News Digest - January 10, 2013
Harsh house arrest conditions lifted against alleged terrorist Mohamed Mahjoub

 

The Toronto Star 08/01/2013 - In a decision Monday, Justice Edmond Blanchard chided the federal government for failing to demonstrate the necessity of the conditions that essentially placed Mohamed Zeki Mahjoub under 24-hour surveillance. "The stringent terms and conditions currently in place are no longer necessary to neutralize the diminished threat posed by Mr. Mahjoub," Blanchard wrote in the ruling of the Egyptian man's detention review. Mahjoub was arrested in Toronto in 2000 on a national security certificate, which allows Ottawa to detain a non-citizen indefinitely without charge or trial pending deportation.  

 

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Privacy

Canada's privacy watchdog offers alternative to Tories' Internet bill
 
The Canadian Press
08/01/2013 - A blueprint solicited by the privacy commissioner's office proposes new procedures to give police and spies key information about Internet users while retaining the principle of judicial oversight, a memo obtained under the Access to Information Act shows. The internal memo reveals assistant privacy commissioner Chantal Bernier asked Universit� de Montr�al law professor Karim Benyekhlef to come up with the proposal. Benyekhlef, a former federal prosecutor who is now director of the university's Centre de Recherche en Droit Public, concludes that the federal bill is inconsistent with the Charter of Rights because it allows warrantless access to subscriber information. He proposes a five-step process in which the authorities would first apply to a court for an order seeking subscriber data.

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Protestors target West Van MP over Internet surveillance bill

US warrantless wiretapping wins again

ACLU 02/01/2013 - It's official. The Senate voted 72-23 last week to extend the FISA Amendments Act another five years, which President Obama signed Sunday. Unfortunately, the public discussion of George W. Bush's warrantless wiretapping program may soon fade back into the shadows. The heartbreak of another Senate vote in favor of dragnet collection of Americans' communications, however, pales in comparison to the rejection of modest amendments in favor of more FISA transparency and accountability. These amendments would not have limited the government's spying program in any way; they would have only compelled the government to tell the public what the law says and whether it protects us from government prying. Simply put, if the public were to find out what the government is doing with our information, or how many of us are affected, the program would be "destroyed," according to Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Dianne Feinstein (D-CA).

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Drones, phones and other 2012 privacy threats
Omar Khadr

Column: Khadr transfer delays remain unexplicable  

Ottawa Citizen
29/12/12 - On Oct. 23, 2010, Canada and the United States exchanged diplomatic notes agreeing in principle to the idea that Omar Khadr should be transferred to the Canadian correctional system after serving one more year in US custody (he'd served eight already). On Sept. 29, 2012, Omar Khadr came back to Canada. I find it difficult to believe that it could take two years to process paperwork about anything, never mind setting the already determined fate of a prisoner who was well known to both sides. But in fact, it seems that it didnt take two years to  process the paperwork. We know that by October, 2011, when Khadr's year in US custody was up, the Correctional Service of Canada had assessed his request for a transfer and handed the file over to Vic Toews'public safety department. That's confirmed in a batch of heavily redacted documents I got in the mail this week, in response to an Access to Information request. I made the request back in April, after my questions to a spokesperson for the public safety department went unanswered.
State secrets

Bradley Manning granted 112-day reduction in possible sentence

The Guardian 08/01/2013 - Colonel Denise Lind, the judge presiding over Bradley Manning's court martial, granted him the dispensation as a form of recompense for the unduly long period in which he was held on suicide watch and prevention of injury status while at the brig at Quantico marine base in Virginia where he was detai ned from 29 July 2010 to 20 April 2011. Lind's ruling was made under Article 13 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice that protects prisoners awaiting trial from punishment on grounds that they are innocent until proven guilty. The recognition that some degree of pre-trial punishment did occur during the nine months that the soldier was held in Quantico marks a legal victory for the defence in that it supports Manning's long-held complaint that he was singled out by the US government for excessively harsh treatment. However, the ruling falls far short of the hopes of Manning's defence team. At best, the soldier's lawyers had pressed for a dismissal of all 22 counts that he is currently facing relating to the transfer of hundreds of thousands of US diplomatic cables and war logs to the whistleblower website WikiLeaks.

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Government seeks to block whistle-blower Bradley Manning's motive from trial

New evidence expected in WikiLeaks case

Bradley Manning trial delayed until June after sentence reduction granted

Bradley Manning prosecutors cite civil war case in arguing he aided al-Qaida

The other Bradley Manning: Jeremy Hammond faces life term for WikiLeaks and hacked Stratfor emails

Obama statement concerns whistleblower advocates, but will it have much impact?

Secret double standard

Ex-Officer is first from C.I.A. to face prison for a leak
Rule of law

Details of Obama 'Kill List' to remain in the shadows, court rules

Common Dream 02/01/2013 - Information surrounding the targeted killing of three American citizens by US drones in Yemen will remain secret for now, following a federal court decision to turn down a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by the ACLU. The information, requested from the Department of Justice by the ACLU, includes a legal memorandum which allegedly gives legal and factual justification for the extrajudicial killings of U.S. citizens Anwar Al-Awlaki and Samir Khan in September 2011, and Al-Awlaki's 16-year-old son Abdulrahman in Octobe r 2011. Anwar Al-Awlaki was placed on Obama's executive "Kill List." "This ruling denies the public access to crucial information about the government's extrajudicial killing of U.S. citizens and also effectively green-lights its practice of making selective and self-serving disclosures," said Jameel Jaffer, ACLU deputy legal director.

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New questions over CIA nominee Brennan's denial of civilian drone deaths

Obama Administration needs to explain drone strikes

US drone strike kills Pakistan Taliban commander: Mullah Nazir

Drone war spurs militants to deadly reprisals

Outrage in Yemen grows as deadly US drone attacks expand

US ramps up Pakistan drone strikes

Former adviser: Obama as 'ruthless and indifferent to rule of law' as Bush

Challenge to UK role in deadly drone attacks in Pakistan blocked by High Court

Afghanistan frees detainees in show of sovereignty before Karzai visits U.S.

How Obama decides your fate if he thinks you're a terrorist

Tom Hayden comic strip on drones

Documentary series on US drone wars

Israeli 'surgical targeting' of journalists, civilians a war crime: report
 
More news
Anti-terror laws   

Guantanamo  

National security  

No-Fly List   

Racism   
Rendition      
Repression of dissent      
Surveillance and technology   

Terrorism   

Torture    

War on terror 
Miscellaneous

 

About us

 

The ICLMG is a national coalition of forty Canadian civil society organizations that was established in the aftermath of the September, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States. You will find in this News Digest news articles, events, calls to action and much more regarding national security, anti-terrorism, civil liberties and other issues related to the mandate and concerns of ICLMG and its member organizations.


Event   

Carters: The Ottawa Region Charity & Not-for-Profit Law Seminar 

 

Thursday February 7, 2013

8:30am-3:30pm 

Travelodge Convention Centre, Ottawa West 

 

The seminar is designed to assist charities and not-for-profit organizations in understanding developing trends in the law in order to reduce unnecessary exposure to legal liability.     

 

Book review  

Against Security, by Harvey Molotch

 

Schneier on Security 14/12/2012 - Security is both a feeling and a reality, and the two are different things. People can feel secure when they're actually not, and they can be secure even when they believe otherwise. This discord explains much of what passes for our national discourse on security policy. Security measures often are nothing more than security theater, making people feel safer without actually increasing their protection.    

 

Take action 

Tell you MP to stand against Bill C-30 and warrantless online spying 

 

OpenMedia.ca - The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police called on the government to revive the invasive Online Spying Bill C-30 - legislation that would grant them warrantless access into the private lives of each and every one of us. Call on your MP to stand against invasive warrantless Online Spying.