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International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group
Coalition pour la surveillance internationale des libertés civiles
March 29, 2025 - 29 mars 2025
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Xan Dagenais: COVID, Surveillance and Defending Privacy Rights
| We launched our 20th anniversary publication "Defending Civil Liberties in an Age of Counter-terrorism and National Security" on Sept 11, 2024. You can read the full PDF or get a physical copy here. Over the next few months, we will be sharing two texts from the publication per News Digest to make sure they all get the attention they deserve. | |
ICLMG 2024 - When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, we were all in shock. The news that the government was working on the COVID Alert app, an application that would track our infection status and who we had been in contact with, immediately triggered alarm bells among civil society. We are all too familiar with the government reacting too quickly to a crisis and adopting new laws or measures that infringe on people’s freedoms and human rights. And once those are in place, it’s much harder to backtrack, especially when those laws and measures give more power to the state and its agencies.
We therefore had to react quickly, especially since, to our knowledge, no other civil liberties organization was looking at the COVID app. After meeting with the Director of the Privacy Management Division of Health Canada to discuss our concerns, we were able to secure a commitment from the government that the COVID app would not collect personal information, and that national security agencies would not be involved in COVID surveillance or have access to COVID information.
We also co-wrote a statement listing seven principles to ensure that government efforts to combat COVID-19, particularly when considering any kind of enhanced digital surveillance or data collection, respected privacy, and we met with the Justice Minister to discuss them. We then created a video and launched a letter-writing campaign in support of the joint statement, and thanks to a subsequent joint open letter, the federal government delayed the release of the national contact tracing app until the Privacy Commissioner had examined and approved it. Finally, we joined 300 organizations and individuals to call on all levels of government to strengthen human rights oversight amid the pandemic. Source
Xan Dagenais is the Communications and Research Coordinator of the International Civil Liberties
Version française : COVID, surveillance et défense du droit à la vie privée
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Maureen Webb: Mobilizing Against Surveillance on the International Scene
| Le 11 septembre 2024, nous avons lancé notre publication 20e anniversaire « Défendre les libertés civiles à l’ère de la sécurité nationale et de la guerre au terrorisme ». Vous pouvez lire le PDF complet ou obtenir une copie papier ici. Au cours des prochains mois, nous partagerons deux textes de la publication dans chaque Revue de l'actualité pour nous assurer qu'ils reçoivent tous l'attention qu'ils méritent. | |
ICLMG 2024 - 2005: ICAMS campaign
In 2005, the International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group (ICLMG) organized an Ottawa summit of NGOs from around the world to explore concerns about governments’ increasingly globalized ‘War on Terror’ measures.
Due largely to the relationships that then-ICLMG national coordinator Roch Tassé and Brian Murphy, an ICLMG steering committee member, had built over the years, we were able to get big players, including the EU’s Statewatch, Walden Bello and his group Focus on the Global South, the American Civil Liberties Union, the US Center for Constitutional Rights, and the Quebec Ligue des droits et libertés, to come to Ottawa for four days and to engage in in-depth discussions about what was going on in our respective jurisdictions.
We saw governments working in a coordinated, lockstep fashion, and through opaque, unaccountable supranational bodies to bring in similar measures without any democratic debate at the national level. And, we felt the dots in this pattern – this new dark turn in global governance – had to be connected, understood and countered on an international scale by an international coalition of local civil society groups.
I think that the work done that week was pivotal because, coming together from our respective countries, we were able to see the ‘War on Terror’ for what it was: an anti-democratic coordinated power grab, laying the ground for the erosion of national sovereignty and nationally guaranteed constitutional rights for decades to come.
You could say, the global surveillance/industrial complex developed their playbook and infrastructure during the years of the war on terror and successfully convinced populations to turn these on “the Other” (at that time, Muslims and, in many countries, political opponents). And, over the past three years, this same surveillance/industrial complex has been experimenting on turning a similar playbook and infrastructure on “the rest of us” – with well-along-the-way plans for making digital ID and central bank digital currency the foundation of a new economy – and has had chilling success in getting people to acquiesce to the kind of “nudge” and “social credit” systems that will turn our democracies into heavily gated and controlled surveillance societies. While many have been overlooking these developments, those of us who’ve been in the trenches fighting national security surveillance overreach for the past twenty years will readily recognize the emerging regime’s antecedents and its dangers.
During the four days of the Summit, we conceived and agreed to collaborate on an international campaign against mass surveillance (ICAMS) for which Ben Hayes of Statewatch and I wrote the core analysis.
Co-sponsored by the organizations at the Summit, the campaign was launched simultaneously in San Francisco, Ottawa and London in April 2005. It was then presented at the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre. Nearly 300 civil society organizations signed on to the campaign’s Manifesto within the following year.
The people who were involved in the 2005 Summit became close colleagues, collaborators, and trusted advisors to ICLMG. Many of them were back in Ottawa a few years later for a colloquium of international experts organized by ICLMG and the University of Ottawa Faculty of Law to draft the Ottawa Principles – a codification of the main areas of international law relevant to government counter-terrorism measures. One of the lessons learned from the 2005 Summit initiative was that there is no substitute for in-person, working relationships. Bringing representatives from each of those groups to Ottawa was an investment that paid off for years to come.
2006: International Conference of Privacy Commissioners
In 2006, Roch Tassé and Patricia Poirier organized the Civil Society Forum that ran parallel to the International Conference of Privacy Commissioners in Montreal. The Forum’s recommendations picked up on the content of the ICAMS campaign Manifesto and, in 2009, the Manifesto was largely adopted at the civil society proceedings of the International Privacy Commissioners’ Conference in Madrid, and reformulated as the Madrid Declaration of Global Privacy Standards for a Global World.
2007: Illusions of Security
Between 2005 and 2006, I wrote a book based on the analysis of the ICAMS campaign, Illusions of Security: Global Surveillance and Democracy in the Post‑9‑11 World, published in 2007 by San Francisco’s City Lights press, to further influence policy and raise public awareness on ‘War on Terror’ surveillance issues.
Media included interviews with Democracy Now!, CBC’s The National with Peter Mansbridge, BBC’s World Service, Chicago Public Radio, Air America, the Ottawa Citizen, Montreal Gazette, Mexican TV, Barcelona’s el Periodico, the Winnipeg Free Press, and even Playboy magazine. Venues I spoke in included the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, the World Affairs Council of California, Canadian Association for Security and Intelligence Studies International Conference (with CSIS, FBI, CIA, and MI5 attending), the International Investigative Journalists conference, film festivals, and numerous universities – to give you an idea of the reach.
Much of what was predicted about global surveillance in the 2005 ICAMS campaign and my 2007 book came true and was confirmed in the 2013 Snowden leaks. And, be aware: surveillance technology has made quantum leaps since the time of Snowden’s revelations, making these digital ID systems we’ve been seeing during the pandemic and in recent global governance plans, in my view, the civil liberties fight of the century. Source
Maureen Webb is a constitutional and human rights lawyer and the author of Coding Democracy (MIT Press, 2020) and Illusions of Security (City Lights, 2007). mitpress.mit.edu/author/maureen-webb-28478 & ubc.academia.edu/MaureenWebb
Version française : La mobilisation internationale contre la surveillance
| | Ontario’s police force using ‘growing ecosystem’ of Israeli spyware – report | |
The Guardian 19/03/2025 - Researchers have uncovered “possible links” between Ontario’s provincial police force and an Israel-based military-grade spyware maker called Paragon Solutions, raising questions about the extent and scope of Canadian authorities’ use of cyberweapons.
The new findings were published by the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto, which tracks and identifies digital threats against civil society, and come three years after a parliamentary committee in Canada called for Ottawa to update the country’s privacy laws in the wake of press reports that the national police force had been using spyware to hack mobile phone devices. No laws were ever passed to address the controversy.
The Citizen Lab, in a report published on Wednesday, found a possible technical link between Paragon, which sells spyware known as Graphite to government clients, and entities based in Ontario, Canada, including one that used the address of the Ontario provincial police (OPP). [...]
Like other spyware makers, the company has emphasized that it is meant to be used to fight serious crime and terrorism. But the company’s spyware, which can hack into any phone, was recently found to have been used against an Italian journalist and several activists who support immigrants. The Italian government has acknowledged it was a Paragon client and that the company suspended its contract with Italy following revelations that the hacking software had been used against members of civil society.
In a previous statement, a spokesperson said Paragon requires all of its users to “adhere to terms and conditions that preclude the illicit targeting of journalists and other civil society leaders”. A spokesperson added: “While we are not able to discuss individual customers, we have a zero-tolerance policy for violations of our terms of service.”
Canada’s use of spyware was a source of controversy in 2022, when the Royal Canadian Mounted Police admitted – in what was called a “remarkable” disclosure – that the national police force had used spyware to infiltrate mobile devices and collect data. It said at the time that it had only used the technology in serious cases, when other surveillance technology had failed.
The Citizen Lab’s new report provides more detail about the use of spyware by Canadian authorities. Researchers said they found evidence of a “growing ecosystem” of spyware capability among Ontario-based police services. Researchers said public court records obtained by the Citizen Lab show that the OPP used a surveillance tool that was being used by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in the course of a 2019 investigation to infect a mobile phone for remote interception of private communications.
Additionally, a 2023 judgment from the superior court of justice in Toronto described a joint investigation by Toronto police and York regional police services where investigators “considered” the use of a spyware surveillance tool, which in Canada is referred to as an “on-device investigative tool” (ODIT).
A 2023 search warrant application obtained by the Citizen Lab, which was prepared by the Toronto police service, also revealed that TPS had obtained an ODIT from an unknown source, and that the police had been seeking authorization to use the software to intercept cellular communications through encrypted instant-messaging applications.
“What these findings show is that there is a widening gap in public awareness regarding the extent to which spyware technology is being used in Canada,” said Kate Robertson, a senior researcher at the lab. “These findings raise important questions for the government and privacy regulators about what technologies are being used, and underscores again the need for law reform to address the security and human rights risks concerned.” Read more - Lire plus
| | Roger Clark: Hassan Diab’s Nightmare and the “Fascist Agenda” | |
HDSC 16/03/2025 - The case of Hassan Diab, a Canadian academic falsely accused of involvement in the 1980 bombing of a Paris synagogue, exemplifies how fascist strategies operate to scapegoat individuals and undermine justice. Diab’s ordeal, marked by a lack of credible evidence and repeated violations of his rights, reflects broader patterns of authoritarianism rooted in the deliberate targeting of “enemies” to justify extreme measures.
Fascism thrives on naming an “enemy” to consolidate power and provoke fear. In Diab’s case, the label of “terrorist” was weaponized despite overwhelming evidence that he was in Lebanon at the time of the bombing. This reflects a fascist mindset where truth is secondary to political expediency.
The word “terrorist,” pervasive in extremist rhetoric, serves as a tool to dehumanize and justify actions that defy legal and ethical norms. Central to fascism is the creation of scapegoats—individuals or groups blamed for societal issues through conspiracy theories masquerading as truth. Diab became the focal point of such a narrative, with his case built on flimsy evidence and perpetuated by political pressures rather than justice. This mirrors historical fascist tactics where scapegoating is used to distract from systemic failures while fostering division.
Moreover, the denial of fundamental principles such as due process and international law underscores the authoritarian nature of this mindset. Despite repeated rulings by French judges favouring Diab’s release, higher authorities intervened to prolong his detention, revealing a system willing to override justice for political ends.
The broader context includes organizations like B’nai Brith Canada, which amplify fears of extremism while often conflating legitimate dissent with threats to public safety. Such rhetoric aligns with fascist tendencies to claim ownership over “truth,” promote victimhood narratives, and justify repressive measures.
Diab’s case is not an isolated instance but part of a dangerous trend where labeling, scapegoating, and denial of rights serve to erode democratic principles. It highlights the urgent need to resist these authoritarian tactics and uphold justice, human rights, and rule of law against the creeping normalization of fascist strategies. Source
| | 450 Canadian organizations call on PM Carney to act following Israel killing more than 400 civilians | |
NCCM 19/03/2025 - Dear Prime Minister Carney,
We, representing over 450 organizations from different faith backgrounds from coast to coast, including virtually representing every Muslim association in Canada, write urgently to you in relation to the following.
On Monday, March 17, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that his government would no longer abide by the ceasefire agreement. Within 24 hours of that declaration, the IDF bombed and killed over 400 civilians, among them more than 80 children and counting.
These attacks are as indefensible as they are bewildering; claims of self-defence can never justify the murder of 400 civilians, including over 80 children. As Canadians, we cannot witness this mass violence against civilians in silence. Canada must uphold its commitment to international law and human rights for all. The ICJ has stated the obvious: that the Israeli government’s attacks in the past 16 months on Gaza have deliberately targeted civilians and that it is committing a plausible genocide.
Today, the Netanyahu government has proved what everyone already knows to be true: it is not interested in peace. We also know that the Netanyahu government’s move today is supported by the Trump government. As Canada searches for support from international allies as we face the Trump administration’s threat of annexation, we know Gaza faces an even more severe threat of annexation by the same administration.
We cannot ask for international solidarity if we do not provide any solidarity when it is our turn. In response to Israel's blatant violation of the ceasefire, we, the undersigned organizations, call for Canada to:
- Stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people of Gaza by unequivocally condemning the IDF's mass violence and US President Trump's plans for ethnic cleansing;
- Impose Magnitsky Sanctions on Benjamin Netanyahu and his war cabinet - including the Kahanists, a listed terrorist entity in Canada, led by Ben-Gvir, for their blatant human rights violations that include using starvation as a weapon and targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure;
- Stand loudly for aid to be able to enter Gaza, even as the Israeli government has blocked that aid;
- Rescue Canadian family members who have been waiting for months to escape;
- Move beyond the current one-way weapons export permit ban and impose a two-way weapons embargo; and
- Immediately recognize Palestine as a state, demonstrating to the international community and Palestinians that Canada believes in peace and the right to Palestinian self-determination, even as the Trump administration threatens to annex Gaza (as he has threatened to annex Canada).
We are calling for Canada to stand on principle. By imposing sanctions on the Netanyahu government, Canada would simply be enacting its own commitment to uphold international law, regardless of whether the perpetrator is an ally. It is impossible to imagine that any other world leader could order the massacre of 400 civilians in less than 24 hours without facing international condemnation. Canada simply cannot allow the Palestinian people of Gaza to endure another period of relentless bombing and starvation at the hands of the Netanyahu government. Now is the time for definitive action.
Respectfully,
National Council of Canadian Muslims Source & signatories - signataires
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ACTION Arms Embargo Now!
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| | BCCLA Statement Against the Systemic Suppression of Support for Palestine | |
BCCLA 13/03/2025 - The BC Civil Liberties Association (BCCLA) condemns the deliberate and systemic suppression of political expression in support of Palestine.
Over the past 16 months we have witnessed a widespread pattern of professional discipline, loss of educational and training opportunities, censure, harassment, and the criminalization of individuals who have exercised their right to free political expression in calling Israel’s actions in Gaza a genocide and demanding those actions cease. Such heavy-handed responses cast a chilling shadow over civil liberties and advocacy for Palestinian human rights across Canada.
A Watershed Moment for our Civil Liberties
While some attacks on free expression – for example, the Vancouver Public Library prohibiting staff from wearing watermelon symbols, or attempts in schools to prevent teachers from delivering Nakba education– claim to be grounded in principles of neutrality, they are anything but neutral. Each of these moments paints a broader, frightening picture of systemic repression on free expression.
In recent months, BCCLA became aware of several lawyers and journalists who have been cautioned by police that posting social media content in support of Palestine, or challenging Israel’s actions, may lead to criminal charges. The threats raise the specter of punishment for expressing certain political ideology, which effectively chills dissent.
It is telling that lawyers and journalists – those who have professional responsibilities to uphold the rule of law, or uncover threats to democracy – are being targeted. This is a watershed moment of peril for civil liberties in Canada.
It is equally alarming that Canada continues to target Palestinian solidarity organizations while ignoring the documented war crimes and crimes against humanity Israel is committing against Palestinians.[i] Canada’s biased response to this international crisis has coloured the domestic interpretation of Charter rights in a way that should raise the alarm for anyone concerned with the protection of freedom and democracy.
A nation that prohibits dissent against its foreign policy, or bans peaceful human rights activism, is a dangerous place. This is a marked departure from the values we claim to hold in Canada.
As a civil liberties and human rights organization, we know that free and rigorous dialogue, particularly political discourse, is a necessary facet of democracy. In a time when fascism is tearing down hard-won rights and freedoms, we must be courageous in defending our democratic values. This is not the time to cave to fear.
We call on our communities to stand together to demand the protection of free political expression, as a core pillar of our democracy.
Biased Policing
In September 2024, BCCLA filed police complaints jointly with Pivot Legal in relation to the excessive use of force applied against people protesting the killing of children in Palestine, the chronic video surveillance of pro-Palestinian demonstrations, and the destruction of a sacred fire, contrary to VPD policy. Our Staff Counsel witnessed a police officer wearing an Israel flag patch while policing a rally, in breach of uniform policy. Police hold a unique role in our society, including the legal authority to detain, make arrest, and physically use force in a manner that others are prohibited from doing. It is a role that should be politically neutral. This is why uniform policy dictates the absence of political symbolism.
When governments turn to police to enforce silence on important political issues, this is the policing of discourse, dissent, and ideas. This does not make anyone safer. We denounce state efforts to control political discourse.
We call on all policing agencies to cease these practices of biased policing and policing political expression, and to discipline officers who breach policy. The biased policing that we have witnessed to date must be thoroughly investigated by impartial third parties, without delay.
Flawed Anti-Terror Tools
The addition of Samidoun: Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network (Samidoun) to Canada’s Listed Terrorist Entities demonstrates how government is using problematic tools to stifle political expression on Palestine. BCCLA has long opposed[ii] the use of this problematic anti-terrorism tool, which is riddled with accountability gaps and violates Charter-protected due process rights, including the presumption of innocence.[iii]
All people in Canada, regardless of their views on Samidoun, should be concerned by this designation and how it operates to suppress freedom of expression and assembly. It highlights the disturbing manner in which foreign interests and internal biases including Islamophobia and anti-Palestinian racism influence government policy and perpetuate stigma and division. Further, the lack of transparency in the process allows political prejudice to go unchecked.
We call on the Federal government to cease the opaque practice of listing terrorist entities. Read more - Lire plus
| | “The Target is Unmistakable”: The Shooting of Gaza’s Children | |
Drop Site & Al Jazeera 27/03/2025 - [...] In Gaza’s overcrowded and strained hospitals, a chilling pattern has emerged. Fault Lines spoke to twenty American doctors who have volunteered in hospitals across Gaza since the war began in October 2023, and they say they’ve treated many children with gunshots—often fatal.
Pattern of Gunshots in Children
Mohammed still holds on to a grim keepsake from the day Mira was shot: the bullet that struck his four year old daughter in the skull, “This is the bullet that ruined my daughter’s life,” he said, “and it represents that awful day when it all happened.”
“More and more, I started to see children with penetrating injuries like gunshot wounds. After five, six, seven, eight, I came to the realization that somebody is shooting children,” said Dr. Tammy Abughnaim, an American emergency physician from Chicago. “I didn't want to believe that children were being shot. Nobody wants to believe that. Nobody wants to think that other humans are capable of annihilating children in that way.” Dr. Abughnaim traveled to Gaza twice last year, working at Al-Aqsa Hospital and then at Nasser Hospital.
The Darini family’s story is part of a broader pattern of the Israeli military deliberately targeting children. Kids make up over a third of the death toll in Gaza, according to the Ministry of Health there. Nearly 16,000 children have been killed. However, the figure is almost certainly an undercount, as many children remain missing or under the rubble.
While most children have been killed by indiscriminate bombing, the doctors we spoke to say it’s nearly impossible to tell how many have been killed by snipers, foot soldiers with rifles, or quadcopters armed with guns. “Part of the Israeli military campaign of genocide has been to attack that very infrastructure that creates a record of who was killed and how,” said Miranda Cleland, an advocacy officer at Defense for Children International - Palestine. Cleland works with researchers on the ground in Gaza who had to stop collecting data because they were being bombed and had to evacuate their homes.
“The target at the end of a scope is unmistakable,” Dr. Mark Perlmutter told us, “They are a young human being, and when that trigger gets pulled on that target, it is not by accident. At all. Ever.” Currently in Gaza serving at Nasser Hospital, Perlmutter is an orthopedic hand surgeon from North Carolina who volunteered at the European Gaza Hospital in Khan Younis last spring.
The Scale May Never Be Known
The Israeli military shooting Palestinian children is by no means new or unique to the escalating catastrophe in Gaza, yet the scale of the shootings over the last seventeen months is on an entirely different level. Between October 7, 2023 and July 2024, the Israeli military killed 141 Palestinian children in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem; 116 of those were shot with live ammunition, according to the Defense for Children International - Palestine. “That comes out to about one child every two days,” Cleland said. “Ninety percent of those children were killed with live ammunition.” Numbers for Gaza are not available, in part because the Israeli military has destroyed its healthcare system.
“Israeli forces have killed so many children in Gaza that it is most likely we will never know all of their names,” Cleland added. “I think it will be a long time until we really understand the scale of how many children were killed and injured in Gaza, and that's even before we get into the details of how many children were shot with live ammunition.” Read more - Lire plus
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New Restrictions – What You Need to Know About Israel’s New Rules for NGOs in Gaza
| | Costs of War: Lessons from Fallujah: War Returnees Face Long-Term Health Risks from Heavy Metal Exposure | |
Brown University 24/03/2025 - Based on interdisciplinary biological, environmental, and anthropological research in Fallujah, Iraq, this report finds that people who have returned to bombarded homes and neighborhoods may face increased risk of negative health impacts from heavy metal exposure, both for themselves and for future generations. The findings support prior research which has demonstrated that those who are first at the scenes of war-damaged areas may be at a higher risk of reproductive health harms, and that Fallujah’s population faced a 17-fold increase in birth anomalies and myriad other health problems linked with the 2003 U.S. invasion. This study found that exposure to remnants of war, amplified by vitamin deficiencies, may play a role in these health outcomes.
The authors' bone sampling research detected uranium in the bones of 29% of study participants in Fallujah and lead was detected in 100% of participants’ bone samples. The amount of lead detected in participants’ bones was 600% higher than averages from similarly aged populations in the U.S. The authors' environmental sampling detected higher levels of heavy metals in the soils of more heavily bombarded neighborhoods, indicating the enduring distribution of heavy metals linked with military activity.
Additionally, the research found that in the process of being displaced, returning, and re-establishing households, nutritional gaps can compound reproductive health risks for returnees.
Returnees to bombarded cities in places such as Gaza, Ukraine, Syria, and Lebanon likely face negative long-term health impacts from heavy metal exposure, both for themselves and for future generations. Returnees can limit negative health impacts by wearing personal protective equipment and prioritizing certain nutritional practices, such as vitamin protocols. Read more - Lire plus
On the Iraq War Anniversary, Where Are the Architects of the Illegal Invasion?
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10 Years of War on Yemen: Leaked War Plan Chats Overshadow U.S. Deadly History Targeting Yemen | |
DemocracyNow! 16/03/2025 - Democratic lawmakers are calling for Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and national security adviser Michael Waltz to resign, after they discussed bombing Yemen in a group chat that also included journalist Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic.
Waltz had set up the chat on the messaging app Signal and appeared to accidentally add Goldberg, who then got a front-row seat as top officials, including Vice President JD Vance, discussed classified information. The attacks ultimately killed dozens of people in Yemen, including children.
Journalist Safa Al Ahmad, who has been reporting on Yemen since 2010, says that while Washington is obsessing over the U.S. national security implications of the group chat, there is almost no criticism of the bombing campaign at the heart of the scandal. “They are killing Yemenis with no recourse for Yemenis themselves,” says Al Ahmad, who notes that U.S. involvement in attacks on Yemen started almost exactly 10 years ago, when a Saudi-led coalition began bombing the country with support from the Obama administration.
“There was actually no legal rationale under the Constitution for doing these strikes,” adds Branko Marcetic, staff writer for Jacobin. “Only Congress is actually able to declare war.” Read more - Lire plus
U.S. Officials Called Signal a Tool for Terrorists and Criminals. Now They’re Using It.
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How the ‘war on terror’ paved the way for student deportations in the US | |
Al Jazeera 28/03/2025 - When Asad Dandia received a message from a young man named Shamiur Rahman in March 2012, he had no reason to suspect that he was under the watchful eye of state surveillance.
Rahman simply seemed interested in deepening his relationship with Islam and getting involved in charity work. As a Muslim community organiser in New York City, Dandia was happy to help.
The young man quickly became a regular at meetings, social events and efforts to help low-income members of the community. Rahman even spent a night in Dandia’s family home.
But nearly seven months later, Rahman made a confession over social media: He was an undercover informant for the New York City Police Department (NYPD). Dandia ultimately joined a class-action lawsuit, alleging the city of New York singled out Muslim communities for surveillance as part of the wider “war on terror” in the United States.
Four years later, the city settled, agreeing to protections against undue investigations into political and religious activities. But Dandia sees an echo of his experience in the present-day arrests of pro-Palestinian student protesters from abroad. He is among the activists and experts who have observed an escalation of the patterns and practices that became core features of the “war on terror” — from unwarranted surveillance to the broad use of executive power.
“What I endured was very similar to what we’re seeing students endure today,” Dandia said.
He noted that a lawyer who represented him is now working on the case of Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia University student and permanent resident facing deportation for his pro-Palestine activism.
The administration of President Donald Trump has accused Khalil of supporting terrorism, though it has yet to charge him with a crime or release evidence to substantiate the claim. Dandia said that the belief that Muslim, Arab and immigrant communities are inherently suspect is the common thread between their experiences. “Even if what Trump is attempting now is unprecedented, it’s drawing from longstanding traditions and policies.”
From neighbours to enemies
Scholars and analysts say that one of the throughlines is the pairing of harsher immigration enforcement with rhetoric focused on national security. The “war on terror” largely began after the attacks on September 11, 2001, one of which targeted New York City. In the days that followed, the administration of former President George W Bush began detaining scores of immigrants — nearly all of them from Muslim, Arab and South Asian communities — over alleged ties to terrorism.
The American Immigration Council, a Washington-based nonprofit, estimates that 1,200 people were arrested in the initial sweep. Many were ultimately deported. But the immigration raids did not result in a single conviction on terrorism-related charges. A 2004 report by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) noted that the government nevertheless advertised the deportations as “linked to the September 11 investigation”.
“Almost immediately after 9/11, Muslim communities were treated not as fellow New Yorkers who were living through the trauma of an attack on their city, but as potential accessories, witnesses, or perpetrators of a follow-on attack,” said Spencer Ackerman, a reporter who covered the war on terror and is the author of the book Reign of Terror.
The ACLU report says that some of those detained were held in solitary confinement and only allowed to leave their cells with shackles on their hands and legs. Some were kept in detention long after the government cleared them of any wrongdoing.
Fear in ‘the homeland’
Nikhil Singh, a history professor at New York University, believes that period of heightened fear caused the US to look inward for enemies, among its own communities. “The argument that the US was fighting these non-state groups who didn’t have borders started to imply that the fight against those enemies could take place anywhere, including in what the Bush administration started to call ‘the homeland’,” said Singh.
He pointed out that those post-September 11 detentions exercised a broad view of executive power, in order to justify a lack of due process for alleged terror suspects. “A lot of what’s happening now can be traced back to this moment, where this argument became normalised that the executive is responsible for keeping the country safe and, for that reason, needs to be able to suspend basic rights and ignore constitutional restraints.”
Art Eisenberg, executive counsel at the New York branch of the ACLU, explained that the history of targeting immigrant communities for national security concerns stretches beyond the “war on terror”. “The origins of policing and surveillance and undercover work targeting immigrant groups goes all the way back to the beginning of the 20th century. The New York City police intelligence bureau used to be called the Red Squad, but earlier it had been called ‘the Italian squad’,” said Eisenberg.
Over time, those operations morphed to target new sources of potential dissent: communists, civil rights activists and the Black Panthers, among others. But he added that the “war on terror” marked an escalation of that targeting. And those types of actions can have lasting effects on communities. The ACLU notes that, in the years after the September 11 attacks, more than one-third of Pakistanis in a Brooklyn neighbourhood known as “Little Pakistan” were deported or chose to leave the area.
Later, in 2012, when it was revealed that authorities had been spying on Dandia’s organisation, donations started to dry up, and the mosque where they held meetings told them to meet outside instead. No one had been charged with a crime. But the chilling effect of the surveillance caused the organisation to eventually close its doors, according to Dandia. “People always ask this question: If you’re not doing anything wrong, why should you worry?” said Dandia. “But it’s the government that is deciding what is right and wrong.”
Escalating attacks
Under the Trump administration, critics say vague allegations of terrorism continue to be seized upon as a pretext to silence dissent. In a statement about Khalil’s arrest, the Department of Homeland Security claimed that his involvement in campus protests against Israel’s war on Gaza showed he was “aligned” with the Palestinian armed group Hamas.
On Wednesday, masked federal agents also grabbed a 30-year-old Turkish graduate student named Rumeysa Ozturk off the street near Tufts University and took her away as she was on her way to dinner. In that case, the Department of Homeland Security likewise accused Ozturk of taking part in activities “in support of Hamas”, without offering details.
The US has designated Hamas a foreign terrorist organisation since 1997. US law prohibits citizens and residents from providing “material support” to such organisations. But Samuel Moyn, a professor of law and history at Yale University, said the recent arrests have failed to meet that threshold. “The scary thing is that they have dropped the pretence of even accusing people of material support for terrorism,” Moyn told Al Jazeera. “They are relying on a claim that these views are at odds with US foreign policy.”
Singh pointed out that the seemingly arbitrary detentions allow Trump to draw on the legacy of the “war on terror”, while he pursues his own aims, including a crackdown on immigration. “It’s the immigration agenda intersecting with the war on terror,” said Singh. “The former involves slowly chipping away at traditional constitutional rights, while the latter gives you a framework of broad presidential power.” If left unchecked, Ackerman said that an expansive view of presidential power could pave the way for further human rights abuses, even beyond immigrant communities.
“If there’s never any accountability for institutionalised abuses, those abuses will continue and they will intensify,” he said. “That is the lesson not just of the war on terror, but of a lot of noxious human history.” “If the Trump administration can say that what you say, what you post on social media, what you put on a placard, redounds to the benefit of a terror entity, then there really is nothing you can do to protect your freedom to say things that people in power disapprove of,” he added. Source
NEW ACTION Release Mahmoud Khalil!
U.S. must immediately release Palestinian rights-activist Mahmoud Khalil and stop threats of deportation against foreign residents, say UN experts
Justice Department is investigating bringing terrorism charges against pro-Palestinian protesters at Columbia University
Trump launches ‘October 7 Joint Task Force’, as war on Palestine protesters widens
An Islamophobia industry compiled lists of Muslims in America. Now those lists can feed a deportation engine
“Kidnapped”: 1,000+ Protest After Masked ICE Agents Abduct Tufts Ph.D. Student Rumeysa Ozturk
Cornell student Momodou Taal Sued Trump Over Free Speech. Then ICE Demanded He Turn Himself In.
Georgetown academics and students call for the release of Badar Khan Suri
Academic groups sue Trump administration for arresting students and faculty members linked to pro-Palestinian protests
| | Faisa Patel: U.S. AI-Driven “Catch and Revoke” Initiative Threatens First Amendment Rights | |
Just Security 18/03/2025 - On March 8, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents arrested Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia University student and a prominent leader of pro-Palestinian protests on the university’s campus. They claimed that Khalil’s student visa had both been revoked and when told that he had a green card, said that too had been revoked. While the full facts of the case are yet to emerge, there seems little doubt that Khalil was detained in retaliation for his activism. U.S. President Donald Trump has frequently and explicitly threatened to go after university protestors, including in his Executive Order on “Protecting the United States from Foreign Terrorists and Other National Security and Public Safety Threats,” which I analyzed in an earlier post. Trump celebrated Khalil’s arrest on social media, warning that it was the first “of many to come.”
Some of the “many to come” will likely be identified via the State Department’s newly launched AI-enabled “Catch and Revoke” initiative, which will scrape social media to find “foreign nationals who appear to support Hamas or other designated terror groups” and cancel their visas. Like the executive order cited above, this effort is framed as an anti-terrorism measure. Instead, it is being used to terrorize foreigners and to dissuade people from participating in First Amendment-protected activity for fear that they too will be targeted in some way.
Starting with the Obama administration, the federal government has built an extensive infrastructure for agencies to comb social media looking for certain types of speech. Even as civil society groups have raised concerns about how these programs could be used to target unpopular speech, they have continued to proliferate.
The State Department, for example, collects social media handles from certain types of visa applicants — some 14 million people a year — which are saved indefinitely in government databases. (The Brennan Center, where I work, and the Knight Institute have challenged this program in court.) The second Trump administration is aiming to dramatically expand these efforts, collecting social media identifiers from an additional 33 million people, including those applying for permanent residence or adjustment of their immigration status. The first Trump administration’s attempt to do so was blocked in 2021 by the Biden White House’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs on the grounds that the government had not demonstrated “the practical utility of collecting this information.”
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) runs at least 12 overlapping programs that track what Americans say online, several of which are focused on protests. DHS used social media to track protests against the first Trump administration’s immigration policies. During the Biden administration, DHS scanned social media for other targets, such as Americans discussing abortion after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and trucker convoys protesting Covid-19 mandates, as well as broadly monitoring online “narratives and grievances” —i.e., people talking politics.
Even as it adds more and more social media monitoring programs to its repertoire, the government has never shown that these efforts are effective. A February 2017 DHS Inspector General audit of six pilot programs found that the department had not even measured their effectiveness. And the few government evaluations that are publicly available undermine any governmental claims of efficacy. A brief prepared by DHS for the first Trump administration concluded that social media monitoring did not provide useful information for vetting refugees. And, according to a 2021 analysis by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, social media identifiers added “no value” to the immigration screening and vetting process.
Looking for unknown foreign protestors who may have made ostensibly pro-terrorist statements is much harder than vetting the posts of a known person, such as a visa applicant. It will undoubtedly sweep far too broadly and result in mistakes. The AI tools that will be deployed by the State Department likely will be tasked to search for specific words or phrases. The Trump administration has used these types of lists in its attempt to root out diversity, equity, and inclusion programs in the federal government, resulting in various blunders. In one instance, a federal employee who managed relations with private equity-held businesses was placed on administrative leave “pursuant to the President’s executive order on DEIA.” The Internal Revenue Service purged its employee manual of references to the “inequity” of holding on to taxpayer money longer than necessary and the “inclusion” of a taxpayer identification number on a form. The Defense Department flagged for deletion mentions of the World War II Enola Gay aircraft and references to people who have the last name “Gay.”
Even without mistakes, broad social media monitoring will have enormous First Amendment consequences. The types of speech that the administration has declared it intends to target is exceptionally broad. In defending his arrest, DHS said Khalil led activities “aligned” with Hamas, a term untethered to any law or regulation. Statements from Trump and his cabinet characterize foreigners who are in the administration’s crosshairs as “pro-Hamas” (most common), “pro-terrorist,” “terrorist sympathizers,” people who “support terrorism,” and “anti-Semitic.” These are broad and contested terms. Pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel sentiments have often been conflated with anti-Semitism or pro-terrorism, leaving a broad swath of people vulnerable to being caught in an AI-enabled social media net.
The Trump administration’s efforts ultimately may sweep even more broadly, seeking out speech that it views as anti-American. The vetting executive order instructed the Secretary of State to recommend measures for foreign nationals who call for the “overthrow or replacement of the culture on which our constitutional Republic stands.” In addition, the sole justification provided by the administration for acting against Khalil is a single line in the Notice to Appear in immigration court: “The Secretary of State has determined that your presence or activities in the United States would have serious adverse policy consequences for the foreign policy of the United States,” citing 237(A)(4)(c)(1) of the Immigration and Nationality Act.” As Adam Cox and Ahilan Arulanantham explained on Just Security, this provision cannot be read as a blank check for the administration to deport people based on an unarticulated foreign policy rationale. But if the administration wants to deport foreigners who take positions contrary to U.S. foreign policy, they will certainly find plenty of fodder on social media.
Khalil’s case and the Trump administration’s promise to go after foreign protestors for their social media posts is an extraordinary assertion of executive power over immigrants living in the United States. But it should not be viewed in isolation. It is part of Trump’s broader effort to subdue all potential sources of opposition by attacking universities, the press, law firms, and jurisdictions that refuse to cooperate with ICE. All of these endanger the fundamental constitutional promise of a democratic society in which a multitude of views and interests can be freely expressed. Source
How DHS Laid the Groundwork for More Intelligence Abuse
LAPD Surveilled Gaza Protests Using Social Media Tool Dataminr
| | How a Landlord and a Florida PR Firm Helped Trump Kick Off the Tren de Aragua Gang Panic | |
The Intercept 27/03/2025 - President Donald Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, was on a Sunday talk show last weekend to defend the administration’s use of wartime powers to label Venezuelan immigrants as gang members and deport them without due process.
“How do your people in the field determine that someone is a gang member?” Jonathan Karl, a co-anchor of ABC’s “This Week,” asked.
“Look, there’s various methods,” Homan responded. “I’ve noticed in the media people saying, ‘They don’t have criminal histories.’ Well, a lot of gang members don’t have criminal histories, just like a lot of terrorists in this world — they’re not in any terrorist database, right?”
It was a rare moment of transparency for Homan, a former acting director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, best known to most Americans for his time as a tough-talking political commentator on Fox News.
His analogy — likening suspected Venezuelan gang members to Al Qaeda or Islamic State fighters — was telling. Both, he implied, operate in ways that make proving connections nearly impossible, allowing the government to label anyone a threat.
For two decades after the September 11 attacks, the federal government inflated the threat of Islamist extremism in the U.S. by running undercover sting operations. The arrests were made to much fanfare, but actually locked up people who posed little or no threat to the country. Instead of bolstering public safety, what these operations did was bolster expanded post-September 11 law enforcement powers and bloated counterterrorism budgets.
Now, the Trump administration is returning to that playbook: exaggerating to the public the threat of a Venezuelan transnational prison gang, Tren de Aragua, to justify expanded powers.
Claiming a growing and direct threat from Tren de Aragua, the Trump administration invoked a law dating back to 1798 to begin mass deportations of Venezuelans.
More than 200 Venezuelans have already been deported under the law, some to a prison in El Salvador, even as a federal judge has ordered the U.S. government to stop using these wartime powers for deportation operations.
Trump claimed that “evidence irrefutably demonstrates” that Tren de Aragua, now treated as a terrorist organization by his administration, is invading the United States.
But that isn’t true.
Public reports tie alleged members of the gang to several violent crimes, including a robbery and murder in Miami, a kidnapping and double homicide in Chicago, and, most infamously, the killing of Georgia nursing student Laken Riley.
That these crimes were isolated and relatively limited in number hasn’t stopped the Trump administration from treating Tren de Aragua as an existential threat. The gang has become the latest stand-in for fears about immigrants — “proof” that open-border policies have allowed dangerous foreign enemies into the country.
Yet this isn’t a national crisis. It’s a moral panic — manufactured, inflated, and easily deconstructed — with unexpected origins in rundown apartment buildings in Colorado and a PR firm in Florida. Read more - Lire plus
Federal judge rejects Guantánamo Bay detention challenge as DOJ confirms no migrants at military base
Trump Administration Sends a New Group of Migrants to Guantánamo Bay
Trump Invokes Wartime Alien Enemies Act, Then Ignores Judicial Order to Turn Around Deportation Flights
Supreme Court faces Guantanamo test again: Does president's power have limits?
Disappeared: U.S. Sends Venezuelan LGBTQ Asylum Seeker to El Salvador’s Version of Guantánamo
Venezuelan Professional Goalkeeper Deported to El Salvador Prison, Stunning Family Back Home
Human Rights Watch declaration on prison conditions in El Salvador for the J.G.G. v. Trump case
Venezuela minister says no Tren de Aragua members among US deportees
| | U.S. to revoke legal status of more than a half-million migrants, urges them to self deport | |
CBS News 23/03/2025 - The Trump administration will be revoking the legal status of hundreds of thousands of Latin American and Haitian migrants welcomed into the U.S. under a Biden-era sponsorship process, urging them to self-deport or face arrest and removal by deportation agents.
The termination of their work permits and deportation protections under an immigration authority known as parole will take effect in late April, 30 days after March 25, according to a notice posted by the federal government.
The move will affect immigrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela who flew to the U.S. under a Biden administration program, known as CHNV, that was designed to reduce illegal immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border by giving would-be migrants legal migration avenues.
A total of 532,000 migrants entered the U.S. under that policy, which was paused soon after President Trump took office, though it's unclear how many have been able to secure another status that will allow them to stay in the country legally.
CBS News first reported in early February that the Trump administration was planning to revoke the legal status of individuals who entered the U.S. under the CHNV process. The Department of Homeland Security said it will seek the arrest and deportation of those subject to the policy change if they fail to depart the U.S. in the next 30 days. Officials are urging migrants to use the newly repurposed CBP Home smartphone app to register for self-deportation.
But DHS said it retains the authority to target migrants who arrived under this program before the 30-day period lapses. Officials say those prioritized for arrest will include migrants who have failed to apply for another immigration benefit like asylum or a green card.
In a statement, DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said the migrants allowed into the U.S. under the CHNV process were "loosely vetted," and argued the program undercut American workers. "The termination of the CHNV parole programs, and the termination of parole for those who exploited it, is a return to common-sense policies, a return to public safety, and a return to America First," McLaughlin added.
Friday's announcement is the latest effort by the Trump administration to discontinue humanitarian-based immigration programs that allow migrants to enter or stay in the country with the government's permission.
The CHNV program in question was hailed by the Biden administration as a successful policy that reduced illegal border crossings by migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and, to a lesser extent, Venezuela. But Republicans denounced it as an effort to circumvent the limits Congress placed on legal immigration, and noted that the program had some recorded instances of fraud.
The Biden administration last fall made a decision not to allow CHNV beneficiaries to renew their two-year work permits under the program, saying they could apply for other benefits, like asylum and Temporary Protected Status. That prospect, however, changed dramatically when Mr. Trump took office.
His administration has already announced plans to phase out the TPS programs for Haitians and Venezuelans. It also suspended all pending immigration benefit applications filed by those who arrived under CHNV, citing concerns about fraud and vetting. Source
ACTION Amnesty International: Canada: End the Safe Third Country Agreement
Democrats push back on plans to use military installations as migrant detention centers
Troops to start surveillance at border
Green card holder from New Hampshire 'interrogated' at Logan Airport, detained
Trump Wants Immigrants on U.S. Soil to Hand Over Social Media Accounts to Apply for Citizenship
| | The FBI Is Investigating Attacks on Tesla as ‘Domestic Terrorism.’ Here’s Why That Matters | |
Wired 22/03/2025 - The US Federal Bureau of Investigation says it’s investigating a series of alleged incidents across the country in which “Tesla charging stations and dealerships were damaged.” On Thursday, Attorney General Pam Bondi highlighted charges against three people accused of throwing Molotov cocktails at Tesla vehicles and, in at least one alleged incident, writing “profane messages against President Trump” near Tesla charging stations, among other crimes.
“Let this be a warning: If you join this wave of domestic terrorism against Tesla properties, the Department of Justice will put you behind bars,” Bondi said in a news release detailing the arrests, which were made over the last several weeks in Oregon, Colorado, and South Carolina.
Civil liberties experts claim treating alleged attacks against Tesla cars and infrastructure as terrorist activity could give federal and local law enforcement broad authority to surveil people protesting Elon Musk’s role in the government. The terrorism designation could also allow Musk and other Tesla executives to access information authorities uncover in their investigations.
Bondi’s announcement comes ahead of hundreds of grassroots “Tesla Takedown” events protesting Musk and his influence in Washington that are scheduled to take place at Tesla facilities across the US this weekend. The demonstrations have multiplied since they began in mid-February, with some attracting hundreds of people each.
Most of the protests have been peaceful, and the organizers of some of them have said that they don’t endorse property damage. But they are happening amid a string of alleged arson and vandalism cases targeting Tesla dealerships and charging stations, including one in Las Vegas Tuesday morning, as well as others in Colorado and Boston.
By labeling these and other incidents involving Tesla domestic terrorism, the FBI can file broader search warrants than in other types of cases. Under the Patriot Act, law enforcement gets “special authorities" while investigating terrorism, including “single-jurisdiction search warrants” from magistrate judges that apply anywhere in the US instead of a single geographic area, according to a 2023 report from the Government Accountability Office. With a court order, law enforcement can additionally get “confidential education records” from any school or agency in the course of a terrorism investigation, the report notes.
The FBI also has a national network of Joint Terrorism Task Forces that allow the bureau to borrow agents, experts, data, and intelligence from more than 30 federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies, including the “Department of Homeland Security, the U.S. military, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and the Transportation Security Administration,” as well as local police throughout a particular region.
In addition to these resources, the FBI has access to surveillance technology that local authorities may not, such as social media surveillance tools, face recognition programs, and allegedly “stingrays” that can intercept data from cell phones.
Most of the powers and resources that law enforcement has access to in a terrorism investigation are also available in other criminal investigations. However, some lawyers have argued that law enforcement tends to exercise the fuller scope of its powers more frequently in the course of terrorism cases. [...]
Risks for Protesters
Domestic terrorism investigations are often fraught. Organizations like the American Civil Liberties Union have argued that the FBI routinely uses them to unfairly surveil activists and communities of color without adequate oversight.
President Trump has said his administration is taking Tesla incidents very seriously. “People that get caught sabotaging Teslas will stand a very good chance of going to jail for up to twenty years, and that includes the funders,” Trump wrote in a social media post on Thursday. “WE ARE LOOKING FOR YOU!!!”
Hina Shamsi, director of the ACLU’s national security project, says that instead of “focusing on the most serious criminal conduct that harms life,” federal agencies have wasted resources and abused their authority by “treating alleged non-violent civil disobedience or vandalism as justification for abusive investigations of civil rights and other activists.”
Historically, [former FBI special agent and current fellow at the Brennan Center for Justice, Michael] German says, the FBI has endorsed an idea called “radicalization theory,” which posits that the beliefs of extremists naturally escalate from moderate and widely held beliefs. That logic, he says, justifies the FBI casting a wide surveillance net, particularly when it comes to monitoring activists.
“They suggest that anybody who's got a similar ideology might be willing to commit the same kind of crime,” German explains. “We've seen a lot of abuse of FBI investigative authorities, particularly around domestic advocacy groups.”
Five years ago, the FBI used the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to surveil people participating in Black Lives Matter protests, investigating whether they had ties to terrorists. The DOJ inspector general called the incident an example of the FBI’s “widespread non-compliance” with FISA rules.
German claims that in this case, instead of focusing on people who are alleged to have committed arson or acts of violence, the FBI’s focus could ultimately be scrutinizing people who it thinks are expressing “anger or animosity towards Tesla or Elon Musk.” Read more - Lire plus
Politics FBI launches Tesla threats task force: ‘This is domestic terrorism’
Trump Fantasizes About Sending American Tesla Vandals to Prison in El Salvador
El Salvador’s Offer to House U.S. Prisoners Is Illegal: It is illegal to expatriate U.S. citizens for a crime.
| | Lawyers and Courts Must Not Back Down as President Trump Issues Executive Order Calling for Sanctions and Investigations of Attorneys and Law Firms | |
Pen America 22/03/2025 - In one of the most draconian steps to date in his campaign seeking retribution against political foes, insulation from legal accountability, and the chilling of immigrants rights’ litigation and other cases of which he disapproves, President Donald Trump signed an executive order today that seeks aggressive sanctions and investigations of attorneys and law firms. In response, Hadar Harris, PEN America’s Washington, D.C. managing director, issued the following statement:
“PEN America stands by lawyers, judges and the rule of law in light of the concerted attempts to undermine, intimidate, and control the legal profession and rule of law outlined in today’s extraordinary executive order, Preventing Abuses of the Legal System and Federal Courts.
The rule of law is fundamental to American democracy. As an organization representing writers (including academics, intellectuals, journalists, and songwriters), we know how the law can be weaponized against unpopular ideas. Too many people are in prison for their writing, being sued because of their articles, or are being deported because of their ideas. Lawyers and their ability to hold the government and other powerful institutions accountable are fundamental to ensuring that people are protected when they are being wrongfully pursued—or when they have been wronged and need to bring claims to protect their lives, liberty and other interests.
This sweeping misuse of presidential and executive power to threaten lawyers and law firms with investigations and severe sanctions is the latest example of a rogue administration flexing its power to demand compliance with its ideological and political priorities— and to punish or sideline those who would stand up to the president or for those his government attacks. It is an example of both preemptively and retroactively using raw executive power and some of the powerful levers of government in an attempt to undermine all who would stand against the president and his personal and political agendas— or who are perceived to have done so over the course of the past two administrations.
The government has pursued universities by yanking research funding or making it conditional on compliance with illegal and discriminatory executive orders. In addition, government is banning words and concepts from research or teaching, targeting artists and culture creators by conditioning grants on developing only certain kinds of products, targeting scientists by banning words and concepts from research proposals, and restricting access for journalists unless they report on events in the way the administration wants.
And let’s be clear: alarmingly, they have had some success. Now they are going after our entire system of justice, trying to intimidate lawyers, law firms, and their clients, from pursuing justice and ensuring zealous representation.
Lawyers and judges are bound by strict professional responsibility obligations and rules of court. Through the weaponized threat of sanctions, targeted executive orders, disciplinary procedures and withdrawal of security clearances, the Trump administration is seeking to undermine the most basic tenet of legal representation: that everyone is entitled to zealous representation and due process under law.
We stand with the legal profession and federal courts in opposition to this blatant attempt to bully the profession into submission. We call on all lawyers, law firms and organizations, and all who rely upon the rule of law—no matter their political views or associations— to stand together to oppose this attempt to undermine it. As John Locke said, ‘Where law ends, tyranny begins.’” Source
| | 1,400+ Arrested in Turkey as Erdoğan Jails Istanbul Mayor & Intensifies Authoritarian Crackdown | | Pakistan: Systematic attacks and relentless crackdown on Baloch activists must end | | |
Amnesty International 27/03/2025 - Responding to the unlawful detention and harassment of Baloch activists in Quetta and Karachi over the past week in Pakistan, Babu Ram Pant, Deputy Regional Director for South Asia at Amnesty International, said:
“The Pakistani authorities’ relentless crackdown on Baloch activists over the last week and continued detention of several protesters and Baloch activists, including Mahrang Baloch, Sammi Deen Baloch, and Bebarg Zehri, speaks of a systematic attack on the rights of Baloch community. Amnesty International is concerned by reports from family members that Mahrang and Bebarg – who is a person with disabilities, are not being given access to medical assistance despite their health severely deteriorating during custody.”
“The weaponization of the legal system, through multiple bogus First Information Reports (FIRs) and preventative detentions under the Maintenance of Public Order Ordinance, despite activists being granted bail, is a gross violation of their right to due process and fair trial. It shows wanton disregard by the law enforcement agencies for the rights of Baloch people under Pakistan’s Constitution and the country’s obligations under international human rights law.”
“Pakistani authorities must immediately release all Baloch activists being detained simply for exercising their right to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly. Amnesty reiterates its call for a prompt, thorough and impartial investigation into the use of unlawful force during the 21 March peaceful protests and ensure those responsible are held to account and the violations are effectively remedied.”
BACKGROUND
Baloch activists, Bebarg Zehri and his brother Hammal Zehri, were taken by Counter Terrorism Department officials from their home in Quetta on 20 March 2025 following a press conference by the Baloch Yakjethi Committee (BYC) at the Quetta Press Club over their long-standing demand is for justice for families of victims of enforced disappearances. During a protest by BYC on 21 March calling for their release, three protesters were killed through use of unlawful force by law enforcement as per reports from local activists. Mobile network signals were completely shut down in the lead up to and following the protest.
Central leader of the Baloch Yakjethi Committee, Mahrang Baloch, along with 17 other protesters, was detained the next day. Mahrang and Bebarg remain under preventative detention under the Maintenance of Public Order Ordinance (MPO), with separate terrorism charges also brought against Mahrang.
On 24 March, at least six activists, including Sammi Deen Baloch a key leader in BYC, were detained for disregarding a blanket ban on assemblies in the city, following a protest in Karachi in Sindh province. Source
| | Regional organisations must respect and promote human rights while countering terrorism: UN expert | | |
OHCHR 11/03/2025 - Dozens of regional organisations around the world play a vital role in the fight against terrorism, but they have also enabled serious human rights violations and evaded adequate scrutiny, a UN expert said today.
“Regional organisations should never enable governments to repress their critics or destroy human freedoms,” said Ben Saul, the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism.
In his report to the 58th session of the Human Rights Council, Saul urged regional organisations to engage more meaningfully with diverse civil society organisations in preventing terrorism, addressing its root causes, and remedying human rights violations.
“Regional organisations must empower member states to fight terrorism in accordance with the rule of law and human rights,” he said.
The Special Rapporteur stressed that the involvement of civil society enhances the legitimacy of counter-terrorism measures, builds public trust and security cooperation, and makes measures more effective. He made key recommendations, including:
- Publicising information on how civil society can get involved;
- Avoiding restrictive accreditation and registration criteria for civil society;
- Providing funding and administrative support for civil society engagement; and
- Protecting civil society from reprisals and intimidation.
“Regional organisations that impose sanctions on ‘terrorist’ individuals or entities must fully respect human rights law, given the acute risk of their misuse against human rights defenders, civil society, journalists and political activists,” the expert said.
In his report, Saul called for regional definitions of terrorism that are used to impose counter-terrorism sanctions to be narrow, rights-respecting and in line with international best practice standards.
“There must be rigorous due process, independent review, and effective remedies for violations,” he said. “The sanctions imposed must also be strictly necessary and proportionate and not applied automatically.”
The Special Rapporteur urged those involved in regional military cooperation against terrorism to respect international law, from capacity-building to peacekeeping and combat operations.
“Regional missions must respect the prohibition on the use of force as strictly interpreted by the International Court of Justice,” the expert said. “They must commit to respect international humanitarian and human rights law and to protect the civilian population.
They must independently investigate violations, accept legal responsibility where appropriate, and provide effective remedies, including reparations.”
“Regional organisations should assess human rights risks in advance of and during missions, including when partnering with third states,” Saul said. “They must scrupulously respect international standards on arms and munitions transfers. They should be transparent in publicly reporting on their operations.”
The Special Rapporteur called for regional missions to always be part of a comprehensive response that addresses the root causes of conflict, including State violations of human rights and poor governance, and enables peace-making and reconciliation.
This is a follow-up to his report to the General Assembly in October 2024, which addressed other human rights concerns related to regional organisations. Source
| | OTHER NEWS - AUTRES NOUVELLES | | ICLMG ACTIONS DE LA CSILC | |
Canada: Abolish rights-violating terrorist entities list!
| | |
On October 15, 2024, the Canadian government placed the Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network on Canada’s terrorist entities list. While ostensibly a tool to protect the safety and security of people in Canada and internationally, the list is an arbitrary political tool that undermines freedom of association, of expression and due process in the courts. Its effectiveness as a national security tool has never been demonstrated in a manner that justifies its use.
Due to these deep flaws, and more, the ICLMG has consistently called for the list to be abolished since the Canadian coalition’s founding in 2002. Please join us in urging the Canadian government to abolish the rights-violating terrorist entities list once and for all. Thank you!
| | Canada: Do not purchase armed drones | | The ICLMG is a member of the No Armed Drones campaign | | In the government's proposal seeking bids for its drone program it laid out disturbing scenarios for Canadian military drone use: One scenario described drones being used to surveil activists protesting a (theoretical) G20 Summit in Quebec, helping the security team intercept and identify the occupants of a vehicle, who are “anti-capitalist radicals” intending to “hang a banner concerning global warming.” Another scenario modeled after US drone strike programs features a drone bombing “Fighting Age Males” in the Middle East after spotting one of them “holding a small radio or cell phone." The initial cost estimate is $5 billion with billions more to operate the drones over their 25-year lifespan. | | CSIS isn't above the law! | | |
In recent years, at least three court decisions revealed the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS) engaged in potentially illegal activities and lied to the courts. This is utterly unacceptable, especially given that this is not the first time these serious problems have been raised. CSIS cannot be allowed to act as though they are above the law.
Send a message to Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino demanding that he take immediate action to put an end to this abuse of power and hold those CSIS officers involved accountable, and for parliament to support Bill C-331, An Act to amend the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act (duty of candour). Your message will also be sent to your MP and to Minister of Justice David Lametti.
| | Canada must protect Hassan Diab! | | Canada must repatriate all Canadians detained in NE Syria now! | |
On January 20, 2023, Federal Court Justice Henry Brown ruled that Canada must repatriate Canadians illegally and arbitrarily detained in northeast Syria. On February 6, 2023, the Canadian government filed an appeal and asked that the Brown ruling be set aside and placed on hold while the appeal plays out. This is unacceptable.
Every day the government fails to bring these Canadians home, it places their lives at risk from disease, malnutrition, violence, and ongoing military conflicts, including bombing by Turkey’s military. United Nations officials have even found that the conditions faced by Canadians in prison are akin to torture. Please click below to urge the federal government to repatriate all Canadians illegally & arbitrarily detained in northeast Syria without delay.
| | 21 years of fighting deportation to torture: Justice for Mohamed Harkat Now! | | Canada must protect encryption! | |
Canada’s extradition system is broken. One leading legal expert calls it “the least fair law in Canada.” It has led to grave harms and rights violations, as we’ve seen in the case of Canadian citizen Dr Hassan Diab. It needs to be reformed now.
Click below to send a message to urge Prime Minister Trudeau, the Minister of Justice and your Member of Parliament to reform the extradition system before it makes more victims. And share on Facebook + Twitter + Instagram. Thank you!
Regardez la vidéo avec les sous-titres en français + Agir
| | Protect our rights from facial recognition! | Facial recognition surveillance is invasive and inaccurate. This unregulated tech poses a threat to the fundamental rights of people across Canada. Federal intelligence agencies refuse to disclose whether they use facial recognition technology. The RCMP has admitted (after lying about it) to using facial recognition for 18 years without regulation, let alone a public debate regarding whether it should have been allowed in the first place. Send a message to Prime Minister Trudeau and Public Safety Minister Bill Blair calling for a ban now. | | |
Thanks to the support of our members and donors in the second half of 2024 we have been able to work on the following:
- Bill C-20, the Public Complaints and Review Commission Act - which has been adopted and will finally create an independent watchdog for CBSA
- Bill C-27, Digital Charter Implementation Act, 2022 and the very problematic Artificial Intelligence and Data Act
- Bill C-63: The concerning Online Harms Act
- Bill C-70: The new and highly controversial Foreign Interference law
- Bill C-353: The Foreign Hostage Takers Accountability Act
- Palestine and the right to dissent
- Canada’s terrorist entities list
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Monitoring the implementation and review of the authorization regime for international assistance to vulnerable populations in areas controlled by “terrorist” groups
- Combatting Racism & Islamophobia
- Repatriation of all Canadians detained in Northeastern Syria
- Justice for Dr Hassan Diab
- Mohamed Harkat & Security certificates
- Work with the international Civil Society Coalition on Human Rights and Counter-terrorism
- The UN Counter-terrorism Executive Directorate (CTED) Canada assessment
- The UN Cybersecurity Treaty & the EU AI Convention
What we have planned for 2025!
The coming year will present many challenges, old and new. Much of our successes from this past year will continue to need follow-up, as we track the establishment of the new CBSA review body, and push back against new foreign interference laws and attempts to silence protest. There are also the challenges we will face with the incoming US government, which is already playing out its promises to increase the securitization of the US-Canada border with more police, drones and facial recognition surveillance. This will place the rights of all travellers, but especially asylum seekers searching for protection and better living conditions, at risk.
We’ll also have our own election in Canada this year, and ICLMG will be working to both make sure the public is aware of the parties’ track records on civil liberties and national security, as well as to secure commitments to protect our rights from candidates and the new government once it is in office.
We will continue our work on these issues and much more in the next year:
- Pressuring lawmakers and officials to protect our civil liberties from the negative impact of national security as well as opposing the discourse of “countering terrorism” to repress dissent, such as protests in support of Palestinian rights and lives
- Co-creating a mechanism to monitor how the new Countering Foreign Interference law is used, as well as continue pushing back against xenophobic fear-mongering
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Protecting our privacy from government surveillance, including facial recognition, and from attempts to weaken encryption, along with advocating for good privacy law reform
- Addressing the lack of regulation on the use of AI in national security, including proposed exemptions for national security agencies
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Fighting for Justice for Mohamed Harkat, an end to security certificates, and addressing problems in security inadmissibility
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Fighting for Justice for Hassan Diab and reforming Canada’s extradition law
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Monitoring the implementation of the authorization regime for organizations that provide international assistance to vulnerable populations in areas controlled by “terrorist” groups
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Pushing back on the false narrative depicting migrants and refugees as security risks, and advocating for rights protection and accountability for border agencies, including by monitoring the creation of a new CBSA and RCMP watchdog and complaint body
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The return of the rest of the Canadian citizens and the non-Canadian mothers of Canadian children indefinitely detained in Syrian camps
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The end to the CRA’s prejudiced audits of Muslim-led charities
- Greater accountability and transparency for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service
- Advocating for the repeal of the terrorist entities list, the Canadian No Fly List, and for putting a stop to the use of the US No Fly List by air carriers in Canada
- Keeping you and our member organizations informed via the News Digest
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And much more! Read more - Lire plus
| | Les opinions exprimées ne reflètent pas nécessairement les positions de la CSILC - The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the positions of ICLMG. | | |
THANK YOU
to our amazing supporters!
We would like to thank all our member organizations, and the hundreds of people who have supported us over the years, including on Patreon! As a reward, we are listing below our patrons who give $10 or more per month (and wanted to be listed) directly in the News Digest. Without all of you, our work wouldn't be possible!
James Deutsch
Bill Ewanick
Kevin Malseed
Brian Murphy
Colin Stuart
Bob Thomson
James Turk
John & Rosemary Williams
Jo Wood
The late Bob Stevenson
Nous tenons à remercier nos organisations membres ainsi que les centaines de personnes qui ont soutenu notre travail à travers les années, y compris sur Patreon! En récompense, nous nommons ci-dessus nos mécènes qui donnent 10$ ou plus par mois et voulaient être mentionné.es directement dans la Revue de l'actualité. Sans vous tous et toutes, notre travail ne serait pas possible!
Merci!
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