Holes begin to appear in Canadian terrorism case

Daily Times


By Khalid Hasan

WASHINGTON: Holes are beginning to appear in the official version of the “grand” terrorist conspiracy unearthed in the greater Toronto area, with one Canadian agronomist saying that the three tonnes of ammonium nitrate fertiliser that the alleged terrorists had ordered to blow up the Canadian Parliament and other buildings cannot be found even in the major agricultural province of Saskatchewan.

All but two of the 17 arrested men are reported to be Pakistanis.

One report on Monday said that the ammonium nitrate had only been ordered but never delivered, as the security agencies had substituted it with some harmless material. The fact that the swoop spread over two years was a sting operation is being underplayed or not even mentioned by the Canadian and American press and electronic media. There is no evidence that the 17 people arrested, five of them minors, had any link with Al Qaeda. Pen portraits appearing in the Canadian press show some of the young men to have become overly religious in the last couple of years. It is also now known that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and probably some other US agencies were also involved in the sting operation.

A Toronto mosque was vandalised following the arrests, with all of its 28 windows being smashed. No one has been arrested in connection with the incident. Mohammad Alam, the president of the Islamic Foundation of Toronto, said that the incident may be the beginning of religiously motivated reprisals against Canada’sover 700,000 Muslims. Tarek Fatah, a spokesman of the Muslim Canadian Congress, said that he felt “a mixture of shock and relief” following the arrests, which began late on Friday. “It’s too close to home,” he said.

Imam Hindy, the hard line leader of the Salaheddin Islamic Centre in Toronto told a newspaper, “Are we now the enemy within? We completely reject that. Since Afghanistan is closed, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), the Canadian intelligence agency, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) are targeting young Canadian Muslims to justify their budgets.” He said that he knew about half of the defendants, mostly from the times when they used to pray at his mosque. He conceded that there might be one or two troublemakers in the group, but predicted that most of the accused would be acquitted.

According to a CNN report, Canadian Muslim organisations have condemned the alleged plot to bomb Toronto-area buildings, while a lawyer for one of the 17 suspects in custody called the charges against them “vague”.

“We are committed to the safety and security of Canada and Canadians,” Alam said. “We of all Canadians are shocked at the recent arrests of young Muslim men and teenagers and the very serious allegation against them.”

Sheik Husain Patel, a spokesman for the Canadian Council of Muslim Theologians, said that the allegations against the young men represented “anti-Islamic behaviour”, if true. “Any threat to Canada poses a threat to Muslims in Canada as well,” he said.

He said that the accused were innocent until proven guilty. “But if they are proven guilty after being given due process, then this is a wake-up call – especially for Muslim leaders – that more must be done to make sure that our children do not get involved in activities contrary to the teachings of Islam,” he said.

He said that Muslim leaders had to emphasise to their followers that “you cannot justify even a legal goal by using illegal means”.

FBI spokesman Richard Kolko said on Saturday that some of the Canadian suspects had been in contact with two men arrested in Georgia, who were accused of videotaping buildings in Washington, including the Capitol Hill and the World Bank headquarters. “There is no current outstanding threat to any targets on US soil emanating from this case,” he said. At least six of the suspects frequented the Al-Rahman Islamic Centre for Islamic Education, including Qayyum Abdul Jamal, a 43-year-old school bus driver who frequently led prayers and made emotional, hard-hitting speeches.

The New York Times reported on Monday that the arrests that shocked Canadians when they were announced on Saturday morning did not appear to create much lingering fear. Roads near the Islamic centre in Mississauga were closed on Sunday morning for a road race. Downtown Toronto was shut down by a charity bicycle ride. “Everybody is going about their normal business, which is the best way to combat terrorism,” said Mayor David Miller. In Muslim neighbourhoods, news of the vandalism of the mosque set off fears of a backlash.