44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 6, 2024 11:00AM
- May/6/24 11:21:51 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, we are here today because of the real and serious issue of foreign interference happening here in Canada. After nine years of the Liberal-NDP Prime Minister, the Canadian dream of being able to live in this country with freedom of expression, freedom of religion and freedom of thought is broken. Diaspora communities across this country are feeling less safe than ever because of fear of extortion, intimidation and, in fact, assassination.
We are glad there have finally been arrests that will bring some justice for Hardeep Singh Nijjar’s family and the community. Those responsible should face the full consequences of their crimes; no foreign agent should be able to kill a Canadian, let alone on Canadian soil. We call on the Indian government to co-operate with authorities as they investigate this murder, because the truth must come out.
Canada’s law enforcement and intelligence agencies must relentlessly pursue any other person or entity that was involved in this murder so they can be held accountable and brought to justice. We wish the government was able to foil this plot and stop this murder from happening in the first place, as was the case in the United States. In the U.S., authorities laid allegations; within one week, arrests were made of those who were going to commit that crime.
The Liberal member who brought this motion forward mentioned Iran in the motion, even though his government refuses to list the IRGC Quds Force as a terrorist organization. The Prime Minister allows 700 agents from Iran’s terrorist regime to operate freely in Canada and terrorize Canadians. Now the regime operatives are recruiting Canadians to terrorize our allies. This terrorist organization shot down flight PS752. The families and communities of those on that flight are still living a nightmare without justice for their loved ones.
It was voted on in the House to ban the IRGC in June 2018. Members should make no mistake: A common-sense Conservative government, under the leadership of the member for Carleton, will list IRGC as a terrorist organization and ban it so it can no longer use our country as its safe haven to recruit, fundraise and hide from any accountability.
The Communist regime in Beijing is another threat that the government ignores. It is the same Prime Minister and his entire cabinet who showed their cowardice by abstaining on a vote to recognize that there is a genocide being committed by the Communist regime against the Uyghur Muslims. The foreign interference inquiry commissioner confirmed that agents from Beijing interfered in the 2019 and 2021 Canadian elections. The election of our former colleague Kenny Chiu was impacted by foreign interference, as we found out from the recent findings by the commissioner. My colleagues have had real threats to their safety and their families' safety because of foreign interference and the lack of any courage to stand up to it by the Liberal-NDP government.
That same regime also intimidates and threatens Canadians who exercise their right to freedom of speech and to vote. Instead of standing up for Canadians, the government was dragged, kicking and screaming, to call a public inquiry into foreign interference in the first place. Police stations run by the Communist regime in Beijing are intimidating others here who are pro-democracy. This only demonstrates that the Liberal-NDP government must take further action to protect our country, including by immediately implementing a foreign influence registry. This is something that, for a long time, the Conservatives have been calling for. We believe paid agents of foreign governments should have to be registered. If a Canadian food bank must register to lobby a Liberal minister, paid foreign agents should have to register as well.
Even the Prime Minister's senior bureaucrats recommended he set up a registry, but nothing has been done. Conservatives brought an opposition day motion in May 2023 calling on the government to create one. All the opposition parties here voted in favour of it as well. Canadians are still waiting to have a registry implemented. This House adopted that motion a year ago. For the sake of Canada’s democracy, the Liberal government cannot continue to dismiss the impact this interference has had on our elections. This was further confirmed by the recent findings by the commissioner.
Conservatives will continue to fight any foreign interference from any country and put an end to any attempts by foreign governments to target Canadians and our elections. This issue is one of the most important we speak about in this House, because fundamentally it is about protecting our country and protecting our people from foreign governments that seek to target them.
The duty of government to protect Canada and Canadians is one of its most important responsibilities, and yet, sadly, as we have seen over the past nine years, the government has failed to do this. We have seen unprecedented foreign interference for years in our democracy and in our communities, and yet the Liberal government has refused to take the action necessary to bring it to an end and send a message to foreign countries that Canada will not tolerate it anymore.
Many immigrants who came to this country, like my family, came here for a safe future. Many immigrants came here because they left countries where they did not have freedom of speech, freedom of religion or freedom of thought and were not allowed to vote the way they wanted to vote. However, when they came to this country, it was like the Canadian dream they came here for, to live freely and to be able to express themselves through their religion, their thoughts and their words, was not there. They do not feel like they are in a country where they are able to do that. It is almost like they left a country and then came to one where they ask themselves what they left their old country for when they cannot freely express themselves here either. That is after nine years of the Liberal-NDP government failing to protect Canadians and failing to protect our democracy.
Make no mistake, a common-sense Conservative government, under the leadership of the next prime minister, the member for Carleton, will do just that. We will restore the Canadian dream. We will act to secure our democracy, protect our people and end foreign interference anywhere within our borders. We will restore the hope that if people come to this country, they will be able to express themselves freely through their religion, their thoughts, their speech and their expressions. We will bring the once lauded Canadian dream back to this country once again.
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- May/6/24 2:46:09 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I appreciate our hon. colleague's question. I share her concern that the rights of all individuals must be respected.
I think she will understand that there is a very small group of individuals, with perhaps violent criminal pasts or those who may be involved in terrorist activity, for whom releasing into the community would not be an acceptable option because of public safety. We worked for many years with the provinces that kept this very small group of individuals in the appropriate custody, and now we are going to take over our responsibility, while at the same time respecting their rights.
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Madam Speaker, the question before us is not just whether the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is a terrorist entity. Its actions over the past four decades are such that such a designation is logical. It is also long overdue, and that may be why the government has so far refused to act. Having ignored past pleas from Iranian experts and from other Canadians, the Liberals are too embarrassed to admit their mistake and do the right thing.
Following the protest in Iran, since the death of Jina Mahsa Amini, Conservatives have been calling on the Liberal government to support the Iranian people's fight for a free and democratic Iran by listing the IRGC as a terrorist entity under the Criminal Code of Canada. The Liberals refused.
The murder of Jina Mahsa Amini was just one on the long list of violations of human rights committed by the Iranian regime. The torture and death of Montrealer Zahra Kazemi, the execution of wrestler Navid Afkari, the imprisonment of lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh and the shooting down of Ukrainian International Airlines flight 752, which killed dozens of Canadians, are examples of a regime that has no respect for its own citizens or for those of other countries.
The IRGC is a part of this regime and is instrumental to its continued existence. The IRGC has terrorized the people of Iran for decades and has openly declared support for other terrorist organizations such as Hezbollah and Hamas, both listed in Canada as terrorist entities.
In June 2018, the government, including the Prime Minister, voted to list the IRGC as a terrorist entity. Despite the motion being approved by the House of Commons, and despite the IRGC downing flight 752 and killing Canadians, the government has yet to list this organization as a terrorist entity. To me, this is shameful. Does the government not understand that Canada needs to take a stand for what is right?
This government's level of hypocrisy has been so big that it does not walk its talk. It does not do what it needs to do. It makes promises, and it breaks them. This is how hypocritical the government has been on this very important issue of protecting Canadians and on making sure that Canada stands where it is right to be.
It was a little more than four years ago when the IRGC shot down flight 752, killing 176 people, including 55 Canadians and 30 permanent residents. This was a mass murder of Canadians. Countries have gone to war over less than that.
The families of those killed in that attack received sympathy from the Liberal government but nothing was done to bring the perpetrators to judgment. Nothing was done to stop them from operating in Canada however they see fit.
There is no doubt that Iran is a state sponsor of terrorism. There is no doubt that the IRGC is one of the prime movers of Iranian terrorist policy and action. There is no reason for Canada to sit by and do nothing. There are an estimated 700 Iranian Agents operating in Canada. If one asks Iranian Canadians whether they feel comfortable speaking up against the regime, they will tell one stories of harassment for their extended families, not only back in Iran, but also here on Canadian soil.
Two years ago, CSIS confirmed that it was investigating what it saw as credible death threats against Canadians coming from inside Iran. In failing to list the IRGC as a terrorist organization, the government could be seen as not caring about the safety and security of Canadian citizens faced with this foreign threat. Certainly, the Liberal government has not sunk so low as to put the protection of terrorist organizations ahead of the safety of Canadians, has it?
Finance Canada officials testified in committee that more than $100 billion is illegally laundered in Canada each year. A leading report recognizes that Canada has become known for snow-washing, given the prominence of money laundering here. I should not need to remind the Liberals that combatting money laundering is a federal responsibility.
With his lackadaisical attitude, the Prime Minister has allowed criminal organizations, including the IRGC terrorist organization, to take advantage of soft-on-crime Liberal policies. Because of the Liberals' refusal to list the IRGC as a terrorist entity, we have no way of knowing how much of the Iranian regime's illegal money laundering in Canada goes undetected. Finance Canada officials have admitted that the government does not know whether the IRGC is fundraising for terrorist activities through the Canadian charitable sector. Simply put, the government is not doing its job.
Common-sense Conservatives have put forward real solutions to mitigate money laundering in Canada. Conservative Bill C-289 proposes changes to the Criminal Code to make it easier to catch and convict criminals laundering money in Canada. That would include IRGC agents. However, the NDP-Liberal coalition voted against the bill. The failure of the government to take terrorism and money laundering seriously allows for murderous entities like the IRGC to operate freely in Canada.
The government needs to wake up and finally list the IRGC as a terrorist organization. To do so would bring us in line with our allies, countries such as the United States, that understand the seriousness of this situation, even if Canada's government does not. Other countries understand that an organization that has involved itself in conflicts in Lebanon, Yemen, Iraq and Syria, should not be allowed to freely export violence and chaos.
The IRGC is open in its support for Hamas and Hezbollah, two organizations that have been recognized as terrorist entities. It does not make sense that the organization that funds the activities of Hamas and Hezbollah should not be called to account for its terrorist actions. What we are discussing here is an organization with a history of exporting violence and mayhem as it seeks to destabilize other countries in the region. Not only that, but this is an organization that is used as a tool of state-sponsored torture and oppression against its own citizens.
We have talked about this in the House before. The will of the House is to have the IRGC listed as a terrorist organization here in Canada. Apparently, though, despite the overwhelming evidence, that is not the will of the Liberal government. I do not understand the reasons for its inaction. It is not as if it believes that it should sponsor terrorism and terrorist organizations. If it does not believe the reports from CSIS or Finance Canada, it should say so. Canadians deserve an explanation for years of Liberal inaction.
The time for empty words and hollow announcements is over. It is time for the government to take action, support the Iranian people's struggles for freedom, do the right thing, and list the IRGC as a terrorist entity in Canada.
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Madam Speaker, I think the member just gave an excellent and powerful speech about the importance of listing the IRGC as a terrorist organization.
I know from talking to community members across Canada that there is wide support for the proposal. There are many different communities that see the negative impacts of IRGC violence: the Iranian community, the Jewish community, the Iraqi community, the Lebanese community and the Yemeni community. Communities in South America are also talking about how the Iranian regime is spreading its violence and collaborating with authoritarian regimes in South America.
We are going to vote on the motion on Wednesday. I think it is going to pass, based on what the opposition parties have said. We will see what the government does. At the end of the day, what we need is executive action or the passage of my bill, Bill C-350. It is not good enough to just pass a motion. After the motion is voted on, and if it passes, what should we expect the government to actually do? A motion like this one passed before, six years ago, and the government has done absolutely nothing in six years. We will pass the motion, I hope, on Wednesday, but we need to hold the government's feet to the fire because what really matters is whether something actually gets done.
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- May/6/24 10:02:48 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan for the excellent question and his work on these issues and many other issues of human rights and security for all communities in Canada.
Based on the record of the government, I will not hold my breath. I cannot be optimistic about what it is going to do, because it has not been respecting the will of the House in terms of what it should act on. The other motion has been here for almost two years, and it still has not acted on it.
There is hope and a call for the government to act, to hear the will of Canadians through the House on what we know of the suffering and the complaints, as well as the will of the communities in Canada that are calling on the government to act on this issue to list IRGC as a terrorist organization and to make sure it follows the talk. That way, we will not end up with the same situation we have right now.
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- May/6/24 10:04:08 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the real expectation of the government is to do what governments do. Therefore, the government is going to have to put forward and implement the proper mechanism to make sure the will of the House and the will of Canadians are followed and listened to. It is only in the government's hands, because it is the government; it should be able to use the proper tools to make sure that things fall into place so Canadians are protected and the IRGC is listed as a terrorist organization. Then the rest of the work can be done.
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- May/6/24 10:09:18 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it has been long overdue for the government to act on some serious issues such as this one. There is enough indication by CSIS, by Finance Canada and by our security forces that this is very serious, and it must be dealt with at the highest level of responsibility by the government. We will be waiting, after the vote, for the government to tell us the plan for how it can do this, how it will list the IRGC as a terrorist organization and what the mechanism is to be able to free up Canadians and to protect Canadians on this soil.
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