosley found, is not consistent with prior Supreme Court decisions and the law itself, and that “CSIS and CSEC officials are relying on that interpretation at their peril and, as cautioned by the CSEC Commissioner and SIRC, incurring the risk that targets may be detained or otherwise harmed as a result of the use of the intercepted communications by the foreign agencies. Section 12 [of the CSIS Act] does not authorize the Service and CSEC to incur that risk or shield them from liability, in my view.”

CSIS: We Never Break the Law

                  While it is good to see that word liability arise in such a decision – and Mosley

firmly stated that CSIS and CSEC cannot justify their activities based on the issuance of special warrants by the Court – there is no guarantee these agencies will comply. Indeed, in its daily boilerplate special, CSIS responded to Mosley by saying everything it does is consistent with “Canadian laws and values,” and while this may be true given the history of Canadian laws and values that have justified the kidnapping, torture, and murder of First Nations children, the rejection of Nazi-era Jewish refugees, the internment of thousands of Japanese heritage, among countless other violations, it does show that even in the small world where individuals like Mosley try to hold CSIS to some kind of lawful standard, it is ultimately impossible to keep them in check. (Notably, CSIS also quietly admitted in a Senate hearing that they would be appealing the decision).

                  Mosley has previously found CSIS witnesses have failed in their duty of candour to the court. Indeed, one Toronto man, Hassan Almrei, faced a decade-long nightmare of solitary confinement and house arrest because a government witness had lied to the court during a secret hearing, while in the Mohmed Harkat secret trial case (still ongoing), another federal court judge found that CSIS’s failure to be honest led to the finding that “it was found to be necessary to repair the damage done to the administration of justice and to re-establish a climate of trust and confidence in this proceeding.”

                  So what is to be done? Some point to the Security Intelligence Review Committee as a model that could be expanded to encompass all of Canada’s national security agencies. Space does not allow reference to the extensive findings of exaggeration, lack of candour, and other CSIS malfeasance that fill the pages of the SIRC’s annual reports. But the body has no enforcement power and, besides, has essentially become an enabler of CSIS. Indeed, as early as 1991, SIRC had settled into its role as a kindly big bother to poor, befuddled CSIS, noting “Those who have followed the progress of CSIS with interest have seen our Annual Reports change from being compendiums of direct and implied criticism, in the early years, to being much more supportive accounts of CSIS’ activities in recent years…. But our criticisms are no longer based upon strong and fundamental disagreements with the CSIS view of the world. [emphasis added] They are far more the results of differences of opinion regarding the  day-to-day implementation of CSIS policies than, as in the past, our opposition to those policies themselves.”

                  By the mid-90s, SIRC noted “It is our responsibility to review CSIS’ activities and then to assure the public that we know what CSIS is doing, that we believe that those activities are necessary, [emphasis added] and that they are being conducted in an appropriate and legal fashion.”  

Useless Oversight in Parliament

                  Wayne Easter, a Liberal MP who once signed secret trial security certificates, feels the solution is his private member’s bill to create a group of National Security Parliamentarians “permanently bound to secrecy” that will, when necessary, hold secret meetings to discuss national security and that, while the appropriate government minister may, if he feels like it, share information with the MPs, he is also entitled by law to “provide none of the information.” So much for oversight, even in a secret body. While the committee would produce an annual report for Parliament, the Prime Minister would be allowed to exclude anything he felt was contrary to national security.

                  Ultimately, the issue is not so much about oversight or review, much as the problem of the disappearing birds could not be solved by the ministrations of the Feline Activities Review Committee. Such discussions divert us from focusing on the nature of the beast: these agencies have historically and continue to play a repressive role that is wholly contemptuous of democracy and, even at a conservative level, the rule of law. From their earliest incarnations, they have targeted as national security threats First Nations and labour organizers, Quebec nationalists, Communists and “Communist-sympathizers”, Canadians of Japanese, German, Italian, Irish, and Ukrainian heritage, Jehovah’s Witnesses and people of Jewish and Muslim faith, the United and Anglican churches, anti-nuclear campaigners and gays and lesbians, and Salvadoran, Kurdish, and Tamil refugees, among countless others. In this context, it is clear who threatens national security in the same way it is clear who threatens the birds when cats are placed in their cages.

                  CSIS, CSEC, the RCMP, the Attorney General, the “Justice” Department, and their brethren will continue to act illegally and laugh behind the backs of judges, as long as all their minions only ever receive is a slap on the wrist from the system: a few harsh words from a court whose decisions are read and digested by few. Until they face time in the dock, they are unlikely to change their ways.

                  Even then, though, the potential for post-crime accountability does little to assist the individual who has already been tortured, whose privacy has been violated, whose job has been taken away, whose family cannot get to sleep at night for fear of that knock on the door.

                  As things stand, despite a lengthy record of criminality and human rights violations, these “national security agencies” continue to enjoy a remarkable degree of respect and deference from the courts, the Parliament, and “oversight” bodies that always assume their “best intentions,” with former Supreme Court judge Frank Iacobucci sadly going so far as to state, in his introduction to a report finding federal government complicity in the torture of three Canadians, that we should be “grateful” to such blood-stained bureaucrats.

                   Perhaps a national referendum on the abolition of agencies that rely on the creation and sustenance of fear is in order. And maybe we could throw in a discussion on seriously overhauling the kind of unequal society that relies so heavily on such repression.

                  Until then, the best efforts of the Richard Mosleys and toiling SIRC lawyers will only produce fine words of outrage about illegal acts by secretive men who, nevertheless, will get up each day, go to work, get promoted, and, regardless of the number of skeletons in the birdcage, carry on as before.

Canada's government-sponsored law-breakers 'push the border out'

By
Matthew Behrens
| January 20, 2014
http://rabble.ca/columnists/2014/01/canadas-government-sponsored-law-breakers-push-border-out

I recently attended an unfortunate anniversary event: it had been one year since the deportation of a family who were terrified of what awaited them if forcibly removed from Canada. Despite the passage of time, the emotions were still raw, tears flowed and hearts ached. Clearly, this deportation was traumatic not only for those directly forced onto a plane, but also for a whole community that awoke to find their neighbours had literally disappeared from their street, school, community and country.

Such trauma is induced daily across this country by a federal agency with zero oversight and accountability mechanisms: the Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA). The name is so blandly beige that it sounds more like a group of Good Samaritans assisting cane-carrying octogenarians through customs than an organization that terrorizes communities by treating non-citizens as suspicious at best and security threats at worst. The CBSA maintains what it calls a "removal inventory" that, though sounding like the waste products of a passenger airline, in fact represents children, women and men who have been ordered to leave the country. A large number of the "inventory" are individuals who have "failed" to be accepted by an unfair Canadian immigration and refugee system and who, at great cost, must be uprooted from their life in Canada to the nightmare that forced so many of them to flee to Canada in the first place.

Although it did not garner many headlines, some statistics released to Parliament last fall illustrate the toll of CBSA-created human misery. From 2006 until November 12, 2013, the "Grand Totals of Removals Executed" stood at 116,266. The use of the term "execution" is quite apropos: some of those who were part of the removals inventory wound up dead in the country from which they originally fled. We do not know exact numbers because the Canadian government does not keep track when it illegally sends people off to face torture and disappearance, but we do hear from advocates, family members and loved ones of such tragedies. Shot in the head and found by a roadside. Tortured. Interrogated and disappeared upon arrival.

Ordered to Syria, Egypt

The countries to which refugees are being ordered to return are not shining beacons of human rights. Among CBSA departure orders -- under which individuals must leave within 30 days -- were Egypt (245 in 2013, despite the brutal coup and crackdown), Syria (376 in 2012 and 415 in 2013, at a time when the Canadian government condemns Assad's war crimes) and Iran (a total of 500 since 2012).

The fear of return is so palpable that some individuals will choose death over the cruel future generated by deportation. Think of 40-year-old Eritrean refugee Habtom Kibraeb, who hung himself in a Halifax park when his options ran out. Another "failed" refugee claimant from Algeria set himself on fire outside an Edmonton federal building. And last fall, a London-area family of three -- Mohamed, Shyroz, and Qyzra Walji -- were killed in a murder-suicide following desperate attempts to avoid deportation to Tanzania. The family had been in Canada for 15 years, and feared discrimination against their daughter, who could not speak and suffered from cerebral palsy, but the Canadian government concluded such discrimination was wholly acceptable because, in its opinion, it did not "rise to the level of persecution." One could see a high and mighty Federal Court of Canada judge sending Rosa Parks back to Alabama in 1956 on similar grounds.

Meanwhile, the CBSA has long been engaged in beefing up a strategy to prevent asylum seekers from getting here in the first place, a clear violation of international and domestic law. The CBSA Multiple Borders Strategy -- a kind of "we own the world" approach -- extends Canada's borders to wherever CBSA wants them to go. Indeed, the CBSA "defines a border for immigration purposes as any point at which the identity of the traveller can be verified…[viewing] the border not as a geopolitical line but rather a continuum of checkpoints along a route of travel from the country of origin to Canada or the United States." Indeed, a listing of their overseas liaison officers and countries of responsibility indicates that for Canada, the border can include everything from Amman, Jordan to Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, and Lima, Peru.
Canada physically blocking refugees

As part of this imperial destiny, the CBSA also hires and trains a group of shady characters to violate Canadian law. Numbering over 60 members, they have the blandly beige appellations of "liaison officers." Indeed, while the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act states that the Canadian refugee system is "in the first instance about saving lives and offering protection to the displaced and the persecuted," the five dozen CBSA officers have vigorously worked since 2001 in some 49 global locations to prevent over 73,000 of the world's displaced and persecuted from reaching Canada's shores.

Their job is to sniff out those using false documents (which a great number of asylum seekers are forced to use, as recognized by Canadian and international law) and, working with overseas airlines and immigration authorities, prevent them from boarding Canada-bound boats and planes. The CBSA strategy to "push the border out" means that anyone they may suspect is an "undesirable traveller" or who allegedly poses a risk to "Canada's security and prosperity are identified as far away from the actual border as possible, ideally before a person departs their country of origin."

Because these "liaison officers" are not required to separate out those fleeing persecution from other migrants, it is not clear how many refugees have been returned to countries where they face arrest, persecution, torture and death. This is nothing new. In fact, Canada prides itself as a world leader in what is known as "interdiction," and assigns fancy names to those doing the dirty work. In a 2003 speech, then immigration minister Denis Coderre (now mayor of Montreal) beamed that "in the past six years, our migration integrity specialists have stopped more than 40,000 people with improper documents before they boarded planes for North America."

For overseas asylum seekers desperate to come to Canada, the CBSA message is clear: you can't get there from here. The United Nations Refugee Convention prohibits Canada and other signatories from punishing individuals who arrive here -- or attempt to come here -- with false identity documents, a principle that is also part of Canadian law.

Some advocates argue that CBSA's overseas efforts to block asylum seekers are intended in large part to deny asylum seekers the protection of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which they could claim upon stepping on Canadian soil. Equally, the overseas CBSA law-breakers preventing refugees from getting here may think that, if they are not within Canadian jurisdiction when engaged in this illegal activity, there are no legal repercussions, though the International Law Commission has found "responsibility ultimately hinges on whether the relevant conduct can be attributed to the state and not whether it occurs within the territory of the state or outside it." In any event, Canada does not seem to care: internal CBSA documents discussed in an excellent November 2013 Harvard University report (Bordering on Failure: Canada-U.S. Border policy and the Politics of Refugee Exclusion) indicate the agency "does not sufficiently emphasize Canada's refugee protection obligations in the training materials delivered by Liaison Officers." Nor does it require its officers to assist those fleeing persecution or to ensure that those they intercept are not returned to persecution.

Subcontracting refugee 'interdiction'

In addition to the five dozen "liaison officers" who daily violate the various human rights instruments that are binding on them, Canada also subcontracts out this law-breaking by threatening private carriers that may be carrying individuals without proper documentation to Canada. As the Harvard study points out, "the threat of sanctions creates serious incentives for private carriers to err on the side of caution and block travelers who appear to lack proper identification from boarding Canada-bound planes or boats, without considering the possibility that they may be genuine refugees. It is widely recognized that carrier sanctions prevent asylum seekers from making refugee claims in Canada."

Some private carriers will go to extreme lengths to avoid penalties: it has been proven that asylum seekers have been thrown overboard on the high seas. (While numbers are hard to calculate since these events occur outside of Canadian waters, it is known that such cases have occurred on Canada-bound boats. In 1997, for example, a Nova Scotia court determined that, although there was sufficient evidence for a second degree murder trial, it did not have the jurisdiction to hear the case of seven officers of a Taiwanese vessel who threw three Romanian stowaways into the ocean before arriving in Halifax.)

Indeed, the federal government enters into a bounty arrangement with Canadian companies called the Airline Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) Program, under which carriers will receive reduced administrative fees if they "reduce the number of improperly documented persons arriving in Canada." Hence, an airline will think nothing of kicking off a refugee with a false passport who is seeking asylum because, under the MOU, the airline immediately receives a 25 per cent discount on fees upon signing, with the promise of additional savings of 50-100 per cent of administrative fees "depending on the level of interdiction success as measured against the assigned performance standards." With private airlines acting as deputized border patrol agents, there is a strong incentive that, when in doubt, sending refugees who have false ID back to the torture chambers is a best business practice, resulting in lower costs and a better rate of return on investment, even if it makes airline shareholders complicit in international and domestic law violations.

The Harvard study covers a broad range of additional Canadian policies that are resulting, plainly, in lives being lost. As it concludes, "Canada is systematically closing its borders to asylum seekers, and circumventing its refugee protection obligations under domestic and international law… By implementing and intensifying these measures, Canada sets a poor example for other countries, and contributes to the deterioration of refugee protection around the world."

Wanted: Harriet Tubmans

Even for those allowed into the country under programs such as the temporary foreign worker program, conditions are grim. While most people were nursing New Year's Day hangovers, the Harper regime inaugurated 2014 by declaring that a proposed ban preventing employers who had been convicted of human trafficking, sexually assaulting an employee or causing the death of a worker from participation in the program was being removed because it were deemed "too rigid and cumbersome."

With the Canadian government clearly acting illegally with respect to standard human rights commitments, the challenge for citizens is responding in a manner that protects the rights of asylum seekers who either face deportation and/or need to get here safely. The need for church sanctuary is greater than ever, yet few places of faith will open their doors. The need for an underground and overground railroad that will also provide safe spaces for those facing deportation is an equally compelling challenge that we need to meet as well. Every schoolkid hears the story of Harriet Tubman leading the persecuted to the Promised Land. We need more Harriet Tubmans who will work to keep them here.

Matthew Behrens is a freelance writer and social justice advocate who co-ordinates the Homes not Bombs non-violent direct action network. He has worked closely with the targets of Canadian and U.S. 'national security' profiling for many years.

Please Support Homes not Bombs During Its 15th Anniversary of Working for Social Justice

 Friends,

25 years ago this month, I found myself sitting in the back of a police car, handcuffed, dressed as Santa Claus, busted with several fellow Santas and elves for trying to remove war "toys" from a store shelf and replace them with cooperative, peaceful games. It was one of many nonviolent actions in which I have had the pleasure of participating, the transformative spirit of which very much undergirds the work of Homes not Bombs.

This year marks the 15th anniversary of Homes not Bombs, the loose-knit network of social justice advocates and nonviolence practitioners who have taken on a wide variety of injustices since we were founded in 1998. We have often been visited by Santa in the course of our work, from resisting the devastating sanctions and wars against the people of Iraq and Afghanistan to singing holiday carols at the immigration detention centres where children – incarcerated simply because they are refugees – wave from behind the bars.

While we generally do not blow our own horn, we felt this would be an opportunity to reflect on some of our successes while also asking that you consider contributing to our ongoing costs so that we can continue on for years to come. 

2013 has been a busy year as we conduct direct action trainings for union locals under attack, provide campaign-building advice for numerous grass roots initiatives that serve to empower youth, and redouble educational and outreach efforts to end violence against women. We also continue working to expose the untold billions spent on Canadian war plans at the expense of social needs at home and abroad, all the while trying to drive home the reminder that we have more power than we know and that positive social change really is possible.

In the past 15 years,  we have many achievements to recall, including:

1. Founding the Campaign to Stop Secret Trials in Canada, the group that took on secret hearing security certificates when few would touch the issue. Our work to advocate for the detainees facing secret hearings and years in solitary confinement eventually contributed to the landmark 2007 Supreme Court decision declaring this medieval process unconstitutional. Two of the five Muslim men subject to the process have had their cases quashed, while three others continue the struggle in the courts. We played a significant role in the preparations for the October, 2013 Supreme Court challenge in the case of Mohamed Harkat, and re-staged our production of Kafka's The Trial in Ottawa with readers including Giller-Prize winner Elizabeth Hay. Significantly, we have made the issue so controversial that CSIS has stopped issuing security certificates altogether. That being said, other repressive tools also involving secrecy in the immigration act continue to be used against a growing number of refugees, and so our work is not yet done.

2. Founding the group Stop Canadian Involvement in Torture, which for years has worked to not only bring home those illegally detained and tortured overseas, but to ensure accountability and apologies for those who still suffer the effects of torture. Our cross-Ontario caravans, educational presentations, and ongoing vigils continue as we raise the uncomfortable questions about Canadian complicity in torture. Our work also inspired the only film made about Canadian complicity in the torture of Abdullah Almalki, Ahmad El Maati and Muayyed Nureddin, the excellent Ghosts (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJmVhUoFjWo)

3. Leading significant nonviolent campaigns and civil disobedience actions across the province of Ontario, from trying to transform the War Department into the Housing Department to working with our friends in Hamilton to organize the Festivals of Life that led to the closure of the Hamilton War Show. We have also played a major role in focusing on drones (doing so beginning in 2002 when few thought this would become a major issue), with an ongoing campaign at L-3 Wescam in Burlington, as well as focusing on the manufacture of assault rifles and grenade launchers at Kitchener's Diemaco and weapons of mass destruction at Northrup Grumman (Litton) in Rexdale. Many of our actions have led to court victories that provide others engaged in direct action with precedents that can help them win their cases as well.

4. Founding the Anne Frank Sanctuary Committee, which has worked to open churches to the idea of hosting refugees at serious risk if deported. We have won two lengthy cases, saving individuals from deportation to torture, and continue working to find safe spaces for those increasingly at risk as a result of repressive legislation.

5. Working with jailed Canadians held in the U.S. or overseas such as Khalid Awan, held since October, 2001, with many years spent in the infamous "Little Gitmo."

6. Founding St. Clare's Multifaith Housing Society, which grew out of our work with homeless youth in Toronto. Since the late 90s, hundreds of not-for-profit housing units have been constructed by St. Clare's.

While these important landmarks remind us of the power we have to frame an issue, focus in on those perpetrating an injustice, and come up with transformative solutions, they represent in many ways the tip of the iceberg in terms of our ongoing campaigning, much of which begins as individualized advocacy with those who have fallen through the cracks and expands into a wider social justice campaign when we see others facing the same plight.

Our work does not always make the news, but it still goes on, sometimes hidden from view given the delicate nature of some of the cases we handle. But rest assured, we continue on with the important work of nonviolence training, speaking in high schools, providing court support, and organizing public action.

Unfortunately, all of this does cost money, and we rely on the support of individuals like yourselves to help pay those bills for organizing both nationally and provincially.

We hope you can make a significant financial contribution to the work of Homes not Bombs (and perhaps share this with someone who is similarly able to do so).

You can do this three ways:

1. To receive a tax deductible contribution for donations over $100, contact us at tasc@web.ca and we can let you know the details.

2. If you do not need a tax receipt, simply write a cheque out to Homes not Bombs and mail it to PO Box 2020, 57 Foster Street, Perth, ON K7H 1R0.

Thanks so much for your support. If you have any questions please feel free to contact us at tasc@web.ca

Peace,

Matthew Behrens
Homes not Bombs
http://homesnotbombs.blogspot.ca/

Santa Claus Rejects NORAD Escort; May be Placed on No-Fly List

 

December 17, 2013

            In a little-noticed news release emanating from the North Pole, a jolly senior citizen has asked that his image not be co-opted this holiday season by the Canadian War Dept. and NORAD. In addition, the gentleman, who identified himself as Santa Claus, also refused the militarized escort that NORAD said would be tracking his annual flight around the world.

            "I don't want war planes on my tail, and I don't want children to think I am in any way associated with the type of organization that plans for things like nuclear war and space warfare," Claus said in an exclusive telephone interview with rabble.ca. "Your War Dept. misrepresents me the same way the sales of war toys misrepresent me. I don't make machine guns and toy tanks, and I certainly do NOT want an escort from warplanes or to be tracked by an organization which is working to militarize the heavens."

            Claus was particularly concerned that NORAD uses this annual opportunity to glorify warplanes and drones which are used to drop bombs on and mutilate children in countries like Afghanistan and Iraq, noting that last week, dozens of people in a Yemeni wedding party were massacred by a drone-fired  Hellfire missile.

            Santa says he is disturbed to again find himself the focus of the annual military public affairs operation, designed to normalize for children the idea that the military – as well as military alliances which plan and constantly threaten life on the planet with nuclear warfare, pre-emptive invasions, and environmental destruction – is a benign outfit.

            “I also don’t need to be tracked,” Claus says. “This is the era where we are learning that CSEC in Ottawa and the NSA are watching every move everybody makes, and it’s getting ridiculous. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer has gotten ulcers out of concern that every time he sneaks into the bushes to do his business, it winds up on some database somewhere and could be used to embarrass him in front of his fellow creatures.”

NORAD LIES ABOUT CLAUS

            The NORAD Tracks Santa website (www.noradsanta.org/‎) is a paean to militarism, inviting young children to play at war and offering videos that are recruitment vehicles featuring martial music more akin to a 1980s Tom Cruise bomb-em-up flick than a period of peace and good will to all. Indeed, one four-minute video making the rounds of community newspaper websites around the globe opens with an image not of Santa but of bomber planes.

            “One of the videos says I did a test flight in cooperation with NORAD, which is a total lie,” Claus said, bemoaning the fact that the tracking site features numerous tributes to an organization that has the power, along with its other “northern command” partners, to commit the ultimate act of nuclear terrorism and obliterate the globe.

            One video features a small child (perhaps the son of US military personnel) stationed in Djibouti, one of over 700 U.S. bases occupying the globe and also the site of a command centre from which drones are launched in countries like Yemen and Somalia. (Djibouti troops do not, notably, maintain a military base protecting their own interests in Florida or Manitoba). While the child talks of going to the beach and riding his bike, it does not mention that one month ago, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights heard evidence on Djibouti’s role in the U.S.-led (and Canadian-supported) rendition to torture and secret detention program. (http://www.interights.org/news/130/index.html)

            The NORAD tracking site also features holiday songs performed by – who else – the Air Force Academy Band.

            “In the same way the militaries of the world try to convince us that humanitarian aid cannot be delivered without sniper rifles or bombing the heck out of a village first, now they are trying to show that Christmas cannot happen without all of their firepower, and that Christmas carols cannot be sung unless by people who’ve been trained to kill,” Claus said. “Well, I have news for them. The trillions spent on war are what deprive most children of happy holidays, regardless of when they celebrate them.”

            Meanwhile, a heavily redacted Access to Information request appears to reveal why NORAD is tracking Santa, and early indicators are it has nothing to do with his protection nor his mission of delivering joy.

CSIS NAMES SANTA SECURITY THREAT

            According to the highly classified document from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), “The Service has reasonable grounds to believe that [name blacked out, but clearly a reference to Claus] is a member of an inadmissable class of persons to Canada based on a variety of associations, travel patterns, and other indicators which constitute a threat to the security of Canada.”

            Among those highly suspect findings, CSIS notes, is Santa’s long beard (“worn in the traditional Muslim fashion that could inspire some radicalized youth to follow bearded individuals such as Osama bin Laden”), his visitation to countries throughout the Middle East and refusal to demonize anyone (“a disturbing inclination towards supporting the human rights of Palestinians,”), his large donations of gifts (“he may be transporting illicit materials that could place him on the United Nations 1267 list, thereby barring him from travelling with goods that could fall into the wrong hands”), past associations (“[subject] did attend at Robben Island prison compound and provide material aid to Nelson Mandela and other members of African National Congress, which Service maintains was, is, or could be a terrorist organization”), has signed petitions urging the release of immigration detainees (including children detained in refugee jails across Canada) and in support of environmental protections (“Service notes subject supports same causes as eco-terrorists trying to block oil sands development”), and his failure to carry a passport.

            “Service also notes that Mr. Claus uses several aliases possibly as a means of avoiding detection, including Jolly St. Nick, Kris Kringle, and, in a special code with woman alleged to be Mrs. Claus, ‘tubby old sock,’ origin for which is still a mystery to Service but further investigation will reveal.” Claus also appears to be under surveillance for carrying of “suspicious” sacks, studious avoidance of customs, and his “religious head gear,” the last of particular concern to Quebec security services attempting to pre-emptively enforce their so-called Charter of Values.

IS PRANCER A CLOSET MUSLIM?

            CSIS also notes with grave concern that at least two of Santa’s reindeer (Prancer and Vixen) have been reading the Koran and allegedly discussed conversion to Islam.

            It is not surprising that Claus would be the subject of concern to “security services,” whose main goals tend toward monitoring outbreaks of democracy and free-thinking inquiry while harassing specific targeted communities using the same vague profiling against, for example, members of this country’s Arab Muslim communities. Santa certainly does have a record of being involved in the same social justice causes that everyone from CSIS and the RCMP to the FBI and CIA have deemed threats to national security. For example, Santa was recently arrested with Walmart workers seeking a decent wage (https://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/11/29-1), while the busiest resident of the North Pole also managed to take an anti-drones message of Peace to the Australian military (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=738RSak2yBI). Santa also performed a tripod action for 9 hours in Glasgow this week to protest immigration raids that break down doors and arrest and detain children simply because they are refugees (http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2012/12/504004.html?c=on#c290190)

            While Santa is proud of involving himself in social justice activities, he does get weary of his image being used to glorify war, especially given that he annually views the painful reality that is a result of relying on military might to enforce injustice and resolve conflicts. "We see all the children of the world, the ones who have lost legs and arms and eyes to landmines and cluster bombs, the ones who have watched parents murdered with Canadian bullets and machine guns in Iraq and Afghanistan, the ones whose only wish for Christmas is peace on Earth, or the return of a parent or sibling killed by an aerial bombardment."

            Claus has joined Homes not Bombs members on many occasions through the years as an ambassador of peace through justice and goodwill. As such, he has been arrested by Loblaws for helping distribute food he took from their shelves (to help pay back the tens of millions of dollars in unpaid taxes owed by Loblaws), protesting sanctions against the people of Iraq which killed over 1 million Iraqis (this with the aid of the Canadian military whose warplanes are set to tail Santa), the use of secret trial security certificates, the production of war toys, L-3 Wescam’s production of drone technology in Burlington, Ontario, the Hamilton War Show, and many others.

            "There are so many causes for me to support, and I want to support them all, but half the time I'm busy trying to correct the false information about me and what I stand for that's presented by the military and the media," Claus said. "I barely have time to speak with you, much less all the other media outlets who request interviews."

CHRIST CONTINUES TO BE DETAINED BY CBSA

            Rabble.ca’s interview with Claus was cut off when he received a call from one of Canada’s top immigration lawyers, Barb Jackman, to discuss his travel options given the increasingly tight Canadian borders for refugees and the possibility that he may be on Canada’s no-fly list. Indeed, it is unclear whether agents of the Canadian Border Services Agency – a federal department with absolutely no independent oversight– will allow Claus to enter Canada, and there are still many unresolved questions regarding its recent rejection of Jesus Christ, who was deemed a failed refugee claimant and a threat to national security.

            Lawyers at the time had asked for information about CSIS interviews with Christ, but because CSIS does not record interviews nor make verbatim notes, there was little to go on. "The Service noted that Christ appeared unusually calm when pressed about his possible association with prostitutes, beggars, and lepers," read a short half page of notes which were eventually declassified. “Christ also seemed hesitant when asked whether an individual named Joseph was his father, a sign that he was withholding the true nature of his character.” Christ’s anti-government activities also raised a red flag for Canadian border officials.

            Christ was also deemed to be a security threat because he allegedly uses a number of aliases, including Prince of Peace, Jesus of Nazareth, and the Son of God. He had travelled to Canada, like most refugees, on a false passport, because if he had used his real name on travel documents, Roman authorities may have picked him up before he could have fled the country. Christ was also deemed inadmissable to Canada because of his criminal record; he, like all refugees coming to this country, are considered not worthy of being accepted even if those convictions have occurred in countries where there is no due process or internationally recognized legal system. Worse, refugees who have been convicted of minor offences which would be deemed "summary" (or lesser) offences if convicted here in Canada have their record interpreted as indictable (or more severe) upon their arrival here, regardless of the circumstances.

            In another mark against Christ, CBSA points out one particular incident in which the refugee applicant was "particularly violent, overturning a table used by moneychangers in a temple frequented by Canadian money speculators." Canada's Criminal Code notes that a terrorist is anyone who "damages property outside of Canada because a person or entity with an interest in the property or occupying the property has a relationship with Canada or a province or is doing business with or on behalf of the Government of Canada or a province."

            While Christ remains in detention with hundreds of never-charged  immigration detainees in Lindsay (many of whom are again on hunger strike), Santa will no doubt be writing the phone number of his lawyer on his arm in the event he needs to make that call. If there’s nothing under your tree December 25, you may want to consider posting bail for the latest in a long line of wrongly imprisoned migrants and travellers caught up in the nightmare of Canada’s immigration regime.

           

  

Why Do We Jail Women Who Choose to Live?

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(Trigger alert, this story contains disturbing reports of assault)

            Earlier this year, the World Health Organization released a comprehensive study that found more than a third of all women worldwide – 35.6% – will experience physical or sexual violence in their lifetime. The great majority of this violence is committed by intimate male partners in acts that can only be described as domestic or home-grown terrorism. It’s the latest in an endless stream of similar reports on this form of domestic terror, but Canada and other governments refuse to both recognize the extent of the crisis and respond accordingly.

            When the report was released, WHO Director General Dr. Margaret Chan declared, "These findings send a powerful message that violence against women is a global health problem of epidemic proportions. We also see that the world's health systems can and must do more for women who experience violence." The report found that of the women who experience direct attacks, 42% require some form of hospitalization.

            In confirming what more than half of the population already knows is a daily reality, the WHO report did not exactly produce a firestorm of response and calls for urgent action from government leaders.  Instead, their “war on terrorism” focuses on racial and religious profiling, the jailing of innocents, the closing borders to refugees, extra-judicial assassination by Canadian-made drones, and continuation of indefinite detention and rendition to torture programs. There are no massive interventions that address the greatest purveyors of fear and violence in Canada and around the world: the men in women’s lives.

            As of April, 2010, there were an astounding 593 women’s shelters in Canada. Earlier this month, the Ontario Association of Interval and Transition Houses released its annual Femicide report, a grim reminder of women’s lives snuffed out by men in Ontario during 2013 (http://www.oaith.ca/assets/files/OAITH%20Final%202013%20Femicide%20List-%20Nov%202013.pdf). And despite a United Nations call for Canada to develop a comprehensive national review to end violence against aboriginal women, Canada’s envoy to the UN in Geneva rejected the idea. Similarly, in 2010, Canada adopted a National Action Plan for the implementation of United Nations Security Council resolutions on Women, Peace and Security which included supporting the rights of girls and women abroad, but it has failed to deliver on its promise of annual and midterm reports.

            Perhaps that is due in part to the fact that Canada’s rhetoric about supporting women’s rights (a mainstay of its justification for the occupation of Afghanistan) rings hollow. In Afghanistan, Canada’s presence does not appear to have moved things forward for women. Indeed, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan reported last December that women who flee rapists and abusive husbands are regularly jailed by the hundreds for alleged “moral crimes.”  Among those jailed are those who have defended themselves against and, in the process, wounded or killed rapists.

            Lest one conclude that Afghanistan is just “behind the times”, it is worth noting that here in North America, women who choose to live by defending themselves are similarly jailed in alarming numbers. In the U.S., the Michigan Women’s Justice and Clemency Project, found: "The average prison sentence for men who kill their intimate partners is 2 to 6 years. Women who kill their partners are sentenced, on average, to 15 years." 

            Marissa Alexander, an African-American mother of three, did not kill her abusive ex-partner when he physically attacked her and threatened her with death only nine days after she gave birth. She fired a warning shot into the ceiling to scare him off, and as a result is serving 20 years of hard time in Florida. During her trial – one in which the judge rejected her “stand your ground” defence - the same rationale used by the state of Florida for failing to arrest the man who murdered Trayvon Martin – Alexander recounted numerous incidents of severe physical abuse including choking, attempted strangulation, and other incidents that required hospitalization. She lost the ability to swallow as a result of her injuries and lost ten pounds. She subsequently obtained a domestic violence injunction against her ex. In 2010, when she was five months pregnant, she was “head-butted” twice, her clothes torn, and thrown to the ground. During all these episodes—and at other times, as well—he threatened to kill her. At trial, numerous witnesses testified about seeing Alexander's injuries, while in-laws of her abusive husband testified about his reputation for violence. One witness confirmed that Marissa Alexander met the criteria for “battered person’s syndrome.” 

            On top of this, her abusive husband admitted in a sworn affidavit, “The way I was with women…they never knew what I was thinking or what I might do. Hit them, push them. …I honestly think [Marissa] just didn’t want me to put my hands on her anymore, so she did what she feel like she have to do to make sure she wouldn’t get hurt, you know. …The gun was never actually pointed at me.”     

            While an appeals court recently rejected her contention that she should have been granted immunity from prosecution under Stand Your Ground (under which an individual can use deadly force if “he or she reasonably believes that such force is necessary to prevent imminent death or great bodily harm”), it did find, in granting her a new trial, that the jury was given the wrong instructions. The original judge essentially placed the burden of proof on Marissa Alexander when it came to showing that she was about to be attacked and needed to act in self-defence. The appeals court confirmed that Alexander “was charged with aggravated assault but – under any possible review of the evidence– inflicted no injury.”           

            While a new trial was a breakthrough, Alexander’s supporters called on the state to drop the charges and let her go free. Unfortunately, the state of Florida is pursuing the trial option, and a hearing to determine whether Marissa will be freed on bond and returned to her children (she has not seen her youngest child in three years) took place earlier this month, with a decision expected by the end of the year.  Meanwhile, the man who continually assaulted her and threatened to take her life walks free.   

            I have had the privilege of corresponding with Alexander while she has been in jail. She is a compassionate and insightful person who recognized immediately upon going behind bars how many women were also in her shoes: they too were in jail because they chose to live, and the judicial system simply could not understand the terror that constituted their daily lives.

            Closer to home is the case of Ottawa’s Ashley White, 25, who earlier this year was found guilty of aggravated assault (and acquitted of attempted murder) for stabbing her abusive former boyfriend. She faces a possible maximum of 14 years behind bars for defending herself. According to press reports on her trial, White’s former boyfriend, Patrick Halcro, aged 36, a veteran of the Afghanistan occupation who suffers PTSD, often went into fits of rage and jealousy. He admitted in court to punching her and smashing her head into a door frame. As QMI News reported, he claimed, "I used proportional force. I felt threatened."

            White suffered a shattered nose and cheekbone, requiring facial reconstruction surgery, in addition to post-concussion syndrome and a diagnosis of PTSD. The Ottawa Sun reported, “Medical evidence suggested her head trauma and the shock of seeing her face bathed in blood could have placed her in a state where she wouldn't have known what she was doing when she stabbed Halcro. As for Halcro, the knife blade nicked his lung but a trauma surgeon said the injury was relatively minor.”

            At one point in the trial, White’s lawyer noted that after pummeling her, Mr. Halcro stepped over her bloodied body to retrieve his luggage. “Your luggage was more important to you than checking on Ashley,” the lawyer said. According to QMI News, “He said he didn’t realize the extent to which he’d hurt her until he got his bag and noticed a lot of blood where White had collapsed.”

            The Ottawa Sun reported that White “remembers being pummelled on the floor as he loomed over her until she could no longer see and felt like she was going to die. He said: ‘I am trained to kill you and I will kill you’ or something like that, White said.”Four years after the original beating, White remains out on restrictive bail, while her ex was never charged. A community of friends has come together to try and assist her with her massive legal bills, both for the trial and an expected appeal. That group has formed a Facebook page, on which they write: “We strongly believe [Ashley] was wrongly convicted of aggravated assault for stabbing her abusive ex-military boyfriend. After being beaten so badly she would later require reconstructive surgery and in a state of near unconsciousness, Ashley fended off the attack with a kitchen knife. It has never been explained why he was never charged and why the lead detective never testified in court, yet Ashley’s life is changed forever. Ashley’s friends and supporters are planning a fund-raising event to help her cover the $90,000 accumulated costs to date and $50,000+ she is facing in future legal fees.” To join that facebook page, where you can leave messages of support and donate to her costs, visit https://www.facebook.com/pages/Friends-of-Ashley-White/471297956316613

In the meantime, Marissa Alexander’s supporters ask that you contact FreeMarissaNow@gmail.com and visit https://www.facebook.com/FreeMarissaNow

And http://www.justice4marissa.com/    As Canada marks the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women on November 25, it is a reminder of how much work remains to be done, not simply on symbolic days, but every day as the war against women grinds mercilessly on.