This week, family members of Abdul Khalil, one of 30 people on a sort of deportation most-wanted list, threatened to sue the Canadian government for defamation. It’s somewhat surprising it took this long. A July 21 press release asking for the public’s help in locating the 76-year-old Afghan, along with 29 other deportees-to-be who’ve fallen off the radar, is sub-headlined: “Government will not tolerate war criminals in our communities.” This is entirely commendable as a general statement, but rather problematic when precisely none of the 30 has been tried or convicted of war crimes.
Whatever the evidence against these 30 men — we have no access to it — it was used in the context of determining their admissibility to Canada. It was found sufficient to exclude them. Then they disappeared. The government isn’t just right to hunt them down, but obligated to do so. Danger aside, these people are fugitives. And there’s nothing at all wrong with prioritizing suspected war criminals over the other undesirables who’ve been ordered deported and who we can’t find.
But our government so rarely just picks a priority and gets on with it, especially when it comes to hot-button issues such as immigration and refugees. It can never resist adding a dash of tabloid-friendly amateurism to the stew and vigorously stirring the pot. Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney often exemplifies this tendency and never more so than on this file. On Wednesday, he tweeted: “Is it true, or merely an urban legend, that the CBC is refusing to publish or broadcast the names and photos of the 30 wanted war criminals?”
So, that’s a direct statement: He’s saying these men are war criminals, based on no trial and no information that any member of the public can verify. Is “alleged” so hard to type?
It’s true, as it happens, that CBC News isn’t publishing the names and photos of the 30 deportees-to-be until they’re captured — a somewhat baffling policy that it hasn’t explained very well. An online article states that “CBC News’ practice is not to name suspects, and therefore [it] is not publishing the names or photos of the suspects at this time.” If CBC News doesn’t name people suspected of crimes, then I’m Wendy Mesley. And the five men who have been captured thus far and named by the CBC are no more suspected of war crimes now that they’re in custody, nor do we have any more information about just what they’ve been accused of or by whom. And all along they’ve been “suspected” of another crime, namely, being in Canada illegally.
Asked to clarify the policy, a CBC spokesman sent me this not very helpful statement: “As per our journalistic standards and practices, we exercise care when dealing with the identities of suspects, victims and others involved in legal matters.”
Admittedly, there’s a certain genius at work here. With just a few press releases and tweets, the Conservatives have aroused fury against potential war criminals, illegal residents, the CBC and the Liberals who presumably would have never considered doing anything like this. Charles Adler seemed close to weeping in appreciation on Wednesday night during his Wednesday broadcast on Sun TV News.
“Another day, another war criminal has been captured,” he began, proving it’s not just governments inviting legal action. But Mr. Adler’s playing with Quebecor’s money. Mr. Kenney’s playing with yours and mine.
Meanwhile, you have human-rights utopians demanding Canada put these 30 people on trial before deporting them. Which is absurd. It’s not just that we don’t have the resources or the information to deliver a fair trial. It’s that it’s none of our business. Should Canada try the people who assassinated Ghulam Haider Hamidi, the Mayor of Kandahar, on Wednesday? Of course not. Why would that change if one of the suspects managed to get himself to Canada and claim refugee status?
These 30 men might be guilty of war crimes, or they might not. In denying residency to them, our courts have deemed that this determination is simply not our problem. And we’ve got enough of our own, thank you, to deal with. The government is right to name people ordered deported, and post their pictures, and track them down and send them home — and to broadcast that it’s doing so, so as not to seem a soft touch in other countries. Everything else is a distinctly unedifying sideshow that, as always, we could do without.
Origin
Source: National Post
Whatever the evidence against these 30 men — we have no access to it — it was used in the context of determining their admissibility to Canada. It was found sufficient to exclude them. Then they disappeared. The government isn’t just right to hunt them down, but obligated to do so. Danger aside, these people are fugitives. And there’s nothing at all wrong with prioritizing suspected war criminals over the other undesirables who’ve been ordered deported and who we can’t find.
But our government so rarely just picks a priority and gets on with it, especially when it comes to hot-button issues such as immigration and refugees. It can never resist adding a dash of tabloid-friendly amateurism to the stew and vigorously stirring the pot. Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney often exemplifies this tendency and never more so than on this file. On Wednesday, he tweeted: “Is it true, or merely an urban legend, that the CBC is refusing to publish or broadcast the names and photos of the 30 wanted war criminals?”
So, that’s a direct statement: He’s saying these men are war criminals, based on no trial and no information that any member of the public can verify. Is “alleged” so hard to type?
It’s true, as it happens, that CBC News isn’t publishing the names and photos of the 30 deportees-to-be until they’re captured — a somewhat baffling policy that it hasn’t explained very well. An online article states that “CBC News’ practice is not to name suspects, and therefore [it] is not publishing the names or photos of the suspects at this time.” If CBC News doesn’t name people suspected of crimes, then I’m Wendy Mesley. And the five men who have been captured thus far and named by the CBC are no more suspected of war crimes now that they’re in custody, nor do we have any more information about just what they’ve been accused of or by whom. And all along they’ve been “suspected” of another crime, namely, being in Canada illegally.
Asked to clarify the policy, a CBC spokesman sent me this not very helpful statement: “As per our journalistic standards and practices, we exercise care when dealing with the identities of suspects, victims and others involved in legal matters.”
Admittedly, there’s a certain genius at work here. With just a few press releases and tweets, the Conservatives have aroused fury against potential war criminals, illegal residents, the CBC and the Liberals who presumably would have never considered doing anything like this. Charles Adler seemed close to weeping in appreciation on Wednesday night during his Wednesday broadcast on Sun TV News.
“Another day, another war criminal has been captured,” he began, proving it’s not just governments inviting legal action. But Mr. Adler’s playing with Quebecor’s money. Mr. Kenney’s playing with yours and mine.
Meanwhile, you have human-rights utopians demanding Canada put these 30 people on trial before deporting them. Which is absurd. It’s not just that we don’t have the resources or the information to deliver a fair trial. It’s that it’s none of our business. Should Canada try the people who assassinated Ghulam Haider Hamidi, the Mayor of Kandahar, on Wednesday? Of course not. Why would that change if one of the suspects managed to get himself to Canada and claim refugee status?
These 30 men might be guilty of war crimes, or they might not. In denying residency to them, our courts have deemed that this determination is simply not our problem. And we’ve got enough of our own, thank you, to deal with. The government is right to name people ordered deported, and post their pictures, and track them down and send them home — and to broadcast that it’s doing so, so as not to seem a soft touch in other countries. Everything else is a distinctly unedifying sideshow that, as always, we could do without.
Origin
Source: National Post
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