The London Free Press
Tuesday, August 3, 2004
By Rory Leishman

While the United States, Britain, Australia, The Netherlands and other countries are vigorously engaged in the war against Islamist terrorism, what is Canada contributing? Practically nothing, except for a small contingent of overworked and ill-equipped Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan who are valiantly trying to help keep order in Kabul, while 10,000 United States soldiers are carrying the fight to the enemy in the remote Afghan badlands.

Meanwhile, here at home, almost three years after the September 11 terrorist attack, our borders remain virtually as vulnerable as ever to penetration by enemy agents. On the basis of internal memos obtained from the Immigration Department under the Access to Information Act, CP reports that at least 15,000 people are still smuggled into Canada every year. That's about the same level as six years ago.

Immigration Minister Judy Sgro says the massive smuggling of illegal immigrants into Canada is "really quite despicable. But the reality is they're going to continue to do that. We're doing everything we can from a security perspective to do what we have to do."

That's bunk. Security along Canada's borders would be a joke, were the situation not so dangerous and appalling.

Recall the notorious case of Ahmed Ressam, the Islamist terrorist. He was caught by an alert United States border agent while entering Washington State on a ferry from Vancouver with enough explosive devices in his car to carry out his millennium plot to blow up the Los Angeles airport. How did Ressam get into Canada in the first place?

The 9/11 Commission looked into this matter and reports the shameful story: "Following a familiar terrorist pattern, Ressam and his associates used fraudulent passports and immigration fraud to travel. In Ressam’s case, this involved flying from France to Montreal using a photo-substituted French passport under a false name.

"Under questioning, Ressam admitted the passport was fraudulent and claimed political asylum. He was released pending a hearing, which he failed to attend. His political asylum claim was denied. He was arrested again, released again, and given another hearing date. Again, he did not show.

"He was arrested four times for thievery, usually from tourists, but was neither jailed nor deported. He also supported himself by selling stolen documents to a friend who was a document broker for Islamist terrorists."

Suppose Ressam had flown into New York instead of Montreal. Chances are that a United States immigration officer would have placed him on the next flight back to France. Failing that, Ressam would almost certainly have been placed in secure custody, pending a formal asylum hearing.

Canadian immigration officers did not then, and do not now, have such legal powers. They cannot summarily either deport or incarcerate a manifestly bogus refugee claimant.

Why not? The fault lies with the Supreme Court of Canada. In 1985, our judicial masters decreed in the Singh ruling that everyone who shows up at a Canadian border point is entitled to the equal protection of the law as guaranteed in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. As a result, even enemy aliens like Ressam are entitled to remain at large for years in Canada, while pursuing a fraudulent refugee claim through the courts.

In contrast, the United States Supreme Court has consistently upheld the summary arrest and deportation of non-resident aliens entering the country with false papers on the reasonable grounds that the equal protection of the laws as guaranteed in the United States Bill of Rights applies only to lawful residents of the United States.

Tom Kent, a former policy secretary to prime minister Lester Pearson and deputy minister of immigration, has urged Parliament to circumvent the Singh ruling, by using the notwithstanding clause of the Constitution to enact a law "that confines the legal protections of the Charter to persons whose residence in Canada is legally sanctioned".

Prime Minister Paul Martin and his fellow Liberals have rejected this sensible proposal. Rather than stand up to the Supreme Court of Canada, they prefer to stick with a defective refugee system -- a system that is so wide open to abuse that it affords, Kent warns, "an easy entry for people, including those with terrorist intentions".

What can save us from such folly?

Rory Leishman