The new citizenship act is efficient. Is it fair?

2014/06/19 1 Comment

Following the Parliamentary hearings and debates, without any amendments, my overall take on C-24 — the Strengthening of Canadian Citizenship Act. Full version below (both pay wall and open versions), excerpt on revocation:

Most fundamentally, revocation for dual nationals convicted of terrorism or treason, at home or abroad, changes a policy stance this country has held since Diefenbaker — that a citizen is a citizen, whether single or dual national.

The government and its supporting witnesses emphasized broad support for revocation in these cases. “Nobody wants a terrorist as a neighbour,” they said. Revocation is not “harsh”and is in line with other countries, they argued. Eight out of ten Canadians support revocation. Immigrants make a choice to come to Canada and accept the “fundamental social contract of citizenship”.

Let’s turn to a specific, theoretical case. Consider the two Calgarians that were killed in Syria fighting for extremist or terrorist groups.

Damian Clairmont and Salman Ashrafi were raised and lived in Calgary. Neither chose to be Canadian. Clairmont was born in Canada. Ashrafi immigrated with his parents when he was in Grade 5 or 6. He became Canadian but also has Pakistani citizenship.

Clairmont would keep his Canadian citizenship; Ashrafi would lose his even though he spent most of his youth in Canada.

Same crime, two different results. Hard to see how the courts would rule this as being charter-compliant.

While Clairmont and Asrafi are dead, similar cases will emerge — such as Mohamed Hersi, the Somali-Canadian convicted of attempting to participate in terrorist activity, who came to Canada as a child.

In the case of the Quebec Values Charter, general polling showed high levels of support — but polling focused on the question of forcing existing Quebec government employees to conform or quit showed less support. Would Canadians necessarily support treating cases like that of Clairmont and Asrafi differently? Someone born and raised in Canada but of dual nationality?

The new citizenship act is efficient. Is it fair? (iPolitics pay wall)

The new citizenship act is efficient. Is it fair? (open)

Filed under Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

It’s a mystery how middle-class Calgary man turned suicide bomber was recruited into ISIS terror group: family

2014/06/14 Leave a comment

More on the cases of Salman Asrafi and Damian Clairmont:

“To be honest, we don’t know what happened to Salman,” a relative said in an email exchange. He asked not to be identified because he did not want to be associated with Mr. Ashrafi’s suspected involvement in terrorism.

While his recruitment into ISIS is puzzling, it is evidence the strength of the extremist group is due partly to its recruitment of foreign fighters. Founded by Al-Qaeda members, it is one of three armed groups in the region that have attracted the most outside volunteers.

Mr. Ashrafi was a Pakistani-Canadian with no affiliation to Iraq. But in Calgary, he had apparently fallen in with a circle of extremists who lived in the same apartment building above a small Islamic centre. Those who run the centre said they had tried to discourage the zealous young men, but they formed their own prayer group.

According to an account posted online by one of the men, who now goes by Abu Dujana, they worshipped Anwar Awlaki, the pro-Al Qaeda propagandist whose videos urge Muslims in the West to either go abroad and fight or conduct terrorist attacks at home.

Isolated by their own accord and with no guidance except the Internet, they decided that being a Muslim meant “jihad and sacrifice for Islam” rather than attending seminars in “an air-conditioned university hall,” wrote Abu Dujana.

The historical figures they admired were uncompromising men of action. “They were not just talking the talk,” he wrote, “but actually walking the walk. They were busy either killing the enemies of Allah or being awarded with martyrdom by being killed in the battlefield.”

There were between three and five members of the group. They included Damian Clairmont, a Muslim convert with a history of mental problems, but another was an engineer named Wassim who divided his time between Toronto and Calgary.

Under the Government’s proposed revocation measures, if they hadn’t been killed, but returned to Canada, and convicted, Salman could be stripped of his Canadian citizenship as a dual national while Damian could not. Same crime, different punishment.

It’s a mystery how middle-class Calgary man turned suicide bomber was recruited into ISIS terror group: family | National Post.

Filed under Citizenship, Radicalization, Revocation Tagged with , ,

Suicide bomber killed in Iraq part of wider jihadi base in Calgary

2014/06/06 1 Comment

More on home-grown radicalization, the most recent case being Salman Ashrafi:

Calgary is earning a reputation as a breeding ground for jihadi fighters.

The Muslim convert Damian Clairmont, who later took the name Mustafa al-Gharib, was killed while fighting with Jabhat al-Nusra, an al-Qaeda-affiliated rebel group in Syria whose membership is made up largely of European, Australian and North American extremists.

Clairmont was also raised in Calgary, as were as many as two dozen other young men who, according to sources, have travelled to Syria to join rebel extremist groups to wage jihad in the last two years…..

“He might have been around certain charismatic preachers in the community that might not have had his best interests in mind,” he added.

It’s a thought shared by Soharwardy, the Calgary imam, who has received death threats for speaking out about this topic, but feels compelled to in order to stop men in his city from killing and dying on jihadi missions abroad.

“It is impossible for me to think the intelligence people do not know who is radicalizing Muslim youth. It is going on undercover; it is going on openly sometimes,” he said.

“The thing is they are recruiting Muslims to go and fight in Syria and getting them killed. It is horrible.… What is the Canadian government doing? Nothing. I mean this guy died, many, many … people died from our country. For what?”

While theoretical, given that both Clairmont and Ashrafi are dead, it is interesting to see how C-24 revocation provisions would apply in each case.

Clairmont was born in Canada and likely had no dual citizenship. Asrafi moved to Canada when he was in Grade 5 or 6, became naturalized but also has Pakistani citizenship.

Clairmont would keep his Canadian citizenship; Ashrafi would lose it even though he spent most of his childhood and early adulthood in Canada.

Easy to understand why most lawyers argue that this kind of different treatment would not be ruled Charter compliant.

Suicide bomber killed in Iraq part of wider jihadi base in Calgary – Canada – CBC News.

Filed under Multiculturalism, Radicalization Tagged with , , ,