U.S. to call for tighter security at borders
Refugee policy under fire: No indication terrorists entered from Canada: PMBack to the Politically Correct Detractor's Page
Just think, now that there's been a massive loss of life suddenly controlling illegal aliens isn't considered racist. Let's wait and see if the ACLU can sue its way out of this one.
September 13, 2001
By Tom Arnold
National Post, with files from Reuters.Brian Snyder, Reuters
Police clear the area in front of the Westin hotel in downtown Boston yesterday. Crowds gathered outside as police and federal agents searched for hijacking suspects inside the hotel.
Washington will pressure Ottawa to adopt tougher immigration and security policies if a Canadian link is proven in the U.S. terrorist bombings, experts suggest.
"I would expect certainly that the United States will put pressure on us, as they have been doing, to adopt similar forms of restrictions as the ones they've got," said David Mutimer, acting director of the Centre for International and Security Studies at York University in Toronto.
"I suspect we're going to have to move in that direction if we want to maintain some form of open border between the two countries."
"There are already indications in Toronto that the Tamil Tigers are raising money, if not recruits, for the ongoing quasi-civil war in Sri Lanka," added Jim Hanson, associate executive director of the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies.
Still, Mr. Hanson said it would not be easy for Canada to bow to demands from Washington. "I think we have the same problem as they do. We are a free country; we are open to immigration; we're open to foreign trade and people can cross the border relatively easily."
Paul Cellucci, the U.S. ambassador to Canada, suggested the two countries consider harmonizing their immigration policies in a bid to reduce the threats of such events in future. He said he supported the idea of a North American perimeter, within which security is focused on people coming to the continent from offshore.
The Boston Herald, citing unidentified sources, said at least two of the suspects flew to the city from Portland, Me., after crossing by ferry from Nova Scotia.
ABC News, also citing unidentified sources, reported that dozens of people were involved in the attacks and most came through Canada.
Sergio Karas, an immigration lawyer in Toronto, said Canada's policies were "overly naive" and must be revisited.
"Canadian immigration policy has been deficient for quite some time, particularly in connection with the release into the streets of undocumented or improperly documented individuals.
"We are the laughingstock of the world because of our incredibly high acceptance rate for refugee claimants."
Mr. Karas suggested all undocumented travellers and those claiming to be refugees but with false passports should be arrested and detained. "This policy used to be the case," he said, adding it changed in the mid-1990s to arresting only those "who are danger to the public."
The government should stop issuing student visas to foreigners from certain countries and order the immediate expulsion of failed refugee claimants from high-risk countries, such Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran and Lebanon, he added. "Failed claimants should be detained if they are high risk, because they otherwise disappear."
The government should also improve citizenship checks and deny permanent residence to those suspected of ties to militants, Mr. Karas said.
Janet Dench, executive director of the Canadian Council for Refugees, disagreed. "This is a very troubling knee-jerk sort of reaction to what are horrible events. You don't help situations by calling for radical measures based more on the passion of the moment."
She worried that people who are not security risks could get "caught up in the security net that currently exists" if laws are changed.
Two former Montreal residents alleged to have links to Osama bin Laden -- the millionaire Saudi Arabian exile who runs an international terrorist organization from the shelter of Afghanistan -- have been convicted of terrorism in the United States. Ahmed Ressam and Mokhtar Haouari, both Algerian nationals, were charged in what was believed to be a plot to blow up Los Angeles International Airport.
The plan was foiled when Ressam were arrested after entering Washington from British Columbia in a car loaded with explosives. A suspect in an attack on the World Trade Centre in 1993 escaped through Canada.
The Prime Minister told U.S. television network CNN yesterday that he had no information suggesting the hijackers had used Canada as a stepping stone to gain entry into the U.S.
"We have no indication from our security [services] that they used Canada to go there. It is a possibility, but we do not know," Jean Chrétien said.
The Canadian Alliance called for an emergency debate when Parliament resumes Monday on security and other issues. Mr. Chrétien supports the idea. So do the Progressive Conservatives.
"We have to ascertain the facts and right now they are just rumours," Joe Clark, the Conservative leader, said yesterday in an interview from Alberta. "If it is true , then we would have to go back and look at if it happened, how it happened. And if there are gaps in our system we should find them quickly and fill them quickly."
Paul Forseth, immigration critic for the Canadian Alliance Party, said problems with Canada's immigration policies are well-known. "There is a historical pattern of reports from CSIS and the RCMP about Canada either being a haven for terrorist operations or for a place where they raise funds or that it is used as a gateway to the United States."
Mr. Forseth, a B.C. member of Parliament, blamed the Liberal government, saying "whenever it's an issue of enforcement, whether it's ports and police, providing higher levels of security training and firearms to border guards or appropriate military personnel or providing resources to airport security, they have squeezed and starved this whole line of resourcing."