Stewart Sharma Harsanyi Calgary Immigration Law Firm Blog

Updated: Air India and the Importation of Conflict

Canadian immigration policy has to recognize that new immigrants often carry with them the hatreds, prejudices and conflicts plaguing their country of origin. It must then seek to identify those likely to continue to adhere to such belief systems and likely to act on them in Canada. Despite the current identification of Islamists as fifth columnists, we only need to look at recent history in Canada to realize that they hold no monopoly on such internal threats -- more than 20 years ago, Sikh fundamentalists used terror to establish their homeland, Khalistan, in India. Canada -- then and now a major destination country for Sikhs -- became a theatre for that conflict when Sikh fundamentalists placed a bomb on an Air India flight, killing 329 (mostly Canadians) and were likely behind the murder of Tara Singh Hayer, a prominent Indo-Canadian editor in Surrey, B.C., who spoke out against violence in the Sikh separatist movement. The Air India inquiry continues and now confirms that there was advance knowledge of the threat -- revealing a massive failure on the part of Canada's security apparatus to act on that knowledge to prevent the deaths of those innocents. In addition to Ontario Lt.-Gov. James... Read more →

Terror charges dropped against Khadr

Omar Khadr - the sole Canadian in Guantanamo had some unexpected news when he showed up for his arraignment before an infamous Bush Administration military tribunal. The charges against him were dropped without prejudice. The fact that the charges were dropped is nothing significant, and is essentially an issue only of semantics - 'enemy combatant' vs. 'unlawful enemy combatant'. The US government will undoubtedly and quickly re-file the charges. Michael Ignatieff, the deputy Liberal leader and Joe Comartin of the NDP quickly expressed that the Canadian government should essentially be doing more for a Canadian citizen like Omar. As an example of what could be done, is Australian David Hicks who was also incarcerated in Gitmo, but took advantage of a 'deal', pled guilty and has returned to Australia to serve his sentence (he'll probably be out of jail by the end of the year). Hicks was supported by his government who pressured the US for a repatriation agreement. Mr. Hicks even has a web site that advocated for his release. No such support seems likely for Omar given the apathy (or flat out antagonism) of the Canadian public towards Omar and the Conservative government has made no request for... Read more →

Zahid Hussain and Pakistan's Faultlines

Zahid Hussain’s “Frontline Pakistan: The Struggle with Militant Islam” makes for interesting reading these days. President Musharraf is the current dictator of Pakistan, and has delivered some success, and failed on other fronts (like nuclear proliferation) in the US ‘War Against Terror’. Both Hussain’s book and recent events indicate the precarious situation of Musharraf, the choices facing Pakistan, and the resulting consequences for the rest of the world. Democracy and the rule of law have eluded Pakistan for most of its post-Independence existence. This has been quite evident for the past 2 months since Musharraf’s arbitrary suspension of the former Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry of Pakistan’s Supreme Court. Here's a good article on the Judge vs. the General. Karachi, Pakistan’s largest city, has now been witness to the massacre of Chaudhry’s supporters who were protesting Musharraf’s unilateral action, apparently by members of the pro-government ethnic based MQM (Mutahida Qaumi Movement) party while Pakistan’s security forces stood by and watched. Hussain feels that that the “war against militancy and Islamic extremism can be best fought – and won – in a liberal democracy”. Musharraf’s proximity to the US and its unpopular policies in the region has resulted in (or exacerbated)... Read more →

"Londonistan" no longer haven for terror cleric

It looks like Londonistan has acted (decisively) to remove a militant Islamic cleric. Abu Qatada claimed asylum in the UK after arriving using fraudulent documents in 1993 (as do many other in-land asylum seekers). He was granted status ... but apparently began preaching against his new 'homeland' from the moment he arrived. The Telegraph's 'profile' on Qatada paints a chilling portrait: Among those he influenced were Mohammed Atta, one of the ring-leaders of the September 11 hijackers, who had a number of Qatada’s videos in his Hamburg flat. ...he advised Rachid Ramda who is in jail in France for financing the bombing of the Paris Metro in 1995 and Djamel Beghal an Algerian in jail in France for plotting to blow up the American embassy in Paris. ... In March 1995, Qatada issued an influential fatwa [religious ruling] which justified the killing of the wives and children of apostates in Algeria. In September 1998 he told his followers it was legitimate to break Western laws, steal and cheat "kaffirs" [non-believers] and take their women for sex or sale. The following year he used his base at the Four Feathers Social Club in Baker Street, central London to issue a fatwa... Read more →