The People's Commission Network and No One Is Illegal Montreal
call for solidarity with Muslim communities and individuals in Canada
and Quebec who are experiencing even more intense Islamophobia and
racism as a result of the media coverage of last week's "Project
Samossa" arrests of Hiva Alizadeh, Khurram Sher and Misbahuddin
Ahmed. Journalists have actually visited mosques where the people
arrested have prayed, thereby greatly intensifying feelings of being
vulnerable, under surveillance, marginalized and profiled simply for
being Muslim or being perceived as such.
The People's Commission and No One Is Illegal Montreal are also
concerned for the well-being of the three men who have been named by
media as part of the alleged plot and are currently overseas. In
recent years, we have seen similar RCMP and CSIS suspicions - even
without intense media attention - result in the overseas detention and
torture of Maher Arar, Abousfian Abdelrazik, Abdullah Almalki and
others.
None of these individuals were ever charged with any crime and
their names were later officially cleared. However, their lives
continue to be marred by the immediate consequences of CSIS and RCMP
actions, consequences that include tarnished reputations, the loss of
freedom of movement, and, in one case, a freeze on all assets.
A few organizations and individuals are speaking out against the
storm of racism the arrests have unleashed (see, for example, the
statement by No One Is Illegal Vancouver:
http://noii-van.resist.ca/?p=2328).
**please circulate**
**See below for what you can do**
The People's Commission and
No One is Illegal Montreal support these statements of concern and
encourages all organizations and all individuals who are opposed to
racism to speak out and vigorously and categorically reject the ways
of thinking that lead to an exceptionalization of "terrorist"
cases (especially those involving Muslims), to an assumption of guilt,
and to profiling that is affecting entire Muslim communities.
To date, no credible evidence has been produced - let alone
established in court - that any of the men who have been so very
publicly accused are guilty of any wrong-doing or even any crime. In
fact, it hasn't even been established that there was a plot in the
first place. Although they were immediately painted as inspired by Al
Qaeda, there is nothing to indicate that the men arrested are anything
other than Muslim. Although, like the majority of Quebecers, they may
well oppose the occupation of Afghanistan and Palestine and be
concerned for the well-being of people currently subject to all the
violence of war and torture, such attitudes should be celebrated, not
criminalized or viewed as suspect.
In the current climate of racism, the People's Commission and No
One Is Illegal Montreal are concerned that the men will not be treated
fairly by a criminal justice system that has proven itself far from
immune from Islamophobia and that relies on the unjust anti-terrorist
law adopted in 2001.
In the public sphere, the men are not being presumed innocent
until proven guilty. The sensationalist media coverage has suggested
that the police acted on information provided by CSIS and that the
RCMP made their arrests when they did because of suspicion that money
was going to be transferred overseas for unspecified "terrorist
purposes".
CSIS's record of incompetence and abuse should inspire immediate
scepticism about the cases. In particular, the fact that, according to
its own oversight bodies, CSIS continues to use information that comes
from torture should lead to questions about the credibility of the
allegations and the information that CSIS received from Pakistan and
Afghanistan which is supposed to have led to the arrests. (See
www.peoplescommission.org/en/csis for more on CSIS and its use of
torture-evidence.)
The involvement of the RCMP should also raise red flags for all
who are familiar with past operations such as Operation Thread, which
were similarly deliberately brought to public attention by RCMP press
releases and press conferences. The long-standing RCMP practice of
infilitrating organizations and the ambiguous role RCMP under-covers
have played in suggesting and facilitating violence in such operations
should also be recalled. It is important to ask what political
purposes were served by bringing these cases to the attention of media
at this particular time.
The statements by the Minister of Security, Vic Toews, and Prime
Minister Stephen Harper, inciting paranoia and literally encouraging
people to spy on their neighbours, friends and family, show how the
arrests are being used to further political agendas. Recently, the
Conservative government has been cutting off funding for organizations
which disagree with its foreign and domestic policies, criminalizing
community organizers who challenged the G20 process, and creating
scapegoats (such as the Tamil asylum-seekers) to justify its
anti-immigrant policies. The comments of Toews and others close to the
Conservative party are aimed at silencing Muslim voices and more
broadly eroding social solidarity.
Solidarity as well as actively and collectively struggling
against injustices are our only safeguards against state repression,
exploitive economic policies and destructive environmental
practices.
WHAT YOU CAN DO
1. Write letters to editor objecting to racist framing of
media coverage. In particular, write to the Star to object to their
reporter's intrusion into a Montreal-area mosque.
Letters must be short (100 words), include name, mailing address
and daytime phone number of the writer; state "Letter to the
Editor" in subject; and content should be in the body of the
email (i.e. don't send an attachment).
Toronto Star: lettertoed@thestar
2. Ask organizations you are involved in to issue a
statement insisting on innocence until proven guilty, rejecting
the use of torture-evidence, and denouncing Islamophobia
3. Distribute CSIS Watch materials and encourage people
not to collaborate with CSIS:
If CSIS comes knocking (flyer in English, French, Arabic,
Spanish, Turkish):
CSIS visits videos (in English and French):
Top Ten Reasons not to Speak to CSIS (French, English,
Turkish):
4. In Montreal, join in organizing the People's Commission's
"Whose Security? Our Security!" popular forum, which
will take place in February 2011.
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