I am really interested to see what sort of solution can be used to stop this cicle of violence!?
Hot on the heels of your question, I could barely believe my eyes this morning ... (just goes to show you how naive I am).
Based on this information, I‘ve got a suggested solution: Let‘s stop allowing CRIMINAL scum and KNOWN FELONS into Canada. We‘ve got enough scum already - we don‘t need to import more (heck - the federal Liberal Party is a breeding party for scum - if only we could cull the herd and deport some of them ... grrr ... just kidding)
War thugs find haven in Canada
Post identifies war crimes suspects whose names Ottawa would keep hidden
Stewart Bell, Michael Friscolanti and Adrian Humphreys
National Post
Saturday, March 06, 2004
One was a militia commander responsible for systematic human rights abuses in Ghana. Another was a Sri Lankan soldier who buried torture victims in mass graves. Yet another was part of an Indian army unit that tortured and killed Sikhs.
The National Post has obtained a secret government list that names dozens of people wanted by Canadian authorities for their suspected involvement in war crimes. They were supposed to be deported, but never were.
Immigration officials have no idea where they are.
While a few are wanted only for questioning, most were ordered to leave Canada for committing atrocities in such countries as Chile, the Congo and Cambodia. Instead of surrendering for deportation, they went into hiding. Immigration officers have so far been unable to find them.
But the federal government will not let Canadians know who they are. The list of lost war criminals is such a closely guarded secret that police say even they did not have it until last summer. When the Post asked the immigration department to release it, officials took more than a year to decide the names could not be made public for privacy reasons.
Although the government will not disclose the names, the Post has obtained a leaked copy of the Investigative Handbook of the Ontario Regional War Crimes Unit, dated Summer 2003, which names 62 people of various nationalities wanted on arrest warrants due to suspected involvement in crimes against humanity.
A third of the names on the list can be tied to war crimes cases before Canadian courts and tribunals through public documents (files on the others remain sealed), and some of their stories raise questions about whether the government is doing enough to track Canada‘s missing war criminals.
Chea Say was an official in the Cambodian police, which tortured and executed opponents of the communist regime. Caught in Canada, he was supposed to be deported in October, 1997. But he was a "no show" for his deportation date, according to his refugee file.
An immigration officer went to his last known address but found no trace of Mr. Say. His landlord said he had left no forwarding address. An arrest warrant was issued on Nov. 20, 1997, but he could not be found.
But Mr. Say was hardly in hiding. He was an active member of Toronto‘s Cambodian community and could often be found at fundraising and cultural events. He "hasn‘t made any concerted effort to hide from immigration," his lawyer told a hearing.
Mr. Say served as a volunteer coordinator at the Canadian Cambodian Association of Ontario, a registered charity funded by the federal and Ontario governments. His job was to phone members of the community and persuade them to attend fundraisers and other community functions.
"Sometimes he was there. I met him," said Kim Huot Sreng, the association president. "He told me he‘s afraid to go back to Cambodia. He told me he got a job, maybe at a grocery or a warehouse."
Yet for six years, his whereabouts remained a mystery to immigration authorities. Only on Dec. 3, 2003, when Mr. Say and his wife, Vouch Lang Song, came forward to apply to stay in Canada on humanitarian grounds, was he finally arrested. He has still not been deported.
"I would like to say please pardon me for my previous offences that I have done," he said at a hearing upon his arrest late last year. "I have been here in Canada for 10 years. I have a place with the living standard [sic], law and order here in Canada."
Whether he has behaved in Canada is not at issue. Under federal immigration law, foreigners complicit in crimes against humanity are barred from entering Canada.
Those caught in the immigration screening system are supposed to be swiftly deported, but it does not always work that way. Documents released under the Access to Information Act show the immigration department has lost track of 40,000 migrants who were supposed to be deported and never were. But perhaps most troubling are the war criminals. They range from hardened torturers to senior members of repressive regimes responsible for grave abuses.
"Some of them have been through the determination by the Immigration and Refugee Board that in fact they are complicit in those things," said Paul Armstrong, director of tactical intelligence at the Canada Border Services Agency, which is responsible for war criminals.
"And others are people, for example, that might not have appeared for an examination or an immigration inquiry where we had information to suggest they were complicit in those activities."
Of those identified as wanted, one has since been caught, one turned himself in, one left Canada on his own, one is serving a criminal sentence in Canada and there is an unconfirmed report that one has returned to his home country, he said. The whereabouts of the others are not known.
Officials say some may have slipped out of the country undetected, but there is no evidence to support that and they might just as easily be living in Vancouver, Winnipeg or Montreal. Some have been on the loose for a decade.
"For the rest, we don‘t know," Mr. Armstrong said. "But our immigration warrants are put into CPIC, the Canadian Police Information Centre, so that, should they come to the attention of any peace officer across Canada, they can bring them to our attention."
Officials have successfully removed 281 people from Canada for war crimes since 1997, 48 of them in the last fiscal year, ending March 31, 2003. Hundreds more have been stopped before they even entered. But for every five war criminals who actually get deported, one goes missing.
The case of Ahmed Hussein Abdurahman is typical. After serving as Somalia‘s minister of defence during a period in which government troops massacred hundreds of political opponents, Mr. Abdurahman arrived at Toronto‘s Pearson airport on June 27, 1993, and said only that he had once worked as a government administrator.
Canadian investigators soon learned he was actually a long-serving official in the government of Siad Barre, the dictator responsible for widespread abuses. But one day Mr. Abdurahman just disappeared. At least seven other senior Somali war criminals similarly came to Canada and disappeared.
An official at the Canada Border Services Agency said investigators cannot be out on the streets canvassing for the lost torturers. "We have to count on tips from the community, and many of them, that‘s how they get caught," she said. As for Mr. Say, she said, "If this guy was active in the community and nobody came forward, it‘s difficult."
But while the government wants community members to report war criminals, it is not willing to identify them, making it all but impossible for Canadians to be of much assistance.
Shortly after he was sworn in as Canada‘s new Justice Minister, Irwin Cotler said that going after war criminals would be one of his top priorities. But the apparent ease with which wanted war criminals have succeeded in evading justice raises serious questions at a time when foreign capitals are watching Ottawa closely, looking to gauge its response to global terrorism.
Under the current system, even those who go underground to escape deportation have gone unpunished. Jian Qui Chen was a security guard at two Chinese hospitals that performed forced abortions. Pregnant women were "dragged in to have abortions performed, kicking and screaming," according to his refugee file.
He was found to be complicit in crimes against humanity and was to be deported. He was supposed to show up to finalize the paperwork for his deportation in July, 2001. Instead, he disappeared and a warrant was issued. He evaded authorities for the next two years, but on Aug. 27, 2003, he went to a government office in Toronto seeking a health form and was arrested. But an Immigration and Refugee Board judge later ordered him set free.
WANTED FOR WAR CRIMES
Here are 20 of the 62 wanted war criminals named on an internal list compiled last summer. They were supposed to be deported from Canada but they never were. Although some have since been picked up, Canadian authorities have no idea where the others are hiding.
AFGHANISTAN
Harooni Ahmad: A member of KHAD, Afghanistan‘s secret police. He came to Canada in 1994 but was found to be complicit in crimes against humanity. While he was appealing the decision, he married and they had a Canadian-born son.
Nazir Ahmad Rasuli: An informer for the Afghan Central Committee. He brought "suspicious" people to the attention of KHAD. The Immigration and Refugee Board said he was complicit in crimes against humanity, notably "endless beatings, electrical shocks to the groin, nails ripped from fingers."
CAMBODIA
Chea Say: He ran the training unit of the Cambodian police, which tortured and executed opponents of the communist government. A Canadian judge found he had committed crimes against humanity. He was scheduled to be deported on Oct. 30, 1997, but never showed up. Rearrested on Dec. 3, 2003. CAPTURED
CHINA
Jian Qui Chen: A security guard at two hospitals in China that performed forced abortions. The Federal Court upheld his deportation but he went into hiding and a warrant was issued on July 17, 2001, indicating he was wanted for "crimes against humanity." He was recaptured on Aug. 27, 2003, but the IRB again ordered his release pending his deportation. CAPTURED
EL SALVADOR
Saul Vicente Ramirez: A corporal and then sub-sergeant in the El Salvador army. Although the Federal Court ruled he never pulled the trigger, he watched fellow troops commit atrocities on civilians. "They would bring these people unarmed and they would torture them and then they would kill them," he said. He fled to the United States, where he was arrested.
GERMANY
Johann Leprich: A member of the SS Death‘s Head Battalion. He was a guard at a Nazi concentration camp where Jews, gypsies, Jehovah‘s Witnesses and Poles were starved, beaten, tortured and killed by "gassing, hanging, strangling, heart injection, electrocution, beating, drowning, torturing, burning, starving and shooting." After the war, he removed his SS tattoo and moved to Detroit. When he was caught, he fled to Canada. He hid for 16 years, partly in Windsor, Ont., until he was caught in Michigan last July. CAPTURED
GHANA
Frank Berko: Chairman of the Committee for the Defence of the Revolution, a militia in Ghana‘s Sampa District. The Federal Court of Canada ruled he was an accomplice to "systematic and grave human rights abuses."
INDIA
Gurpal Singh: Served in the Punjab Armed Police between November, 1992, and February, 1995. He repeatedly witnessed fellow officers torturing and killing Sikhs. During an IRB hearing, he insisted he never participated in the torture, but rather stood guard at the main gate of the police headquarters while the beatings occurred.
SOMALIA
Ahmed Hussein Abdurahman: Somalia‘s minister of defence. His troops massacred up to 400 opponents at demonstrations. He was also justice minister and attorney-general in the regime of dictator Mohamed Siad Barre. When he came to Canada in 1993, he said he was an "administrator."
Ahmed Abdulkadir Aden: A member of the Red Berets, which a Federal Court judge ruled "was an organization principally directed to a limited and brutal purpose, that is, to terrorize the people of Somalia."
Khalif Mohamed Duale: A diplomat for the Siad Barre regime. He was ruled to have been an influential government official complicit in war crimes.
Adem Hersi Esse: Former Somali ambassador to the United Arab Emirates.
Mohamed Farah: Former Somali diplomat who sought sanctuary in Canada.
Mohamed Gaashan: A former vice-minister of health, finance and labour in Somalia in the 1980s during the reign of Siad Barre. After the collapse of the Siad Barre regime, he moved to Toronto and disappeared.
Yussuf Abdi Ibrahim: He was deemed a war criminal because he had been a senior official in the Siad Barre regime. He was ordered to report to the IRB for an inquiry on Nov. 9, 1994, but never showed up and has not been seen since.
Mohamud Mohamed: A former colonel in the Somali army who fled to Canada.
Guled Mohamed Siad: The son of Somali dictator Mohamed Siad Barre, he served as a diplomat in his father‘s regime and was vice-chairman of the Somali Petroleum Agency.
SRI LANKA
Illandaridevage Kulatunga: A sergeant in the Sri Lankan Army in the early 1990s. "Kapila" arrested innocent civilians, stood by while his comrades tortured and killed them, and helped bury the bodies to hide the evidence. He later travelled to Victoria, B.C., as a boxer on Sri Lanka‘s Commonwealth Games team. After losing his first fight, he fled to Toronto and filed a refugee claim. He has not been seen since 1997.
Debalathas Sinnathurai: Paid "taxes" to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) terrorist group. Later, he was arrested in Colombo and accused of being an LTTE member who had come to the capital to carry out terrorist activities. He came to Canada in 1996 and made a refugee claim that was rejected in September, 2000. His refugee file makes no specific mention of war crimes.
UGANDA
Abdul Holyfield: Was "complicit in the arrest, beatings and torture of numerous individuals from 1991 to 1993," when he served in the Ugandan military, according to the war crimes unit. His refugee claim was turned down in 1995 and his appeal to the Federal Court was denied three months later. Meanwhile, he was convicted of credit card fraud and other offences and served jail time in Guelph. Once on parole, he was deported to Uganda under escort on Nov. 17, 1998. But his appearance on the warrant list suggests he has since returned to Canada.
Source: "Warrant Case List," Citizenship and Immigration Canada, War Crimes Unit, 2003.