Canadian Convulsions > Inquiry into Trudeau's invoking Emergencies Act against Truckers - Have you ever heard so much BS?

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This report is from CBC which is Justin Trudeau's biggest fan. Despite criminal behaviour on a few occasions, embarrassing behaviour on a few other occasions, and very questionable decisions (like refusing to name the 11 MPs who were financed by China in the last elections), the CBC has never found any cause to criticize Trudeau. In fact, they very rarely even ask him real questions. I have a few questions which you will find in the report below.

Trudeau's national security adviser felt convoy protest posed

'a threat to democracy:' documents

This is CBC's headline and it is obvious that they are trying to justify Trudeau's use of the Emergencies Act which his father, Pierre Trudeau, also used in 1970. "'How far will you go', Trudeau the senior was asked".  "Just watch me," he replied.

Catharine Tunney · 

CBC News · 

Posted: Nov 15, 2022 10:52 AM ET | 

Inquiry into use of Emergencies Act underway in Ottawa

The history-making Public Order Emergency Commission, which is reviewing the federal government's use of emergency powers last winter, is hearing testimony in Ottawa. The inquiry is expected to last six weeks.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's national security and intelligence adviser believed that the convey protesters posed a "threat to democracy," according to a document tabled at the Emergencies Act inquiry.

The comments offer a glimpse of the advice cabinet was receiving as it invoked the Emergencies Act for the very first time in the legislation's history to end the convoy protests that blocked two trade corridors and gridlocked downtown Ottawa last winter.

In an email presented at the Public Order Emergency Commission Tuesday, Jody Thomas, Trudeau's national security intelligence adviser, writes that she's looking for a threat assessment.

No-one has actually heard of Jody Thomas before today. What are her credentials?

The email was sent just before noon on Feb. 14 - the day the government announced it was invoking the Emergencies Act and around the time the prime minister was briefing premiers.

The timing here is critical, and so is the content of what Trudeau was briefing the premiers. CBC didn't ask those questions. Was Trudeau looking for advice, or had he already made up his mind and was looking for justification?

"The characters involved. The weapons. The motivation. Clearly this isn't just COVID and is a threat to democracy and rule of law," wrote Thomas, whose title is often shortened to 'NSIA'.

"Could I get an assessment please … It's a very short fuse."

Workers use heavy equipment to remove temporary fencing and supplies from the Parliament Hill area

in Ottawa, Feb. 23, 2022. (Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press)

A few minutes later, Thomas wrote an email to senior government officials warning that "this is about a national threat to national interest and institutions.

"By people who do not care about or understand democracy. Who are preparing to be violent. Who are motivated by anti-government sentiment."

These are astonishing assumptions Thomas made in 'a few minutes.' How did she know what level of democratic literacy the truckers and their supporters possessed? Is her assumption based on the fact that the caravan started in Alberta? Are all Albertans incapable of understanding government?

How did she know that they were preparing to be violent? In the weeks-long protest, there were hardly any incidents of violence. No one challenged the police at any time.

She may be correct that the motivation was largely anti-government, but, on the other hand, the truckers went to Ottawa to talk to the government, not to overthrow them. No one from the government ever actually talked to the truckers except the Ottawa Police who had worked out an agreement with the truckers. That agreement was replaced by the Emergencies Act. The Ottawa Police Chief, Peter Sloly, resigned the very next day.

The motivation was to change some of the remarkably stupid policies that the government had enacted. 

CSIS didn't feel convoy protests constituted a national security threat under the law: documents

Proposed meeting between federal representatives, protesters was unlikely to work, public servant says

The request for a threat assessment made its way to the RCMP's Adriana Poloz, executive director of intelligence and international policing.

Her assessment said that ideologically motivated violent extremism "adherents" had been linked to the convoy. She pointed to a Three Percenters flag spotted on a truck taking part in the Ottawa protest and said that Diagolon members also attended that protest.

The Three Percenters are members of a listed terrorist entity in Canada. While members of the Diagolon online community claim the organization is satirical, the RCMP's assessment said prominent members have "espoused increasingly violent rhetoric opposing vaccine mandates."

The report also noted that the majority of protesters had been peaceful.

I don't know anyone who has ever heard of The Three Percenters or Diagolon, and I have my ear pretty close to the ground on things like this. But one flag, seen once, on one truck, does not a rebellion make.

RCMP questioned on chain of command

Commission lawyer Gordon Cameron raised the emails Tuesday as part of his questions to RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucki and Deputy Commissioner Michael Duheme.

"How does it happen that when the NSIA wants a security threat [analysis], it doesn't go through one of you, but goes directly to somebody in an intelligence directorate that frankly none of us had seen before we saw this email?" he asked.

For the significance of this, let me relate a story that preceeded the Iraq war. Looking for a reason to invade Iraq, Dick Cheney called a CIA agent who was writing a report on Iraq. Cheney told her to include Weapons of Mass Destruction in her report. Credit the agent - she told Cheney that it was illegal for him to call her directly and told him to call her boss.

The report, God bless her, did not include any mention of WMDs, however, Cheney had the report rerouted directly to himself where he modified the report to include WMDs which then justified Americas attack on Iraq. 150,000 civilians were killed in that war. 

This was the work of Deep State, and it kept weapons inventories moving for 8 years. 

It's a well-known philosophy in the government that 'It's a lot easier to get forgiveness than permission'. I confess I have used that myself in my Public Service career.

Duheme said that while it isn't ideal, sometimes people in government reach out for information directly if they have a relationship with the person providing it.

Another astonishing statement! It hints very loudly, that Thomas had some relationship with Poloz. Does that mean that she knew Poloz would say exactly what Thomas wanted her to say? Remember the timing here - it took only a few minutes for Thomas to make up her mind, which would suggest that Poloz responded almost instantly.

Cameron pointed out that the NSIA was advising government on whether to use extraordinary emergency powers 

"This was a very time-pressured situation. It might be understandable that corners were cut or direct contact was used," said Cameron.

"Were you alert to the fact this was a threat assessment going from your people to the Privy Council Office in connection with the invocation of the Emergencies Act?"

Duheme said he wasn't sure if he was briefed beforehand and said it's possible Poloz's response to Thomas relied on assessments the RCMP had written already.

Answers that lack a great deal of confidence.

Brendan Miller, a lawyer for some convoy organizers, asked Rob Stewart, the deputy minister of the federal Public Safety department during the protests, about the advice the federal cabinet was getting about the convoy at the time.

Miller showed Stewart a document that showed the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) didn't believe the self-styled Freedom Convoy constituted a threat to national security, according to the definition in its enabling law.

CSIS didn't see convoy as a threat: docs

The document, a summary of an interview CSIS Director David Vigneault gave the commission, showed the intelligence agency had concerns about invoking the Emergencies Act.

"[Vigneault] felt an obligation to clearly convey the service's position that there did not exist a threat to the security of Canada as defined by the service's legal mandate," said the document.

Stewart said the government would have a broader interpretation of what constitutes a national security threat.

And yet, did the government's broader definition actually fall within CSIS's more narrow definition?

Jody Thomas, national security and intelligence advisor to the prime minister, arrives at the west block on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Tuesday, May 10, 2022. (Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press)

"The cabinet is making that decision and their interpretation of the law is what governs here," said Stewart.

"And their decision was, evidently, the threshold was met."

"You have the RCMP, you have CSIS, you have the entire intelligence apparatus in the federal government and none of them said that this threshold was met, did they?" Miller asked Stewart.

"They weren't asked," Stewart said.

OMG!  You can't be serious! The RCMP, CSIS, Ottawa Police, were not asked, but the advice of one obscure woman who appears to have talked very briefly to a friend as accepted carte blanche. That, in itself, should be enough to dump Trudeau.

The Public Order Emergency Commission is assessing whether the federal government met the legal threshold to invoke the Emergencies Act to clear Ottawa of protesters last winter.

Under the Emergencies Act, a public order emergency "arises from threats to the security of Canada that are so serious as to be a national emergency." 

The act refers to CSIS's definition of threats, including serious violence against persons or property, espionage, foreign interference or an intent to overthrow the government by violence.

Unlike the 1970 October 'crisis', there were no murders, no kidnappings, no bombs exploding and no government was ever in danger of being overthrown.

RCMP Deputy Commissioner Mike Duheme looks on as Commissioner Brenda Lucki responds to a question as they appear as witnesses at the Public Order Emergency Commission, Tuesday, November 15, 2022 in Ottawa. (Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press)

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau cited issues with police enforcement when he announced his decision.

"It is now clear that there are serious challenges to law enforcement's ability to effectively enforce the law," he told a news conference. 

Ottawa Police Chief Sloly said the situation was under control. 

Under the Emergencies Act, a national emergency is "an urgent, temporary and critical situation that seriously endangers the health and safety of Canadians that cannot be effectively dealt with by the provinces or territories."

"It must be a situation that cannot be effectively dealt with by any other law of Canada."

Lucki and Duheme said they quickly became worried that the Ottawa police did not have a plan to end the convoy protest that occupied the capital last winter.

The pair also sat for an interview with commission lawyers in September. A summary of that conversation was entered into evidence Tuesday. 

During that interview, Lucki said the RCMP became concerned during the week of Jan. 31 —  the week after the first weekend of protest — that the Ottawa Police Service (OPS) did not have an overall operational plan to end the occupation of Ottawa.

But they did have a plan to manage the occupation, a plan that was trashed by the Emergencies Act.

RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucki details concerns with Ottawa Police Service resources during the convoy protests as she testifies at the Emergencies Act Inquiry.

Both Mounties said they needed to see a plan before committing more resources to Ottawa as similar anti-COVID-19 restrictions protests began to sprout in Western Canada and at the Windsor, Ont., border crossing. 

Duheme told the commission lawyers that he joined a call with Ottawa officers on Jan. 31, where OPS indicated it wanted to launch an aggressive enforcement operation from Feb. 3-6.

"Duheme said he felt that OPS lacked the resources to conduct these operations and had neither the resources nor the plans to sustain them over the long term," said the interview summary.

"Lucki became concerned that OPS lacked a plan to use the RCMP and OPP resources that were then assisting OPS."

Lucki and Duheme said they never saw an overall operational plan prepared by the Ottawa police.

"It was not clear to them whether OPS lacked such a plan or was unwilling to share it with the RCMP," said their interview summary.

Wouldn''t you think they should know the answer to that?

Lucki also said it would have been inappropriate for her to interfere in Ottawa police Chief Peter Sloly's planning and intelligence assessment processes.

It has been my contention right from the time Trudeau invoked the Emergencies Act that his response was like that of a frightened little boy. This happens when a control freak loses control.

Corruption is Everywhere > Greece's PMO uses Predator Spyware; China Covertly funded 11 Canadian Election candidates

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Greece's Prime Minister 'used state intelligence agency to spy

on political rivals, journalists and businessmen'

By HANNAH MCDONALD FOR MAILONLINE

PUBLISHED: 13:44 EDT, 5 November 2022 |

Greece has been rocked by a 'wiretapping' scandal as a bombshell report claimed Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis 'used state intelligence to spy on dozens of people including potential political rivals, journalists and businessmen'.  

Documento reported that the list of targets included former premier Antonis Samaras, current members of the cabinet and shipping magnate Vangelis Marinakis, owner of Olympiakos and Nottingham Forest football clubs.

Illegal software known as Predator was used in collaboration with technology employed by Greece's state intelligence agency EYP, the newspaper added.

Influential members of the conservative New Democracy party - potential rivals in any future leadership challenge to Mr Mitsotakis - were among those targeted, of which there were 30 politicians, the newspaper said.

Documento reported that the list of targets included former premier Antonis Samaras (pictured)

The weekly, which has close links to the main opposition Syriza party, sourced its information to 'two people with key roles in the surveillance' and said illegal software was also used to tap mobile phones.

'The evidence is missing,' said government spokesman Giannis Oikonomou, who nonetheless called on judicial authorities to investigate what the newspaper has reported.

Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis (pictured) 'used state intelligence to spy on dozens of people including potential political rivals, journalists and businessmen'

He accused the report of trying to 'hurt' the government and undermine stability.

On Friday, a European Parliament committee investigating wiretaps in Greece and other EU states called for a deeper investigation of the case.

Shipping magnate Vangelis Marinakis, owner of Olympiakos and Nottingham Forest football clubs, was also targeted

A Greek parliamentary committee set up to investigate the scandal folded after a month and critics said it failed to summon key witnesses.

The affair exploded in July when Nikos Androulakis - an MEP and leader of Greece's Socialist party - filed a complaint against alleged attempts to tap his mobile phone using Predator spyware.

Within days, it emerged that Mr Androulakis had been under surveillance separately by Greek intelligence before he became leader of Pasok, the country's third largest party.

Two Greek journalists and another senior opposition politician also claim to have been under surveillance.

The affair exploded in July when Nikos Androulakis (pictured) - an MEP and leader of Greece's Socialist party - filed a complaint against alleged attempts to tap his mobile phone using Predator spyware

The scandal forced the resignations in August of the Greek intelligence service chief as well as a close aide and nephew to the prime minister.

The Greek government has flatly denied using illegal surveillance software. It has admitted that state intelligence monitored Mr Androulakis, without disclosing the reason.

'Surveillance software exists in Greece as in the rest of Europe, but no (Greek) public authority has purchased or uses it,' Oikonomou said Saturday.

Mr Mitsotakis has promised to ban the use of illegal wiretaps by law. But critics note that one of his first acts when he became prime minister in 2019, was to attach the national intelligence service to his personal office.

Canadian intelligence warned PM Trudeau that China

covertly funded 2019 election candidates

Toronto Chinese Consulate

By Sam Cooper Global News

Published November 7, 2022 

Canadian intelligence officials have warned Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that China has allegedly been targeting Canada with a vast campaign of foreign interference, which includes funding a clandestine network of at least 11 federal candidates running in the 2019 election, according to Global News sources.

Delivered to the prime minister and several cabinet members in a series of briefings and memos first presented in January, the allegations included other detailed examples of Beijing’s efforts to further its influence and, in turn, subvert Canada’s democratic process, sources said.

Based on recent information from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), those efforts allegedly involve payments through intermediaries to candidates affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), placing agents into the offices of MPs in order to influence policy, seeking to co-opt and corrupt former Canadian officials to gain leverage in Ottawa, and mounting aggressive campaigns to punish Canadian politicians whom the People’s Republic of China (PRC) views as threats to its interests.

CSIS told Global News it could not answer some questions for this story. But the service confirmed it has identified the PRC’s foreign interference in Canada, which can include covert funding to influence election outcomes.

 “The Chinese Communist Party … is using all elements of state power to carry out activities that are a direct threat to our national security and sovereignty,” CSIS stated.

The briefings did not identify the 2019 candidates. But the alleged election interference network included members from both the Liberal and Conservative parties, according to sources with knowledge of the briefs.

Global News was not able to confirm from the sources which cabinet ministers may have been privy to the briefs nor the specific timing that the information was reportedly shared.

Chief among the allegations is that CSIS reported that China’s Toronto consulate directed a large clandestine transfer of funds to a network of at least eleven federal election candidates and numerous Beijing operatives who worked as their campaign staffers.

The funds were allegedly transferred through an Ontario provincial MPP and a federal election candidate staffer. Separate sources aware of the situation said a CCP proxy group, acting as an intermediary, transferred around $250,000.

The 2022 briefs said that some, but not all, members of the alleged network are witting affiliates of the Chinese Communist Party. The intelligence did not conclude whether CSIS believes the network successfully influenced the October 2019 election results, sources say.

CSIS can capture its findings through warrants that allow electronic interception of communications among Chinese consulate officials and Canadian politicians and staffers.

Sources close to this situation say they are revealing details from the 2022 briefs to give Canadians a clearer understanding of China’s attacks on Canada’s democratic system. Out of fear of retribution, they have asked their names be withheld.

In response to the briefing details, experts say the alleged interference points to weakness in Canada’s outdated espionage and counterintelligence laws, which sophisticated interference networks run by China, Russia and Iran are exploiting.

Justin Trudeau's comments were typical Trudeau - sound like you really care about this and then don't do anything more than you absolutely have to. Trudeau has to be cautious with his response so as not to put in place laws that will prevent global environmentalists from contributing to Canadian election campaigns.

There needs to be an inquiry into this to expose the 11 MPs and shame them into resigning. It's hard to believe the Canadian media is protecting these MPs rather than Canada's democratic government. I wonder how many cabinet ministers Trudeau and the Liberal media are protecting?

There is much more on this story at Global News.

Canadian Convulsions > CSIS Covers up Trafficking Teens to Syria; Liberals Out-of-Touch - Rex Murphy

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CSIS persuaded Turkey to hide recruitment of operative

who trafficked teens to Islamic State

Globe and Mail, 

September 29, 2022

The most senior intelligence officer in charge of covert operations at the Canadian Security Intelligence Service went to Ankara in March, 2015, to persuade Turkish authorities to stay silent about the agency’s recruitment of a Syrian human smuggler who trafficked three British teenage girls to Islamic State militants, according to three sources.

The sources said the officer, Jeffrey Yaworski, who was at the time CSIS’s deputy director of operations, was carrying out a discreet but high-level campaign to prevent the spy agency from being publicly blamed for using the smuggler as an operative. The Globe is not identifying the sources because they were not authorized to discuss national security matters.

One of the sources said Turkey eventually agreed to Mr. Yaworski’s request, but punished Canada by limiting the number of CSIS agents operating at the Canadian embassy in Ankara. CSIS also promised that any further clandestine activities in the country would be conducted as joint operations with Turkish intelligence, the source said.

The smuggler, Mohammed al-Rashed, was arrested by Turkish authorities on Feb. 28, 2015, within days of when he helped the girls cross the Turkish border into Syria. His capture threatened to place Canada at the centre of an international incident, after Turkish media reported that he had shared the girls’ passport details with CSIS, and that he had smuggled other British nationals seeking to join the Islamic State.

At the time of his arrest, Britain’s Scotland Yard had been frantically searching for the girls, and Turkey was unaware that CSIS had an Islamic State double agent operating in the country.

Turkey never publicly confirmed CSIS’s involvement with Mr. al-Rashed after Mr. Yaworski‘s travels to Ankara. The sources said he visited Turkey at least two times to meet senior Turkish officials in the aftermath of the operative’s arrest. One of the sources said Mr. Yaworski was trying to put the operational mess “back in the box.”

During the first visit, another source said, Mr. Yaworski apologized and asked the Turks to release Mr. al-Rashed, which Turkey declined to do because of the intense publicity in Britain about the missing girls. Turkey also did not want to be blamed for freeing an Islamic State human smuggler, since Ankara had been heavily criticized for failing to stop the flow of foreign fighters into Syria, the source said.

Mr. Yaworski declined to comment on his interaction with Turkish authorities, saying through an intermediary that he is bound by the secrecy provisions of the Security Information Act.

CSIS also declined to discuss the matter. “There are important limits to what CSIS can confirm or deny given the need to protect sensitive techniques, methods and sources of intelligence,” spokesperson Eric Balsam said in a statement.

Around the time Mr. Yaworski was holding secret talks with Turkish authorities, CSIS convinced British counterterrorism officials to cover up the agency’s role in the handling of Mr. al-Rashed. Those discussions were revealed in The Secret History of the Five Eyes, a new book by author Richard Kerbaj that recounts parts of Mr. al-Rashed’s story.

Mr. Kerbaj interviewed Richard Walton, the chief of Scotland Yard’s counterterrorism command, who said two CSIS officials came to see him shortly after the arrest of Mr. al-Rashed. They informed Mr. Walton that CSIS knew about the trafficking of the three teens and asked the British to obscure the spy agency’s role.

In his book, Mr. Kerbaj also wrote that CSIS sent an unidentified top official to Ankara to beg Turkey’s forgiveness for running a counterintelligence operation in their country. Mr. Kerbaj subsequently learned that the official was Mr. Yaworski, and that he had travelled to Turkey on at least two occasions after the arrest of Mr. al-Rashed. As deputy director of operations, Mr. Yaworski was responsible for all undercover missions, including recruitment and running of spies.

Mr. Kerbaj provided Mr. Yaworski’s name to The Globe and Mail last week, and the three sources later confirmed that he had travelled to Ankara.

The Globe has reported, citing a source with direct knowledge, that Mr. al-Rashed was freed on Aug. 5 after serving years in a Turkish prison on terrorism and smuggling charges, including for trafficking the three British girls, who were aged 15 and 16 at the time. The source said CSIS had planned to relocate him to Canada after his release. The government will not say if he has been granted asylum.

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Rex Murphy: The Liberals are so far out of touch

it probably can't be measured

Canadians need the Trudeau government to deal with the realities of

skyrocketing fuel, food and mortgage costs

Author of the article Rex Murphy

Publishing date: Oct 03, 2022 

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks during a Countdown to COP15 leaders event about climate change in New York City on Sept. 20, 2022. Rex Murphy wishes the Liberals would concentrate their energies on such domestic issues as inflation, soaring fuel costs, lack of clean drinking water on First Nations and government inefficiency. PHOTO BY BRYAN R. SMITH / AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

The greatest and most characteristic failure of the Trudeau administration has been its war against the oil and gas industry. It was so-early signalled. There is, for example, this brilliant pat-on-his-own-back — a yoga twist Mr. Justin has perfectly mastered — from nine years ago:

“I am pleased to announce that we will keep our commitment to implement a moratorium on crude oil tanker shipping on British Columbia’s north coast.”

From out of that deep but callow mindset came the blocking of pipelines, the wretched, useless (and in this time of rampant inflation) insulting so-called “carbon taxes,” the supine genuflections to the international global warming extremists, the hobbling of a mighty natural resource, and latterly the incredible elevation of a one-time Greenpeace activist and tower-climber, Steven Guilbeault (name his other qualifications), to a ministry in a supposedly mature national government.

The second greatest failure is a corollary of the first, the disregard, perhaps reaching to contempt, for the interests of the Western provinces. It amounts to the prime minister establishing a two-tier Confederation.

I am very well aware that I have made this observation many times before, but that puts no halt on my restating it: If oil and gas were the principal industries of Ontario, or especially Quebec, a drawing of an oil pipeline, or better yet that of an oil barrel, would long ago have supplanted the maple leaf on the Canadian flag.

How ever did global warming become the principal policy and obsession of the government of this vast, cold, main northern nation? If Canada were one of those tiny islands that shoot out warnings that they will be submerged in the apocalypse-to-come, it might be understandable.

The Maldives, for example, have staged their worry on this point. They held a televised “underwater cabinet meeting” to “raise awareness” of global warming. They gurgled very impressively, air bubbles drifting upwards, but, note, they still have land-based governance.

Of the thousands of islands in the Maldives that are barely above sea level, none have disappeared yet.

But Canada? Here’s a raw question too rarely asked — what’s our concern in all this? Why is global warming the principal and sternest policy of a Canadian government? Can we change China, India, Russia by our example? Beyond the burnishing of Trudeau’s credentials as the most self-advertised woke politician, what is it all about? Is Canada a heat furnace? Does Newfoundland threaten the global thermostat?

With the Canadian press asking stern questions about “carbon emissions policy” and which party has the “best” one, will no one ask the essential question: What benefit to Canada flows from “carbon reduction” schemes? Why does the Canadian government embrace global warming as the principal theme of national governance? Most succinctly, will no one in the press gallery ask the prime minister this question: What does it matter what we do?

Are there not wells to clean, passport lineups to shorten, inflation to worry about, estrangement from the Confederation to address?

Next question: Why has an international agenda, supported by every liberal billionaire and dogmatist of the warming crusade, become the key, near genetic, policy of the Trudeau administration? As Hillary Clinton so famously asked, “What difference, at this point, does it make?”

Can no one in the national press ask why it is important, or in any way consequential, or has any impact on any other government in the world, that Trudeau taxes Canadian gasoline and heating fuel in the “fight against global warming?”

Are there not wells to clean, passport lineups to shorten?

Why his personal and shallow preoccupations, and those of his ideologically driven mentor, Gerald Butts, are shaping the destiny of our nation? Canada is not a footnote to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

It may be fine for cabinet ministers flying abroad, a PM with his private air accommodation, and MPs with solid salaries not to care about pump prices or the jump in food costs and mortgage payments, to ignore reality and stick with the global warming fixation. But it is not for most Canadians, and certainly not for the poorest of them, which should always be our care.

And equally to the point, now that the blizzard of scandals and missteps, the airport clogs, the passport shambles, the WE scandals and the summoning of the near wartime Emergencies Act, have precipitated a drastic fall in the polls and signalled the “horror” of “Trumpian” Pierre Poilievre in the ascendant, would it be possible for the Trudeau government to stop role-playing on the international stage and tend to the less glamorous business of keeping Canada secure and stable?

It's my contention that Trudeau has always considered the Prime Minister of Canada as being a stepping stone to something more grand and fitting to his ego.

The current administration is so far out of touch I am not sure a measurement for the distance is available.

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Canadian Convulsions > CSIS Trafficked Shamima Begum and her friends to ISIS in Syria - 2 are now dead

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Trudeau defends CSIS after U.K. author claims agency

informant smuggled girls into Syria

PM says the government will probe the claims and expects intelligence agencies

to follow the rules

Murray Brewster · 

CBC News · 

Posted: Aug 31, 2022 5:22 PM ET | 

Shamima Begum made worldwide headlines when, at 15, she left the U.K. with two teenage friends to join ISIS.

(Alba Sotorra/Sky Documentaries)

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stood behind the country's top civilian intelligence agency on Wednesday in response to an allegation that one of its contractors helped traffic three British teenage girls to Islamic State extremists seven years ago.

A new book by U.K.-based writer Richard Kerbaj — The Secret History of the Five Eyes — is set to be published on Thursday. It claims that an informant for the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS) smuggled Shamima Begum, 15 at the time, and her school friends Kadiza Sultana and Amira Abase — 16 and 15 at the time — into northern Syria, and that the informant told his Canadian handlers.

Consequently, CSIS had the opportunity to stop these girls from going to Syria, thereby saving the lives of two of the girls, and perhaps preventing the three lost pregnancies of Shamima. That's 5 lives someone is responsible for. What possible reason could CSIS have for trafficking these three girls?

The book goes on to claim that CSIS later approached the counter-terrorism branch of London's Metropolitan Police — which was investigating the disappearance of the teenagers — and asked that the agency not become the focus of attention.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says CSIS and other intelligence agencies have to abide by 'strict rules.' (Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press)

Trudeau said the government will follow up on the claims.

"The fight against terrorism requires our intelligence services to continue to be flexible and to be creative in their approaches," Trudeau said following the swearing-in of two cabinet ministers on Thursday. 

"But every step of the way they are bound by strict rules, by principles and values that Canadians hold dear, including around the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and we expect that those rules be followed."

Trudeau said "there are rigorous oversight mechanisms" governing intelligence agencies — a reference to the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP).

(Left to right) Kadiza Sultana, 16, Shamima Begum, 15, and 15-year-old Amira Abase go through security

at Gatwick airport before catching a flight to Turkey on Feb 17, 2015. (Metropolitan Police/The Associated Press)

Kerbaj alleges the informant, Mohammed Al Rasheed, facilitated the teenage girls' journey to ISIS-controlled Syria, took phone photos of the passports used by the British schoolgirls and showed them to his Canadian handler in Jordan. By the time the information was passed to the U.K. and Metropolitan Police, Kerbaj claims, the girls were already in ISIS territory.

Two of the girls — Sultana and Abase — are now dead, while Begum has been denied permission to return to the U.K. and has been stripped of her British citizenship.

Her lawyers have argued that the removal of her citizenship was unjust because she was a victim of human trafficking.

Tasnime Akunjee, one of her lawyers, told CBC Radio's As It Happens on Wednesday that the fact his client was trafficked is well known, but hearing that Canadian officials were aware of it is "helpful" to her case.

"The fact is that they communicated it to the police, who didn't communicate it to us. Or be it that Richard Walton, the head of the investigation at the time, decided for the last seven years not to mention any of this to the family but rather to put it into a book that he was happy to publish, which we think is rather egregious of him," said Akunjee, referring to the interview Walton gave to Kerbaj for the forthcoming book.

A 'twisted phrase'

Trudeau's assertion that intelligence agencies are expected to be "flexible" and "creative" drew a sharp response from Akunjee, who cited the rendition and torture of Canadian engineer Mahar Arar in Syria during the early 2000s. 

"It's all well and good for a prime minister or a president or a head of state to say, 'Yes, we follow the rules,' but that's patently not the case," Akunjee said.

"In many examples, and in this case, being flexible is rather a, maybe, twisted phrase when you're talking about intelligence being worth more than the lives of children."

CSIS appears to think intelligence is worth more than the lives of children. Trudeau doesn't appear to disagree with that. Good grief!

Both Canadian and British security officials say they don't comment on intelligence matters.

At the moment, Begum lives in a detention camp in northern Syria. She has given birth to three children, all of whom died young.

Perhaps Shamima has suffered enough.

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Why the Spy Trade is Such a Booming Industry

Profession is thousands of years old, but motivations behind it remain basically the same

By Brian Stewart, for CBC News

Russian President Vladimir Putin's alleged attempt to meddle in the U.S. election has raised new concerns about global espionage. But, as Brian Stewart explains, there's been a massive surge in spying for years. (Alexander Zemlianichenko/Associated Press)

The alleged Russian plot that targeted the U.S. presidential election has raised concerns we're headed for Cold War levels of spying, but there's actually plenty of evidence the world soared past that point years ago.

In a CBC News documentary that aired four years ago, intelligence experts described new global threats as almost a pandemic of espionage that seems to know no limits.   

It was clear revolutionary forms of spying had emerged, the most powerful of which was the kind of cyberattack skulduggery Russia allegedly used to try to destabilize the Democrats and help Republican Donald Trump win the presidency. 

Sure, Cold War espionage was baffling enough — dubbed "a wilderness of mirrors" by the British — but it was at least more focused on the big power struggle between the U.S. and Soviet Union and far more technologically limited than today's sleuthing free-for-all.

There are now an estimated 120 countries involved in espionage, each trying to infiltrate military, political and economic targets all over the world.

High-tech snooping dramatically increased espionage threats and the quantity of information governments collect. (Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP/Getty Images)

And those are just the official spy operations. Non-state and corporate spies have become much more active, not to mention rogue cyber warriors who sell their wares as independents and major organized crime and terror groups.

I suggest there are other categories of cyber-spies. Powerful organizations such as might be operating under the UN banner, or for oligarchs like George Soros, the Koch brothers, etc., could well be entering the field of play. Remember, 2 years ago Lord Christopher Moncton overheard a British envoy to the UN Climate Change forum predict the fall of Conservative Prime Ministers from Australia and Canada. They were standing in the way of a global agreement on climate change that would cede powers to the UN to fine or punish countries for failing to meet targets in CO2 reduction. Both PMs were gone within a year. The climate change agreement was seen by Monkton as the first major step into a one-world government.

More threats, bigger budgets  

Globalization naturally helps the growth of espionage by making it easier for covert operators to move around more open societies. At the same time, high-tech internet snooping ensures it's often possible to steal sensitive information without even leaving a secure base. 

These growing threats naturally boost national spy agency budgets. The British MI6 foreign intelligence service is reportedly expanding by 40 per cent over four years, while U.S. spy operations already spend $70 billion a year.

More threats and more information to be analyzed has resulted in budgets hikes for spy agencies like the Central Intelligence Agency. (Reuters)

So the shadow world keeps expanding, but this brings us to the big question: why the global addiction to espionage and its many dark crafts? 

Spying is known as one of the world's oldest professions and the motives behind it have remained consistent over thousands of years: fear, avarice, insatiable curiosity and a desire to undercut real or imagined opponents.    

At the most basic level, spies seek to feed governments with as much information as possible on threats emanating from other powers, as well as intelligence about economic and scientific competitors, and sometimes even antagonistic political groups that might do them harm.

Information overload 

It's often said 90 per cent of all useful intelligence can be had from open public sources, but that secret 10 per cent that can only be obtained through covert means is still gargantuan.

Modern espionage produces information overload. And the fact that the goal is to collect, send and analyze this deluge of data for risks and opportunities as quickly as possible means intelligence operations are only getting bigger.  

And consider how competition works in spying. Governments tend to prefer analysis of secrets from several sources rather than just one, so you have the U.S. with 17 separate intelligence hubs and Russia with a half dozen.

See my next post: U.S., Russia - Long History of Election Interference.

The National Security Agency is one of 17 separate U.S. intelligence groups. (Jason Reed/Reuters)

Historical jitters have also contributed to the insatiable craving for more secrets that motivates leading espionage powers.  

It's no coincidence that the U.S., Russia, China, Israel and Iran, to name just a few, all suffered sneak attacks in war that left them convinced the best defence is an espionage offence and that they can never learn too many secrets.

The U.S., for example, has been exposed for spying on allies like Germany, while Russia has alarmed several governments including Poland, Ukraine, Germany, Sweden and Norway with a surge in espionage and covert interference.

Kremlin's goals

Moscow's methods of political sabotage allegedly include hacking political parties and state agencies, creating fake news stories to stir up xenophobic passion and providing money to far-right parties.

The goal seems to be to sow discord through the Western alliance and destabilize the EU while also trying to ensure an end to sanctions against Moscow.

Putin's goals include disrupting NATO and destabilizing the EU. (Mikhail Klimentyev/AP)

Mark Galeotti, a leading authority on Russian security, says even President Vladimir Putin's most aggressive espionage efforts are primarily motivated by defence.

"Every external operation is first and foremost a domestic one," he wrote in a study for the European Council on Foreign Relations. "This means carrying out operations to prevent 'foreign interference' as the Kremlin sees it, as well as dividing strategic rivals such as the EU."  

Whatever the mindset, the aggression comes at a time when international nerves are already on edge because of political turmoil in the EU, constant concern about terrorism, as well as a potentially unpredictable new era with Trump in charge of the U.S.

U.S. President Donald Trump says he'll make cyberwarfare a 'priority' in the fight against ISIS and other terrorist groups. (Carlos Barria/Reuters)

The fact it's so difficult to track and expose so many cyber threats from Russia and other sources only means we can expect even more of them.   

A new term, "hybrid warfare," is increasingly used in NATO to characterize clandestine and cyberattacks that could target governments, military sites, energy infrastructure like nuclear plants, stock markets and basically entire economies.

In a very rare public warning, MI6 boss Alex Younger recently said the difficulty in dealing with so many global phantoms "should be a concern to all who share democratic values."

"Data and the internet have turned our business on its head."

Canada not immune

No country seems immune to hacking and meddling — certainly not Canada. Top security figures including former CSIS director Richard Fadden have warned that other countries have likely already tried to influence our elections.

Canadian government computers have been hacked, including those at our premier scientific research body, the National Research Council, in 2014. The Harper government described the perpetrator as "a highly sophisticated Chinese state-sponsored actor."

Former CSIS director Richard Fadden says other countries have likely already tried to influence Canadian elections. (Sean Kilpatrick/Canadian Press)

Canada, like all advanced countries, is a target of economic espionage. That's where foreign countries, trade  competitors and cybercrime groups try to steal secrets from key sectors such as aerospace, biotechnology, chemicals and nuclear energy. 

Adding pure greed to the mix of state insecurities makes the global scourge of spying even more difficult to combat, especially when few countries have totally clean hands.

A great many international conferences and studies over years have struggled to find ways to control espionage, especially cyberattacks. Some even argue progress will come only if perpetrators, including the U.S., China and Russia, come to fear retaliation by equally damaging attacks. 

But escalating covert attacks to combat bad behaviour does have a chilling Cold War ring to it, and there's also the risk counterattacks might actually make this espionage pandemic even worse.  

Brian Stewart

Canada and abroad

One of this country's most experienced journalists and foreign correspondents, Brian Stewart is currently a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Munk School for Global Affairs at the University of Toronto. He also sits on the advisory board of Human Rights Watch Canada. In almost four decades of reporting, he has covered many of the world's conflicts and reported from 10 war zones, from El Salvador to Beirut and Afghanistan.