|
International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group
Coalition pour la surveillance internationale des libertés civiles
August 16, 2025 - 16 août 2025
| | The News Digest will be on hiatus for a month - La Revue de l'actualité sera en pause pour un mois | | Webinar: Stop Bill C-2, the dangerous "Strong Borders" Act
| |
ICLMG 13/08/2025 - The “Strong Borders” Act makes all of us less safe
Join us to learn everything you need to know to take on and fight back against Bill C-2!
When: August 27th, 7PM ET (4PM PT/5PM CT/8PM AT)
Who: Some of Canada’s leading civil society voices on humanitarian issues and your rights!
Speakers will include:
- Adam Sadinsky, Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers
- Kate Robertson, The Citizen Lab
- Sarom Rho, Migrant Rights Network
- Matt Hatfield, OpenMedia
- Moderator: Tim McSorley, International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group
Where: Online via Zoom. Register here!
What: Bill C-2, Mark Carney’s so-called “Strong Borders” Act, is cruel, useless and dangerous. Experts are calling it the most anti-privacy legislation since Harper’s C-51, and comparable to – and in some ways, even worse than – the Trump administration’s anti-migrant and refugee measures. The Government and the bill’s supporters say we need strong borders to protect our safety; but C-2’s flagrant attacks on our rights are so broad, it will make all of us less safe. Yet unless we mobilize in force now, Bill C-2 will likely pass into law this fall.
This webinar will cover the essentials you need to know to understand what’s wrong with Bill C-2, and the “elbows down” political context that’s driving Carney’s proposal. You’ll be able to:
- ask privacy and migrant rights experts your questions about the details of the bill;
- leave with a full toolset to make your voice heard and help stop this harmful and dangerous legislation.
Care about human rights and privacy and believe Canada should be committed to them? Join this session!
Co-organized by: International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group, Migrant Rights Network, OpenMedia, Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants, Canadian Council for Refugees
Co-presented by: Amnesty International Canada (english speaking section), BC Civil Liberties Association, Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers, Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East, Centre for Black Development Options Canada, Clinique pour la justice migrante, HIV Legal Network, Ligue des droits et libertés, Refugee Lawyers’ Association of Ontario. Source
Please like and share on Bluesky + LinkedIn + Facebook + Instagram + Twitter
NEW Parliamentary petition to withdraw Bill C-2!
Bill C-2 FAQ: Explaining Canada’s Dangerous New Surveillance Law
Migrants deliver demands to Mark Carney: Regularization for all undocumented migrants, stop Bill C-2 and scrap the Safe Third Country Agreement
C-2 vise à « restreindre les droits reconnus internationalement », dit un expert
| | Featuring ICLMG: Migrant surveillance data no longer has to remain in Canada. That has civil liberties advocates worried. | |
Investigative Journalism Foundation 06/08/2025 - The Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) revised a surveillance technology contract to allow foreign companies to bid on supplying and tracking ankle monitors for some migrants.
On June 20, the day the House of Commons recessed and MPs returned home to their ridings, the CBSA amended a request for proposals (RFP) it had first issued in November 2024, removing a section mandating that the contractor must store the tracking data securely within Canada.
The revised RFP, which required the contractor to maintain a web portal where CBSA could access the data, closed just 10 days later. It was the minimum period permitted under procurement guidelines, only under a state of urgency.
The CBSA can use electronic monitoring as an alternative to detention when a migrant's status is being reviewed.
While Parliament does not review CBSA contracts, civil liberties advocates raised questions about the change’s timing and whether it complied with data privacy laws. “This may have been done in anticipation of Bill C-2 passing,” said Xan Dagenais, the communications and research coordinator for the International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group (ICLMG), referring to the government’s sweeping border and national security bill. The bill received first reading on June 3 and was discussed in the House of Commons for two weeks before the CBSA’s revision.
“There’s definitely a shift happening in how the Canadian government treats data privacy,” they said, adding, “It just seems like they don't consider migrant data to be worth protecting anymore.”
CBSA did not respond by deadline to IJF’s questions about whether the agency’s changes to the RFP were linked to the bill.
If passed, Bill C-2 would expand the agency’s enforcement powers and facilitate data sharing with foreign governments, according to ICLMG and other advocacy groups.
Prime Minister Mark Carney has backed the legislation — and promised that the government will buy Canadian — as part of an effort to bolster border security amid trade negotiations with the United States. U.S. President Donald Trump has imposed tariffs on Canadian exports, pointing to Canada’s alleged failure to stop the flow of fentanyl across the border.
Dagenais also linked the change to U.S. legislation called the Clarifying Lawful Overseas Use of Data Act, which allows U.S. authorities to access any data stored on U.S.-based servers, or foreign servers owned by U.S. companies. Canada is negotiating with the United States under this legislation.
Responding to IJF’s questions, a CBSA spokesperson defended the changes. “No personal information is being shared with the vendor,” she said, explaining that the geolocation data will not be linked to a migrant’s name or identifying information. The RFP shows that the location data will be connected to the ankle bracelet’s device number instead.
Dagenais said that argument is inaccurate. “You can definitely identify someone if you follow their movement across time,” they said.
The original RFP classified migrants’ geolocation data as "Protected B." That's a federal designation applied to information that, if compromised, could cause serious injury to an individual. The IJF’s review of CBSA publications found the agency has previously included geolocation data under the Protected B classification.
The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (OPC), which reviews federal departments’ compliance with privacy regulations, did not respond to the IJF’s questions about the revised call for proposals. The OPC has stated that location data is sensitive, even when not directly linked to identifying information, and has urged Justice Canada to apply "comprehensive, appropriate, and robust safeguards" to cross-border data transfers.
The commissioner’s office has warned about the "significant privacy implications" of a proposed international treaty regarding data sharing, called the Second Additional Protocol to the Budapest Convention.
A company headquartered in the Vancouver area, Jemtec Inc., was proposed to track the locations of migrants for CBSA as early as 2015, the IJF’s Open by Default database shows, with some of Jemtec’s contracts apparently flowing through Correctional Service Canada. The federal government does not publish information about all contracts involving security matters.
The winning contractor may track up to 250 people at a time on the agency’s behalf within two years, according to the RFP. The contract is for one year, with the option of two one-year extensions.
Though the contract was set to begin on Aug. 1, CBSA’s spokesperson said on July 31 the agency has not yet selected a vendor.
Petra Molnar, associate director of the Refugee Law Lab at York University and a faculty associate at Harvard University’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society, called the CBSA’s decision to change the Protected B classification “troubling.”
“These categories are not arbitrary classifications but exist to mitigate risks of profound harm,” she said, “particularly for populations such as people-on-the-move and asylum seekers, who often already lack the ability to … challenge the imposition of surveillance on them.” Source
| | |
JURIST 25/07/2025 - Gaza is suffering “man-made mass starvation” caused by the blockade of aid into the territory, the head of the World-Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, has said, as more than 100 humanitarian agencies urged Israel to allow supplies in to alleviate the crisis.
In the face of this catastrophe, Canada must urgently deploy peacekeeping forces to break Israel’s blockade of Gaza and end what U.N. Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, Michael Fakhri, has called “the fastest starvation campaign we’ve seen in modern history.” More than 18,000 Canadians have already signed Parliamentary e-petition 6619, calling on the Canadian government to “work with international partners, including the United Nations, to urgently deploy peacekeeping forces to Gaza for the protection of civilians, to support the delivery of humanitarian aid.” The petition, sponsored by NDP Member of Parliament Heather McPherson, affirms that “impartial international peacekeeping forces have historically played a vital role in protecting civilians and facilitating humanitarian aid in areas of armed conflict.”
Yet when JURIST reached out to Canada’s current ambassador to the United Nations, Bob Rae, to inquire why Canada has not publicly supported the deployment of peacekeeping troops to Gaza to help end mass starvation, no response was given. The lack of response highlights a broader hesitation within the Canadian government to translate growing public concern into concrete international action—despite Canada facing a formal UN investigation for its complicity in enabling Israeli atrocities.
Editor’s note: After the publication of this piece, JURIST received the following response from UN Ambassador Bob Rae:
In order for there to be a peacekeeping operation, there has to be a ceasefire and the release of hostages held by Hamas. Those discussions are currently underway. Canada has long been calling for such a [ceasefire]. We support the full withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza and the West Bank. A peacekeeping force would require authorization by UN and whether Canada would join would depend on agreement / but security and safety must return to the region.
In a comment to JURIST, Western University law professor emeritus and former UN Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Michael Lynk, stated:
The United Nations General Assembly has affirmed, on numerous occasions, its permanent responsibility with respect to the Question of Palestine until it is satisfactorily resolved in all of its aspects.
Given that Israel is conducting an unlawful occupation—as determined by the International Court of Justice in July 2024 and accepted by the General Assembly in September 2024—and has shown no indication of ending this occupation by the September 2025 deadline, and given its repeated defiance of legally binding provisional measures issued by the Court in January, March, and May 2024, the United Nations has the legal responsibility to take all feasible steps to end both the occupation and the military assault on Gaza.
This would include sending peacekeeping forces and a peacekeeping administration to all parts of the occupied Palestinian territory (as was done in East Timor) to facilitate the transition to a genuine Palestinian state.
The legal pathway for such intervention exists through established UN mechanisms that circumvent Security Council paralysis. As Fakhri notes, “when the Security Council is in a deadlock because of a veto, the United Nations General Assembly has the authority to call for peacekeepers to accompany humanitarian convoys to enter Gaza.” Canada should immediately invoke the “Uniting for Peace” resolution and work with like-minded nations to authorize a robust peacekeeping mission through the General Assembly. The East Timor precedent that Lynk references provides a concrete example of how the UN can deploy comprehensive peacekeeping missions to facilitate transition to statehood when occupation powers refuse to comply with international law. [...]
A Canadian-led multinational peacekeeping force could fulfill three urgent roles:
- Physically breaking the blockade by securing humanitarian corridors;
- Protecting civilians from ongoing violence; and
- Creating space for sustainable political solutions
The mission would require sufficient mandate and resources to deter attacks on civilians and aid operations, potentially including naval vessels to secure sea-based aid delivery and air assets to monitor compliance with international humanitarian law. Canadian Forces could coordinate with nations like Ireland, Norway, and South Africa—countries that have shown strong support for Palestinian rights—to deploy a comprehensive mission combining military protection and humanitarian capacity.
However, Canada cannot credibly lead such a mission while simultaneously undermining Palestinian self-determination through Operation Proteus and supplying military goods that may support Israeli war crimes. Operation Proteus, whereby Canadian police train Palestinian security forces in the West Bank to suppress protest against Israel’s occupation, fundamentally contradicts Canada’s stated commitment to protect Palestinian civilians and erodes Canadian credibility before a single Canadian peacekeeper is even deployed into Gaza. [...]
The UN investigation into Canada’s complicity underscores a stark reality: continuing with the current policy of passive alignment with Israeli actions while claiming to champion human rights is an unsustainable and morally bankrupt position.
Canada’s path forward demands immediate and decisive action:
- Terminate Operation Proteus to eliminate policy contradictions
- End all direct and indirect exports of military goods to Israel to address UN concerns about complicity
- Mobilize international partners to pursue General Assembly authorization for a peacekeeping mission; and
-
Deploy Canadian peacekeepers with a clear mandate to break the blockade and secure humanitarian access. Read more - Lire plus
Israeli military plans to occupy Gaza City in major escalation of war
61% of Everyone Who’s Starved to Death in Gaza Over the Past 22 Months Died in the Past Three Weeks
NEW Parliamentary petition: Arms embargo now, Demand unrestricted aid access and End Canada's complicity in violations of international law
NEW Canada must close the US loophole and stop arming Israel
NUPGE: Canada must act to end the genocide in Gaza
Canada Labour Congress applaud recognition of Palestinian statehood and urge further action to end the crisis in Gaza
Green Party Welcomes Recognition of Palestine, Urges Canada to Match Words with Action
| | As Gazans Starve, Families in Canada Struggle to Get Loved Ones Out | |
The Tyee 05/08/2025 - A year and a half after a Gaza airstrike injured a three-year-old boy, his aunt continues to try to get him to Canada. Nariman Ajjur says her nephew is now showing “clear signs of malnutrition” as well as the psychological effects of living in a war zone.
Khalid Ajjur and his mother, Ezdehar, were injured in an October 2023 airstrike in the early days of Israel’s war in Gaza. Although Khalid and Ezdehar were pulled alive from the rubble of the building where they had sought shelter, the bombing killed Khalid’s father, Mohammed Ajjur. Video provided by Nariman Ajjur to The Tyee shows Khalid — then only about one year old — being rushed to hospital, where he was treated for a ruptured spleen. While Khalid made a full recovery from his injuries, Ezdehar still has shrapnel lodged in her head.
In January 2024, Ottawa opened a temporary residence visa program for Gazans who have family members in Canada. Khalid’s aunt applied as soon as the program opened, hoping to bring Khalid, Ezdehar and seven other family members — her parents, four siblings and a sister-in-law — to join her in Surrey.
Today, Nariman Ajjur is still waiting as starvation and war continue to worsen in Gaza. Israel is continuing its military offensive in the region, while a joint Israeli and U.S. scheme to deliver food aid has spiralled into chaos, with hundreds of Gazans shot and killed while trying to get food. [...]
From the time the Canadian visa program for Gazans was first rolled out, advocacy groups and immigration lawyers have warned it was overly onerous compared with other programs. Amnesty International Canada pointed out that Canada worked to quickly move tens of thousands of people out of Ukraine after Russia invaded in 2022. [...]
The program was capped at 5,000 people, quickly reached that limit and has been closed since March. (The Ajjur family was included in those 5,000 initial applications.) Families say the process now seems to be at a standstill, making it impossible to get their loved ones out of Gaza as the situation on the ground worsens.
Of those 5,000 applications, 864 people have arrived in Canada from Gaza under the family reunification program, according to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, or IRCC. A total of 1,750 have passed security screenings and been approved to come to Canada. IRCC says it is still working through the remaining applications and can’t provide a time frame for when they will all be assessed.
Family reunification refugees must make their way out of Gaza to a third country before they can be processed to come to Canada, IRCC says. But it has become increasingly difficult for people to escape Gaza as the conflict has continued. [...]
The IRCC says Canada is on the forefront of “accepting displaced civilians from Gaza.” But Amnesty International says other countries have done a better job of evacuating people from Gaza and temporarily resettling them. Canada’s foreign affairs minister, Anita Anand, recently announced that Canada had evacuated 11 Canadian children and their mothers from Gaza.
But Ajjur said evacuating fewer than a dozen people, two years into the conflict, shows that Canada has failed to get even Canadian citizens out of the war-torn region. “We really appreciate that these lives were saved, but this doesn’t even meet the bare minimum,” Ajjur said. Global Affairs Canada did not respond to a request for comment from The Tyee. [...]
Matsinhe said Canada has previously worked to quickly bring in asylum seekers from Afghanistan and Ukraine and that the rollout of the program for Gazans is another example of “the differential treatment that we are seeing when it comes to the Palestinians.” Matsinhe said Canadians can help families like Ajjur’s by writing to their member of Parliament, taking part in protests and speaking up on social media. Ajjur has also started an online petition.
“We are watching ethnic cleansing live on television,” Matsinhe said. “And the powers that be that could make a difference are not acting.” Meanwhile, Ajjur watches the news, speaks to her family when she can, and feels like time is running out to get them to safety. “The forced starvation now is another issue,” she said. “I see their faces. It’s just bone and skin. I know they are not eating well, and I’m afraid to ask if they had anything to eat.” Read more - Lire plus
NEW Canada MUST Evacuate Mamdouh from Gaza Immediately to Join his Ontario Family
NEW August 20th Ottawa Vigil: Open Emergency Evacuation Corridor! Canada Must Bring Families of Palestinian Canadians from Gaza
EXCLUSIVE: 100+ Doctors Who Worked in Gaza Demand Global Action as 'Colleagues Are Starved and Shot by Israel'
UN experts call for immediate dismantling of Gaza Humanitarian Foundation
UN agencies and NGOs warn that without immediate action most international NGO partners could be de-registered by Israel in coming weeks
Victory for U.S. Charity that Aids Palestinian Refugees: Court Dismisses Lawsuit Aimed at Defunding UNRWA
| | The Canadian Company Staffing ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ | |
The Tyee 08/08/2025 - A Canadian company is providing the muscle for a new Florida detention centre dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz” — and the Canadian government isn’t ruling out working with the security giant in the future.
This wishy-washy stance when it comes to jaw-dropping cruelty tied to the United States is yet another stroke in an increasingly clear portrait: one of Prime Minister Mark Carney with his elbows firmly planted to his sides when it comes to big business.
Quebec-based GardaWorld, which has reportedly been awarded a US$8-million contract for work on the U.S. detention site, has also been awarded more than $100 million in Canadian government contracts since Carney won the Liberal leadership in March of this year.
Most of these contracts were for work relating to the Canada Border Services Agency, or CBSA, valued together at more than $75 million.
The disclosures I found were listed under variations of the name “Garda,” including “Garda Canada Security Corporation” and “Garda Security Group GP.” A search of all federally registered corporations in Canada shows the only corporations with “Garda” in their name that have been active during Carney’s tenure are registered at the addresses associated with the same GardaWorld corporation involved with Alligator Alcatraz.
With the start of operations at the Florida detention centre, experts have argued the United States has crossed a dangerous line when it comes to constitutional rights violations. Lawyers who have sought an injunction against Alligator Alcatraz have said detainees are being held without charges and some have been pressured “to sign deportation orders without the ability to speak to counsel.”
In an opinion piece for MSNBC, Andrea Pitzer, the author of a history of concentration camps in four countries, defined this type of imprisonment as “mass civilian detention without real trials targeting vulnerable groups for political gain based on ethnicity, race, religion or political affiliation rather than for crimes committed.”
Pitzer argued that Alligator Alcatraz fits this definition. And, she said, concentration camps are a “modern” invention: “The patenting and mass production of barbed wire and automatic weapons over a century ago made it possible to detain large groups with a small guard force for the first time.”
The facility is supposed to turbocharge U.S. President Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda, a cruel and aggressive effort that has seen legal U.S. residents rounded up, activists targeted and detained for extended periods of time, and deportations without due process.
Reports have already started to emerge detailing horrific conditions at the so-called Alligator Alcatraz.
Lawmakers who were given access to the hastily constructed facility described detainees shouting for help as they endured suffocating heat, insect infestations and a lack of adequate food.
News of the Montreal-based company’s involvement in Trump’s one-stop shop for mass deportation first emerged in reporting from the Miami Herald and the Logic earlier this month. Days later, the Montreal Gazette reported GardaWorld was “hiring armed guards for a facility in the same Florida community” as the deportation facility. Outrage soon followed. On social media, Canadians tagged Mark Carney in angry posts.
This isn’t the first time GardaWorld has been involved in controversy over conditions at an immigration detention facility it was hired to staff. Immigration detainees went on several hunger strikes at a Montreal-area facility in the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. Detainees were protesting “what they [felt were] life-threatening conditions,” Human Rights Watch reported at the time. The watchdog organization cited detainees who said it was “impossible to stay safe from the virus in the detention facility.” Read more - Lire plus
NEW Tell the Canadian Government: Stop Funding Companies Supporting Trump’s Human Rights Abuses
Noem: ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ to serve as model for detention centers nationwide
Trump’s plan to hold migrants at military bases begins taking shape
| | Recognizing the Tamil Canadian experience in public life | |
Policy Options 08/08/2025 - Headlines in recent weeks about Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree’s past advocacy for the Tamil community have reignited questions about who truly belongs in Canadian public life. Critics have pointed to his long-standing involvement in Tamil human rights efforts as problematic. They imply dangerous affiliations, but don’t adequately provide the political and historical context of his actions.
This public discourse signals something deeper than one minister’s past. It exposes Canada’s ongoing struggle to integrate post-conflict diaspora communities into its national story — and policy landscape.
Nor is this moment about one person. It is about whether our democratic institutions are prepared to accommodate communities shaped by war, forced migration and international justice efforts — or whether we will continue to treat these communities as security threats rather than civic partners.
A post-conflict diaspora in a democratic state
Many people who have been displaced from their countries, usually due to war or violence, maintain connections to their homelands while living in another part of the world. Tamil Canadians, many of whom arrived during and after Sri Lanka’s decades-long civil war, are one of the largest post-conflict diaspora communities in Canada. From 1983 to 2009, there was intense fighting between the Sinhalese-dominated government and Tamil militants, including the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), also known as the Tamil Tigers. The fighting took at least an estimated 80,000 to 100,000 lives, and there were widespread reports of war crimes and civilian massacres, particularly during the conflict’s final months.
Many Tamil families fled not just general violence but targeted persecution, disappearances and state repression. Canada became a refuge: In 2021, it was estimated that nearly 240,000 Tamils had settled here. Over the decades, Tamil Canadians have become deeply embedded in our society — as civil servants, researchers, lawyers, entrepreneurs and elected officials. Yet despite their contributions, their experiences are too often sidelined or misunderstood in policymaking and public discourse.
The burden of political baggage
The security environment in Canada after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States cast a long shadow over Tamil advocacy and civic engagement. In 2006, Canada officially listed the LTTE as a terrorist group — a designation that many Tamils felt overlooked the complexity of the conflict and its state-sponsored atrocities. The LTTE was indeed responsible for violent tactics and authoritarian practices, but for many Tamils living under siege it represented a form of protection in the absence of international intervention.
Despite this nuance, Tamil community events, advocacy efforts and even cultural celebrations in Canada were often surveilled, policed and portrayed as suspicious. The result was a chilling effect on Tamil public participation and led to a generational burden of constantly having to prove that expressions of their identity were not dangerous.
Recent calls for Anandasangaree’s resignation, based on his past Tamil advocacy, have revived this atmosphere of scrutiny. But they also highlight a policy failure: Canada has not invested in ways that allow post-conflict communities to engage politically without fear of being branded extremist. Canada lacks clear public policy to distinguish between legitimate diaspora advocacy — such as calls for accountability or justice — and actual support for banned or violent organizations.
Policy failure #1: No history or specific policy
Canada does not currently have an explicit “diaspora policy” nor does it mandate the kind of historical literacy that should inform national security assessments, integration efforts and reconciliation strategies — particularly in relation to Tamil Canadians and other diasporas shaped by conflict. This vacuum leaves these communities vulnerable to being stereotyped and to one-size-fits-all treatment under anti-terrorism laws.
A robust policy response should include:
-
Context-sensitive involvement: Government agencies, including Public Safety Canada and Global Affairs Canada, must develop more sophisticated approaches to engaging with communities from conflict-affected regions. This includes educating staff on the history, diversity and trauma that are part of these communities.
- A stand-alone office: Canada should establish a permanent federal office for diaspora affairs. It could serve as a bridge between communities and government, offer advice on culturally appropriate policymaking and support responsible civic engagement by diaspora groups — without defaulting to surveillance or criminal suspicion when these groups advocate for justice abroad.
- Access to information: Many Tamil Canadians suspect they were surveilled during the height of the war. Canada should review and declassify outdated intelligence assessments that may have shaped discriminatory policies. This would be similar to how national security files have been disclosed in other jurisdictions to promote trust and accountability.
Policy failure #2: Invisibility
Despite being one of the largest racialized communities, Tamil Canadians are rarely separated out in national statistics. Without data, there can be no tailored policy. Health outcomes, employment access and experiences of discrimination in the Tamil community remain under-researched, which makes it harder to address specific needs.
Additionally, there are no formal federal or provincial initiatives acknowledging Tamil history in Canada. Ottawa, Ontario and British Columbia have declared January Tamil Heritage Month, but this symbolic recognition has not translated into concrete support for Tamil civic life, education or mental-health services.
Key reforms could include:
- Distinct Data: Federal and provincial governments should commit to collecting data specific to Tamil Canadians — especially in health, employment and justice sectors. Health statistics could highlight the prevalence of untreated post-traumatic stress disorder among war-affected individuals and lead to targeted mental-health services. Employment information could reveal systemic barriers in credential recognition or workplace inclusion, while justice data could inform culturally responsive legal aid or diversion programs.
- Education reform: School curriculums should include content on the Sri Lankan conflict and refugee experiences. Younger Tamil Canadian generations and their peers from other backgrounds could then better understand the history that shaped Tamil communities in our country.
- Mental-health investment: Targeted funding for trauma-informed services in Tamil-majority neighbourhoods is essential. Post-conflict communities often carry intergenerational trauma, and culturally competent services remain scarce.
Public representation and democratic inclusion
That Anandasangaree — a human rights lawyer and former UN delegate — is now Canada’s public safety minister is symbolically powerful. But the backlash to his appointment in May reveals a double standard often applied to racialized politicians. While mainstream leaders are allowed complex affiliations and evolving views, racialized leaders must constantly distance themselves from their roots — lest their identity be read as bias.
This isn’t an isolated phenomenon. Muslim Canadians, for example, face similar scrutiny. Mass surveillance of their communities in the aftermath of 9/11 has fuelled Islamophobia and racialized narratives that Muslim leaders and activists must continually fight to overcome.
Canada must move beyond this double standard. We need to recognize that post-conflict communities have a right to civic and political participation — not despite their histories, but because of them.
Toward a more inclusive future
The attacks on Anandasangaree may fade from headlines, but they reveal a lingering discomfort with diasporic communities shaped by complex conflicts. Canada’s public policy must catch up with the country’s demographic realities. Inclusion must be more than symbolic.
The federal government has rightly prioritized equity and anti-racism in recent years. But unless these priorities extend to how we interact with post-conflict communities — in security, education and public service — they will remain incomplete.
We must ensure that younger Tamil Canadians do not inherit the suspicion that shadowed their parents. That means building public institutions capable of viewing communities not as security risks, but as survivors, contributors and storytellers. Source
| | Trump’s Trial Run for a Police State | |
The Intercept 11/08/2025 - The Justice Department announced in January that violent crime in D.C. hit a 30-year low in 2024. So far this year, it’s down 26 percent from that. This, in other words, is a curious time for the president to declare that the nation’s capital is a violent cesspool that demands the sort of crime-fighting expertise that only a 79-year-old man who fetishizes dictators and whose entire worldview is perpetually stuck in the 1980s can provide.
The motivation for Donald Trump’s plan to “federalize” Washington, D.C., is same as his motivation for sending active-duty troops into Los Angeles, deporting people to the CECOT torture prison in El Salvador, his politicization of the Department of Justice, and nearly every other authoritarian overreach of the last six months. He is testing the limits of his power — and, by extension, of our democracy. He’s feeling out what the Supreme Court, Congress, and the public will let him get away with. And so far, he’s been able to do what he pleases.
The incident that apparently precipitated Trump’s D.C. crackdown was entirely pretextual. It wasn’t the overall amount of violent crime, it was that the wrong person had fallen victim to it. Both Trump and Elon Musk declared D.C. to be a crime-infested wasteland after photos emerged of Edward “Big Balls” Coristine, formerly of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, beaten and bloodied from an alleged carjacking. The attackers ran off when a Metro police officer arrived on the scene — which is far more protection than crime victims usually get from law enforcement.
In response, Trump raged on social media over the weekend. He immediately sent hundreds of agents from the FBI, Department of Homeland Security Investigations, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement into the city (who then responded to a fender bender as if someone had detonated a dirty bomb.)
Trump is now deploying hundreds of National Guard troops to the city too. While state National Guards report to governors, the D.C. National Guard reports to the president. The federal government also has jurisdiction over Washington. Oversight power is supposed to lie with Congress, not the president. But this Congress has essentially dissolved itself into Trump’s agenda.
These legal distinctions mean that Trump’s “federalization” of D.C. isn’t quite as extraordinary a power grab as his deployment of Marines and National Guard troops to Los Angeles in June. But as he made clear at an unhinged press conference on Monday, Trump himself is either unaware of that distinction or doesn’t acknowledge it. He vowed to send troops into Oakland, Baltimore, and New York as well.
But as with Washington and Los Angeles, violent crime in Oakland and Baltimore has fallen dramatically this year. New York, meanwhile, remains one of the safest big cities in the country, despite what the trembling cowards on Fox News may tell you. If there were truly a violent crime surge in D.C., Trump wouldn’t have cut security funding to the city by 44 percent. (I’m dubious of the link between such funding and crime rates, but the important thing here is that Trump thinks they’re linked.)
There was no emergency in Los Angeles, either. With the aid of the right-wing media bubble, the administration exploited a couple incidents of property destruction with a surge in peaceful protests against the administration’s immigration raids to depict the city as a dystopian hellscape.
The important thing Trump learned from Los Angeles is that the federal courts failed to intervene. While the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit ruled that a president’s decision to federalize the National Guard over the objections of a state governor is reviewable by federal courts, the court also took at face value Trump’s claim that the protests presented a threat to immigration enforcement.
There’s little evidence that this was true. But more importantly, that was never the real reason Trump cracked down on the city. As Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, Trump himself, and internal documents made clear, the real reason was to intimidate protesters, terrify immigrant communities and their advocates, and “liberate” blue cities and states from the “socialists” elected to office. It was a projection of power.
Trump has long disparaged cities with large Black populations and Black leadership. New York, D.C., Baltimore, Oakland, and Los Angeles are all cities with large Black populations who are run by Black Democrats. The front-runner to be the new mayor of New York is a Muslim Democratic socialist. Trump isn’t planning to “protect” the residents of these cities from crime. He’s planning to impose his will on them.
The crackdown in D.C. comes 10 days after the New Republic reported on a Pentagon memo authored by Phil Hegseth, the Defense Secretary’s brother, laying out the administration’s plans to deploy active-duty troops around the country to aid in immigration enforcement “for years to come.”
That memo would end once and for all this country’s centuries-old tradition of keeping the military out of routine domestic law enforcement, it would eradicate one of the cornerstone principles that drove the American Revolution, and it could well end with U.S. soldiers firing their guns at U.S. citizens. [...]
The memo reported by the New Republic seeks to replicate what Trump did in Los Angeles in other cities. It conflates peaceful, constitutionally protected protest with international crime syndicates and Al Qaeda or ISIS. And it puts heavy pressure on the Pentagon to scrap Founding-era principles about the role of a standing army in favor of a military increasingly directed inward, against U.S. residents and citizens, to do the president’s bidding. [...]
We should also be thinking about how this could ease a slide into authoritarianism should we face an actual crisis. National security experts worry that Trump’s dismantling of the CIA and FBI and politicization of the NSA could leave the country vulnerable to a September 11-style attack. Whatever you make of that fear, such an attack wouldn’t be a vulnerability for this administration so much as an opportunity. Nothing conditions the public to accept restrictions on civil liberties and vast expansions of government power like fear. It seems safe to say that this administration will exploit any genuine crisis as shamelessly as they’ve exploited the crises they’ve manufactured.
For 15 years now, I’ve given a speech about police militarization based on my first book. I’ve always ended the speech with a reality check on the term “police state.” I’ve tried to emphasize that despite the unsettling trends I just spoke about, we do not live in a police state. Instead, it’s important to speak out about these problems as they happen, because by the time you’re actually in a police state, speaking out is no longer an option.
We are now past the point of crisis. Trump has long dreamed of presiding over a police state. He has openly admired and been reluctant to criticize foreign leaders who helm one. He has now appointed people who have expressed their willingness to help him achieve one to the very positions with the power to make one happen. And both he and his highest-ranking advisers have both openly spoken about and written out their plans to implement one. It’s time to believe them. Read more - Lire plus
Data vs. dog whistles: Debunking Trump’s manufactured DC emergency
All 800 National Guard troops officially deployed in DC amid Trump's federal takeover
“They Will Be Held Accountable”: California AG Takes Trump to Court for Deploying National Guard
Trump could expand role of national guard for ‘quick reaction’ to unrest
| | Trump’s New Secret Directive OKs Military Action in Latin America Under Guise of Drug War | |
DemocracyNow! 12/08/2025 - President Trump secretly signed a directive approving the Pentagon’s use of military force on foreign soil to target Latin American drug cartels, according to a New York Times report.
The order gives the Pentagon authority to direct military operations at sea and on foreign soil against cartels designated by the Trump administration to be terrorist organizations.
“I think it’s directed mostly in Venezuela,” says Alexander Aviña, associate professor of Latin American history at Arizona State University. The U.S. “has used the war on drugs as another way to advance the U.S. imperial geopolitical designs in the Western Hemisphere.” Read more - Lire plus
Congress has a chequered history of overseeing US intelligence and national security
| | Torture at CECOT: Venezuelan Men Freed from Salvadoran Mega-Prison Describe Brutal Beatings, Humiliation | |
DemocracyNow! 04/08/2025 - A new investigation reveals the months of physical and mental abuse Venezuelan men deported by the Trump administration endured inside a Salvadoran prison.
The men describe beatings, medical neglect and unhygienic conditions in CECOT, where a prison director reportedly told them, “Welcome to Hell, where you enter alive and leave dead.”
Of the 238 Venezuelan men who were held in El Salvador, at least 197 had not been convicted of any crime. “The administration itself knew, even when they were portraying them as the violent criminals that deserved to be sent to a prison in a country that was not their own, potentially indefinitely — they actually knew that the vast majority did not have convictions in the U.S.,” says Perla Trevizo, a reporter with the ProPublica-Texas Tribune investigative unit that worked on the investigation with a team of Venezuelan journalists. Read more - Lire plus
Trump Orders State Department to Overlook International Human Rights Abuses
| | Trump’s Entry Bans Aren’t About National Security | |
Brennan Center for Justice 14/08/2025 - President Donald Trump’s proclamation blocking nationals of 19 countries from entering the United States is cloaked in the language of national security but is not tailored to further that goal. Instead, it seems calculated to bar populations the president has stigmatized or vocally vowed to exclude, including Muslims, Haitians, Venezuelans, and Africans.
The June 2025 ban applies to nearly all temporary visas, blocking tourists, business travelers, students, and scholars as well as many applicants for permanent residence, including relatives of U.S. citizens. The administration is reportedly considering banning nationals from an additional 36 countries, which would further impede legal immigration pathways.
Immigrants are often criticized for failing to “wait their turn” or “come the right way.” The people harmed by these bans — immigrants and their U.S. sponsors — are doing exactly that: gathering documents, undergoing background checks, and waiting, often for many years. But now, even if they have followed all the rules, they will still find the door slammed shut.
The government’s claim that the ban strengthens U.S. national security is belied by its own data. Although national security rhetoric may have intuitive appeal, none of the government’s three rationales — high overstay rates, insufficient screening and vetting systems, and refusal to accept deportees — hold up under scrutiny. By cherry-picking metrics to justify the ban, the administration seeks to vindicate an ugly policy of demographic exclusion that targets Muslims, Haitians, Venezuelans, and Africans.
First, the government has rigged its visa overstay metric so that nationals of countries with high numbers of overstays are not affected, whereas nationals of countries with very low numbers of overstays are banned. Second, the proclamation rests on the false premise that the United States relies on the security systems of the banned countries to disqualify certain travelers, but with its detailed screening criteria, a vast vetting apparatus, and high denial rates, the United States’ own security mechanisms are more than sufficient to identify and exclude individuals who could pose a threat. Third, the government’s data reveals that individuals from the banned countries are deported regularly from the United States, undermining the rationale that those countries won’t accept their citizens back.
As Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in her dissent in 2018 when the Supreme Court upheld the final iteration of the first Trump administration’s Muslim ban, the government once again has “failed in [its] attempts to launder the Proclamation of its discriminatory taint.”
The New Entry Ban’s Scope and Impact
The June 2025 proclamation banning nationals of 19 countries from entering the United States is much broader than the September 2017 ban upheld by the Supreme Court, which only targeted nationals from 8 countries. The proclamation can be understood as comprising three distinct entry bans based on the visa applicants it targets: students, tourists, and business travelers; applicants for permanent residence; and workers and fiancés of U.S. citizens. The affected countries are Afghanistan, Burma, Burundi, Chad, Cuba, Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Laos, Libya, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sudan, Togo, Turkmenistan, Venezuela, and Yemen.
First, individuals from all 19 countries are banned from entering the United States as students, tourists, or business travelers. This prohibition is already sending international students and US universities scrambling and depriving hospitals of critical medical staff. It also imposes significant human costs, likely preventing family members from visiting sick or dying relatives, as happened to a Yemeni mother unable to see her terminally ill two-year-old, a U.S. citizen, in 2018.
Second, the proclamation also bans certain types of green card applicants from all 19 countries, including siblings and adult children of U.S. citizens; spouses and children of lawful permanent residents; abused, neglected, and abandoned children; and clergy and other religious workers.
The government approved nearly 34,000 immigrant visas in these categories from the targeted countries in fiscal year 2023. Because Congress limits the number of these visas granted annually, many now-banned individuals have already been waiting for several years to begin employment or reunite with family members in the United States.
In an apparent move to satisfy the favorable view of exemptions in the Supreme Court’s prior Muslim ban opinion, the spouses, parents, and minor children of U.S. citizens are exempted from the ban, although the proclamation demands “clear and convincing evidence of identity and family relationship (e.g., DNA).” Special immigrant visas, designated for Afghans who had served the U.S. government, are also nominally exempt, but the administration is shutting down their access to protection.
If the government proceeds with banning nationals from an additional 36 countries, it will reduce the number of the specified green card applicants from sub-Saharan Africa by more than 83 percent, an extraordinary barrier to immigration from the region. Read more - Lire plus
| | Guantánamo and Beyond: A Conversation with Human Rights Lawyer Alka Pradhan | |
JURIST 12/08/2025 - The US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has played a central role in post-9/11 detention, rendition, and interrogation programs. From a legal perspective, what mechanisms currently exist—or could be developed—to hold intelligence agencies accountable, both within the US system and under international law?
The primary mechanism to shield the CIA from accountability has been the sweeping use of the State Secrets Privilege (State Secrets) by each administration to throw out any cases brought by CIA victims. It is simply not credible that all of the details around the torture program are State Secrets two decades later, and certainly not when so much information has been released. The government could simply stop invoking the privilege and allow the lawsuits to go forward. If the US government believes that the torture program is defensible, then they should attempt to defend it in court, in public.
Under international law, one of the reasons that the International Criminal Court (ICC) has been so maligned by the US in recent years is because of their investigations that included CIA and military crimes abroad. Instead of agreeing to properly investigate ourselves, the US instead sanctioned the ICC. This sort of forceful rejection of international accountability undermines the entire international system.
Many Americans believe Guantánamo is closed or irrelevant. What do you wish the public better understood about its ongoing legal and moral implications?
I wish that more Americans understood how Guantánamo, the injustices perpetrated there, and our apathy towards it, was an early indicator of our vulnerability to fascism. Each president since 9/11 has expanded executive power so that it’s barely recognizable under the Constitution anymore, and that can be traced directly to Guantánamo and the crimes still occurring there. So the fact that people think Guantánamo is “history” or was somehow necessary, shows how much more education we need on these topics.
How do you navigate tensions between national security narratives, human rights, and the rule of law, especially when your clients are portrayed as “the worst of the worst”?
Security is very different from national security theater, and so much of what the US government does is theater, rather than security. The phrase “worst of the worst” was devastating because few Americans have ever bothered to read beyond it and question who is actually at Guantánamo and why they are being held. Guantánamo was not invented for the “worst of the worst”—rather, the phrase was invented as post-hoc justification for Guantánamo. And I guarantee that if the men held there were white western Europeans, Guantánamo would not exist. Much national security theater is rooted in racism.
So I try to cut through the propaganda and educate people on the real people at Guantánamo, most of whom were never charged (and could never have been), and how the few that are charged were tortured so badly that fair trials are no longer possible. No matter what the political stripes, most people can agree that the lack of justice for 9/11—because of our own actions—is a travesty.
Your legal strategy often challenges evidence obtained through torture. How are these arguments received differently in US military commissions versus international legal forums?
I believe it would surprise people to know that torture-acquired evidence is still very much used and promoted by prosecutors around the world, and that courts accept it or look for ways to include it in order to secure convictions. That is true of the American prosecutors at the Guantánamo military commissions, and it is unfortunately sometimes true of prosecutors at the international courts and tribunals. As a believer in international criminal law, I was shocked that the military judge at Guantánamo ruled to suppress my client’s torture-acquired statements on the basis of overwhelming evidence of torture, but international judges refused to do so in a different, but equally compelling case.
The answer is to strengthen education around the impact of torture on every aspect of the investigative and judicial process. Courts cannot be credible if their decisions are built on torture. This is why I assisted with the drafting of the Mendez Principles and promote their use by attorneys, investigators, and judges around the world.
Beyond Guantánamo cases, you’ve litigated before international courts representing victims of drone strikes and other alleged abuses. Could you share a case that stands out and what it revealed about accountability in global counterterrorism operations?
I often think about my clients from Pakistan, the children from Waziristan whose grandmother was murdered by a US drone. They traveled here to DC, to try and get an apology or recognition that their grandmother was wrongfully killed. We organized an event for them in Congress; two lawmakers showed up. We asked the Obama White House for an apology, none ever came. My client’s trip was a test of our humanity—whether we recognize that affording people dignity contributes more to our security than random murder and hiding from consequences. And we failed that test. We proved that “global counterterrorism operations” are often premised on our refusal to admit mistakes, which makes us all less safe.
You’ve worked with organizations like ECCHR to hold Western governments accountable for their alleged complicity in torture and surveillance. What legal or political breakthroughs have you seen, and what barriers remain?
I’ve seen very few political breakthroughs on torture and surveillance. In fact, with the current trends of citizenship-stripping and Western governments’ endorsement of crimes in Palestine and other parts of the Middle East and Africa, impunity seems to be spreading. Read more - Lire plus
| | One Year On, EU AI Act Collides with New Political Reality | |
Tech Policy Press 07/08/2025 - In August of last year, the European Union’s landmark Artificial Intelligence Act entered into force, a world first in regulating the technology.
The law promised — if imperfectly and incompletely — to protect people from the most dangerous and discriminatory AI systems, while championing the “EU values” of trust, innovation, and fundamental rights.
A year later, the world in which this legislation was written is largely gone.
Since then, we have witnessed a dramatic shift in global and European politics driven by a transatlantic race for AI supremacy, a deregulatory agenda in Brussels, and a wave of militarization. These shifts aren’t background noise — they upend the assumptions that shaped the AI Act and force us to ask uncomfortable questions: Can we still talk about how “AI governance” can balance rights and innovation when those rights are no longer even part of the discussion?
The AI Act in the age of militarized tech
The AI Act was born out of a contradiction between two irreconcilable goals: regulating harmful uses of AI — especially in policing, migration, and surveillance — while aspiring to become a global AI superpower. By 2024, that contradiction could no longer hold.
After the publication of the Draghi report, which criticized Europe’s stagnating innovation and regulatory approach, the European Commission unveiled a sweeping deregulatory agenda that “simplified” the AI Act in the name of "competitiveness." By June 2025, Commissioner Henna Virkunnen confirmed that the AI Act’s few crucial safeguards could be diluted ahead of their 2026 implementation.
Meanwhile, the return of US President Donald Trump to the White House began with a pledge to invest $500 billion in private-led AI infrastructure and dramatically weaken US regulations. His administration also moved to purge so-called “woke AI” and accelerated the use of AI in surveillance, policing, and military operations.
In the EU, the same priorities are taking hold. Faced with pressure to compete globally, the EU is increasingly choosing revenue over rights. In the EU’s new Multi-Annual Financial Framework for 2028 to 2034, the Commission proposed massive increases in military and border budgets, while social programs face sweeping cuts. This means more public money for the technology, security, and military industries.
This redirection of public funds amounts to a taxpayer-sponsored blank check to the very industry that the AI Act was meant to regulate. Billions are being funnelled by the EU and member states into biometric surveillance at borders, predictive policing software, military-grade drone systems, and AI-powered crowd monitoring tools — all with minimal scrutiny and even less accountability.
The reality of AI governance
AI is not neutral. Its owners run a nearly trillion-dollar industry in which the largest government application is defense. From Gaza to the Evros border between Greece and Turkey, European funds have been leveraged by companies to support the development of AI technologies being used to control, target, and punish people. This is automated repression, and it’s booming under the EU’s watch.
What we are witnessing is not temporary tension — it's a revelation of what AI governance means in a militarized world.
Austria’s recent use of facial recognition to track climate activists and Hungary’s decision to legalize facial recognition at Pride marches are not one-off abuses. They’re previews of the future we are hurtling towards, where AI policy is dictated by military demand and private profit, not civil rights.
These abuses were ratified by European legislators. Under the AI Act’s current loopholes, law enforcement and migration control authorities benefit from vast derogations, while member states can invoke national security to bypass core protections. Predictive policing, risk-scoring in migration procedures, and biometric categorization based on proxies for race or ethnicity all remain alarmingly possible. Emotion recognition is also still allowed for use by law enforcement and migration officials. European states have continued to expand surveillance frameworks — particularly those that target migrants, racialized and marginalized communities.
Towards a tech policy for people, not the security industry
In moments like this, it becomes clear that EU policy mirrors the interests of those in power, and those interests are not ours.
We need to stop pretending that rights can be balanced against profit, or that expansive deregulation can coexist with dignity. This is not a fight for the best version of the AI Act. It’s a fight against a political agenda where surveillance, control, and extraction are sold as innovation.
That means rejecting the idea that competitiveness justifies cutting protections. It means pushing back, strengthening bans on mass surveillance, challenging the vast digital border systems Europe deploys to prevent migration, and holding governments accountable when they fund private surveillance with public money.
And it means something deeper too: we need visions of how we spend public resources that respond to the needs of everyday people, not the corporations shaping our world. Tech policy should be rooted not in military logic or market efficiency, but in care, equity, and justice.
The AI Act will only become fully applicable in August 2026. The next 12 months are pivotal. Civil society, journalists, researchers, and activists must treat this not as a moment of celebration, but as a critical window to resist the erosion of hard-won protections.
We cannot afford to sleepwalk into a future where “AI governance” is just a euphemism for automated repression. Tech legislation needs to work for people, not for profit. Source
How Trump’s AI Policy Could Compromise the Technology
ICE Is Buying Mobile Iris Scanning Tech for Its Deportation Arm
A CBP Agent Wore Meta Smart Glasses to an Immigration Raid in Los Angeles
LAPD Eyes ‘GeoSpy’, an AI Tool That Can Geolocate Photos in Seconds
| | Response to the National Security Strategy 2025 and its Expansion of Powers | |
Cage International 15/08/2025 - The UK government has committed to adopting the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism and State Threat Legislation, Jonathan Hall’s recommendations to create new state threat powers. These have been outlined in the National Security Strategy 2025: Security for the British People in a Dangerous World (June 2025), raising significant civil liberties concerns.
Under the National Security Act 2023, a state threat refers to activities carried out by or on behalf of foreign states, such as espionage, cyberattacks, or political inference that aim to harm the UK’s national security or democratic institutions. The expansion of powers under the National Security Strategy 2025 can apply to individuals both in the UK and abroad, depending on the nature of the suspected activity.
This Strategy will inevitably lead to the suppression of dissent evident under current counterterrorism legislation, creating a parallel regime that will further compromise individual freedoms within the domestic sphere while providing justification for international actions framed as responses to state threats.
Under current counterterrorism legislation, Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures include relocation powers permitting authorities to move individuals suspected of terrorism away from their homes, often to unfamiliar areas far from their families, communities, and support systems. Intended to disrupt potential threats by severing local ties, these powers lack the due process of law and leave a deep psychological impact on individuals’ mental health. The proposed expansion in the Strategy mirrors these powers to include individuals suspected of state threat activity in the UK (see below).
The Strategy grants police significant powers with serious implications for individual rights, including the ability to make direct applications to the High Court for Serious Crime Prevention Orders in State Threat cases. These measures mean that the usual safeguards afforded to defendants in criminal prosecutions, such as but not limited to the right to a fair trial and the presumption of innocence, are largely absent, and the evidential threshold for such interventions is very low.
The foundations of the Strategy are alarmist, as the strategic environment is framed as a ‘dangerous world’. This supports a narrative of external threats that justify expansive internal security measures, including forced relocation from one’s home and passport seizure, even without charge or criminal conviction. These measures are likely to lead to the surveillance and monitoring of ethnic or religious communities, especially Muslims. This can be discerned from the Strategy’s emphasis on Iran, citing ‘Iranian hostile activity on British soil’ and echoed in media coverage such as The Guardian’s article titled ‘Britain must prepare for the possibility of attack on UK soil,’ both of which contribute to framing Iran as a key threat. There can be little doubt that such language risks stigmatising Iranians living in the UK and reinforcing anti-Middle Eastern sentiments.
“We are committed to taking forward the recommendations of the Independent Reviewer of State Threat Legislation, and will draw up new powers - modelled on counter-terrorism - to tackle state threats. Counter Terrorism Policing will continue to investigate terrorist and state threat offences. We have also renewed the mandate of the Defending Democracy Taskforce, which will strengthen safeguards against individuals and companies acting as proxies for foreign donations.” National Security Strategy, 2025. [...]
In conclusion, the proposed extensions of powers to cover state threat activities significantly erode the normal protections afforded to individuals in criminal investigations. Like other counterterrorism laws generally, there appears to be little regard for the many existing laws that could already be used to address such crimes. As a result, the proposals represent an attack on basic civil liberties whenever the UK security apparatus deems certain activity to amount to a threat to the state. Based on the experience of counterterrorism laws to date, there is a high risk that minority communities will be disproportionately targeted, reinforcing an already existing two-tier criminal justice system. Read more - Lire plus
| |
Amnesty International UK: Arrests of Palestine Action protesters 'deeply concerning'
| |
AI UK 09/08/2025 - In response to the mass arrests of Palestine Action protesters in Parliament Square today, Sacha Deshmukh, Chief Executive of Amnesty International UK, said:
“Today’s mass arrests of peaceful protesters under UK terrorism law are deeply concerning.
“Peaceful protest is a fundamental right. People are understandably outraged by the ongoing genocide being committed in Gaza and are entitled under international human rights law to express their horror.
“The protesters in Parliament Square were not inciting violence and it is entirely disproportionate to the point of absurdity to be treating them as terrorists.
“We have long criticised UK terrorism law for being excessively broad and vaguely worded and a threat to freedom of expression. These arrests demonstrate that our concerns were justified.
“Instead of criminalising peaceful demonstrators, the Government should be focusing on taking immediate and unequivocal action to put a stop to Israel’s genocide and ending any risk of UK complicity in it.”
Call for restraint
Amnesty wrote to Sir Mark Rowley, Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, ahead of the planned protest, warning against the arrest of peaceful demonstrators expected to gather in their hundreds.
The letter highlights that arresting individuals solely for displaying messages such as “I Oppose Genocide. I Support Palestine Action” would breach the UK’s international obligations to uphold the rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly. Amnesty stressed that any further arrests on these grounds would violate international human rights law. Under international law, protest speech can only be criminalised if it incites violence, hatred or discrimination. In the case of today’s protest, holding a placard and peacefully stating support for Palestine Action cannot be treated as an example of incitement. Source
More than 500 arrested in London for opposing ban on nonviolent group Palestine Action
What will happen to people arrested at Palestine Action demonstration? Anyone convicted under section 12 of the Terrorism Act could get up to 14 years in jail
A duty to intervene’: the former UK government lawyer at centre of pro-Palestine protests
“Let Gaza Live”: 50 Jewish Peace Activists Arrested Protesting Sens. Schumer, Gillibrand for Vote to Keep Arming Israel
Que fait le gouvernement français face au génocide à Gaza?
| | Belarus: Anti-extremism laws put digital rights at risk | |
Article 19 07/08/2025 - Belarusian authorities seem to be leading the authoritarians and authoritarian wannabes by example – branding almost any dissent as ‘extremism’ or ‘terrorism’ has become the go‑to tool of repression. The prosecution for ‘extremism’ often takes absurd forms – songs, memes, and anime are routinely deemed as manifestations of extremism.
However, the consequences are far from humorous – Belarusian courts have repeatedly issued harsh sentences for making online donations, leaving online comments, or administering online platforms. Since the 2020-2021 protests, the Belarusian de facto authorities reported at least 22,500 criminal cases opened on ‘anti-extremism’ grounds. Together with our partner Human Constanta, we present a joint analysis examining this worrying trend, which further deepens the pervasive crackdown on civil society.
The ‘ecosystem’ of ‘anti-extremism’ repression rests on specialised laws on combating ‘extremism’ and ‘terrorism’, corresponding criminal and administrative offences, numerous ‘extremist’ lists, amendments enabling the citizenship revocation for ‘extremist crimes’, the imposition of the death penalty for ‘acts of terrorism’ and ‘high treason’, and introducing ‘prone to extremism’ labels in prisons. The politicised nature of this system has been repeatedly criticised, including by the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Belarus, the Group of Independent Experts on the Situation of Human Rights in Belarus, the OSCE Moscow Mechanism rapporteurs, as well as international and local non-governmental organisations.
In our analysis, we examine the impact of excessively broad provisions on digital rights and online behaviour in Belarus. We take a closer look at cases of political prosecution and threats arising from as little as online comments, participation in messaging groups, and online donations. Read more - Lire plus
Belarus must end ill-treatment of prisoners convicted on terrorism and extremism charges, say UN experts
| | OTHER NEWS - AUTRES NOUVELLES | | ICLMG ACTIONS DE LA CSILC | | The Liberal government has introduced a sweeping new national security and border omnibus bill, Bill C-2, the Strong Borders Act. Under the guise of addressing border security and placating the Trump administration, the government is seeking unrelated powers – some of which they have unsuccessfully attempted to obtain in the past – which will have wide-ranging negative impacts on human rights and civil liberties. Please send a quick email to your MP, the Public Safety Minister, the Justice Minister, the Immigration Minister and the Prime Minister urging them to withdraw this dangerous bill. Thank you! | |
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!
| | 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 the Public Safety Minister demanding that he take immediate action to put an end to this abuse of power and hold those CSIS officers involved accountable. Your message will also be sent to your MP and to the Minister of Justice.
| | Canada must protect Hassan Diab! | | Canada must repatriate all Canadians detained in NE Syria now! | Every day the government fails to bring these Canadians home, it places their lives at risk from disease, malnutrition, violence, and ongoing military conflicts. 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 and arbitrarily detained in northeast Syria without delay. | | 22 years of fighting deportation to torture: Justice for Mohamed Harkat Now! | | Reform Canada's extradition law now! | |
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 the Prime Minister, the Minister of Justice and your MP to reform the extradition system before it makes more victims. Thank you!
Version française: Le Canada doit réformer la loi sur l'extradition!
| | Canada must protect encryption! | |
Canada, with other G7 nations, continues to push to weaken our access to strong, reliable encryption, after decades of being supportive of strong encryption. We need encryption to safeguard our data, our online transactions, our communications, and to protect the lives of journalists and human rights activists.
Please send a message to the Prime Minister of Canada, the Minister of Public Safety, as well as your Member of Parliament, to urge them to reverse course and once again commit to protecting encryption.
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 the Prime Minister and the Public Safety Minister calling for a ban now. | | What we’ve been up to from January to May 2025 and our plan for the rest of the year | |
ICLMG 30/05/2025 - Thanks to the support of our members and donors, here is what we were able to work on so far in 2025 :
- Open letter to the new Prime Minister and government
- 2025 federal election and National Security Info Card
- C-20: First independent watchdog for the CBSA
- C-27: Digital Charter Implementation Act, 2022
- Online Harms
- Foreign Interference
- Combatting Racism & Islamophobia
- Canada’s terrorist entities list
- Palestine and the right to dissent
- Impacts of Counter terrorism financing
- Hassan Diab & Extradition
- Civil Society Coalition on Human Rights and Counter-terrorism
- And more!
What we have planned for the rest of 2025!
We have our work cut out for us! In response to threats of tariffs and annexation from the Trump administration, the Canadian government has problematically committed to the rapid expansion of border security, surveillance and information sharing with the US, and expanded the use of rights violating anti-terrorism tools. We also cannot ignore the US crackdown on protesters and migrants under the guise of fighting terrorism and protecting national security. We need to ensure that Canada disentangles itself from the US national security regime, resists US pressure to expand surveillance and counter-terror powers and tools at the expense of our civil liberties, and increases protections for privacy, dissent, migrants and asylum seekers.
We will continue our work on these issues and much more:
- 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
- Advocating for restrictions on Canadian information sharing with the US, including the application of the US No Fly List in Canada
- Campaigning for the repeal of secretive and rights violating national security lists, such as the Terrorist Entities List and the Canadian No Fly List
- Halting the rapid expansion of new security measures at the border and continuing to push back against 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 agency
- Advocating with lawmakers and officials to protect civil liberties from the overall negative impact of national security
- Countering the escalating repression of free expression, dissent and protest in the name of “countering terrorism,” including the crackdown on protests in support of Palestinian human rights and against the genocide in Gaza. This includes countering new “bubble zone” laws at the municipal and federal levels
- Fighting for Justice for Mohamed Harkat, an end to security certificates, and addressing problems in security inadmissibility
- Fighting for Justice for Hassan Diab and reforming Canada's extradition law
- Addressing the impacts of measures to counter terrorism financing on civil society groups, including the CRA’s targeting of Muslim-led charities and restrictions and criminalization of the provision of international assistance and humanitarian aid
- Calling for the return of Canadian citizens and the non-Canadian mothers of Canadian children, who remain indefinitely detained in Syrian camps
- Pushing for restrictions on the implementation of new foreign interference laws
- Keeping you and our member organizations informed via the News Digest
- And much more! Read more - Lire plus
Share on Facebook + Instagram + Bluesky + Twitter
| | 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!
| | | | |
