Many American films of the 1980's portrayed scenes where travelers in the Soviet Union would be stopped by officials and asked, "Your papers! Show me your papers!" The frightened traveler would fumble as they produced travel papers, which included name, birth date and gender. These movies would portray the worried traveler being checked at least three times by the KGB before leaving the airport or boarding the plane. Movie goers here in Canada could bask in democratic arrogance because under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms we have the protection that, “The restriction of freedom has reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.”
Just how does a society ever degrade to that level of a police state?
Under the former liberal federal government, the Public Safety Act 2002 authorized the establishment of the "Canadian No Fly List," a secret growing list of Canadian citizens and permanent residents compiled by CSIS and the RCMP. This list identifies people who these two organizations deem to be "suspected" of being capable of endangering airline security. This list is maintained as a directive under the "Passenger Protect Program" which is under the umbrella of Transport Canada.
In the post 9/11 world, it sure sounds like the government is protecting it citizens!
But what you may not know is that this list can contain anyone who this small group deem a threat based on 'intelligence' information. They have the ability to profile and list people. This list is then made computer accessible for airport security when you pick up your boarding pass. If your name, birth date and gender matches, security is required to contact the police and the Minister of Transport. The police are then required to take action. Furthermore, the person on the list is not allowed any disclosure as to why they are on the list. Their only recourse is to appeal to the ominous sounding "Office of Reconsideration."
What this sounds like, is a chapter from George Orwell’s novel “1984.” Can this really be taking place in Canada?
Consider the case of 26 year old, Hani Al Telani, a permanent resident who is enrolled in Montreal’s Concordia University studying Computer Engineering. Last June, Al Telani checked-in at Montreal's airport after purchasing return tickets to Saudi Arabia in order to visit is mother and father. His vacation ended before it started, when he produced his I.D. papers at the ticket kiosk. The airline employee refused to tag his bags. While waiting, a Transport Canada official arrived and handed him an ‘Emergency Direction’ that declared him an “Immediate Threat to Aviation Security." In a sworn affidavit, Al Telani has declared that he is not a threat and he has no criminal record to indicate that he a danger.
Authorities refuse to disclose why he is on the list and what criteria they use to determine him a threat. Al Telani has now been publicly portrayed as dangerous and he is now looked at as a Saudi National who is considered a terrorist by Canadian authorities. Worse yet, this young man is unable to leave Canada by air. The only way back to Saudi Arabia to see his parents is by boat.
The “No Fly List” is something that has been adopted by other countries and first suggested by the US Department of Homeland Security. The USA has their own “No Fly List” and according to the US Government Accountability Office, more that 30,000 travelers have been falsely associated with terrorism when attempting to board a plane.
As an example, in January of 2006, U.S. fighter planes intercepted an Air Transat flight to Mexico because it was carrying a Canadian citizen of Lebanese origin who was on the U.S. “No Fly List.” Al Telani was our first “No Fly List” person targeted and our first case of false identification under this program.
This policy of giving a small group of ‘intelligence' officers the power to profile Canadian citizens to separate them as terrorist without due process of law, is a blatant violation of our chartered rights and freedoms. Canadians do not need the protection of a “No Fly List” as the Criminal Code of Canada already gives authorities the ability to arrest and detain suspects who they believe upon reasonable and probable grounds, that they are about to commit an indictable offense, such as a terrorist act. To just suspect that someone is a threat based on shoddy intelligence such as his or her religion, race, or where they were born is abhorrent to human sensibilities. We should all be outraged!
But, when I talked to one lady last week and disclosed this policy to her, the immediate reaction was, “That won’t affect me or my family.” That was obvious because this lady is a white female of Christian heritage.
We should all be reminded that just because a person is Islamic, darker skinned, Lebanese, Saudi, Afghani or from Iraq, by all probability they are not born terrorists. Looking for the bogyman in every corner of our society make us all Xenophobes and reeks of McCarthyism.
With the federal election just concluded, it is time that we remind those who we elected into
office to undo some injustices. The “No Fly List” is an unacceptable and unfair profiling policy that turns Canada into a quasi-policestate.
Perhaps Mr. Harper should add this ‘program’ to his justice reform efforts.
If the Harper government neglects the reformation of this program, it may give future Prime
Ministers something to apologize for.
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