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Border Issues
Oversight hearing on Terrorist Threats to the United States
January 26, 2000

Committee on the Judiciary Hearing Testimony Presented to Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims

Oversight hearing on Terrorist Threats to the United States -- January 26, 2000

News Advisory, Witness List, Honorable Lamar Smith, Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee Ambassador Martin Collacott, Mr. Steven Emerson, Mr. David Harris, Mr. Christopher Sands, Mr. Gary Stubblefield, Mr. John Thompson, Ambassador Philip C. Wilcox (prepared testimony not available)

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Statement of the Honorable Lamar Smith, Chairman
Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims
House Committee on the Judiciary
Hearing on Terrorist Threats to the United States
January 25, 2000

Recent arrests on the Canada-U.S. border underscore the threats faced by both our nations from international terrorists, and alien and drug smugglers.

The December arrest of Ahmed Ressam as he attempted to enter the U.S. from Canada with hundreds of pounds of sophisticated bomb-making materials was a loud wake-up call.

And an alleged accomplice, Lucia Garofolo, a Canadian, smuggled one or more suspected Algerian terrorists into Vermont.

Canadian media reported that Ressam came to Canada in 1994 carrying a false French passport and using an alias. He applied for refugee status, stating that the Algerian government had accused him of terrorist and criminal activities.

The Canadian authorities released Ressam and scheduled a court date to hear his refugee claim, but he failed to appear. Ressam was taken into custody but then released again.

Between 1994 and 1999, Ressam repeatedly failed to appear for court hearings, but he was not detained or deported. He embarked on a career of crime that resulted in a number of criminal charges and convictions. Evidence indicates that Ressam was a member of an Algerian crime gang raising funds for an Algerian terrorist organization responsible for murderous attacks on Algerian and French civilians.

The Canadian Security Intelligence Service identified Ressam as a potential terrorist and tracked him for a few years, but then dropped its surveillance due to a lack of resources.

In May of 1998, Canadian immigration authorities issued a warrant for Ressam's arrest but did not actively pursue or locate him. In the summer of 1998, Montreal police charged, convicted and briefly imprisoned Ressam for theft, but failed to act on the immigration warrant. In February of 1999, when Ressam submitted fingerprints along with his application for a Canadian passport, the fingerprints were not correlated to those in his refugee application or his criminal record, so Ressam was able to receive a Canadian passport in a false name.

Numerous Canadian government officials, terrorism experts, and journalists have criticized the Canadian refugee system as prone to abuse by criminals and terrorists. Canada does not detain refugee claimants, even those with suspicious backgrounds. Instead, thousands of refugee claimants each year - as many as 10,000 last year, according to Leon Benoit, a member of the Canadian Parliament - disappear into Canadian society, never to be located by law enforcement authorities.

Even if a refugee claim is denied and the alien ordered deported, the deportation order is almost never carried out. The Canadian National Post recently reported that Immigration Canada, the Canadian immigration agency, has accumulated over 40,000 outstanding deportation orders over the past six years.

The Canadian Security and Intelligence Service has warned us about terrorism. "For a number of reasons, Canada is an attractive venue for terrorists. Long borders and coastlines offer many points of entry which can facilitate movement to and from various sites around the world, particularly the United States," CSIS reported last month.

This statement echoes the service's 1998 annual report: "Most of the world's terrorist groups have established themselves in Canada, seeking safe haven, setting up operational bases, and attempting to gain access to the USA," CSIS informed the Canadian public at that time.

In Montreal, where Ressam was briefly jailed then released despite pending warrants, police investigator Claude Pacquette noted that loose immigration controls and interagency fumbling, have turned Canada into "a Club Med for terrorists."

Last August, The Globe and Mail reported, "Canada could soon enjoy membership in an exclusive club of nations-including Panama, Columbia and Mexico-blacklisted by the United States for being soft on drugs." The newspaper quoted British Columbia Attorney General Ujjal Dosanjh as blaming a lack of funding for the drug enforcement shortcomings in B.C.

And in another disturbing story about organized crime and illegal drugs, The Globe and Mail quoted 19-year RCMP veteran Constable Scott Rintoul as calling Canada "an easy mark" because of its porous border with the United States and weak sentences for those convicted of drug offenses.

Drugs coming to the U.S. from British Columbia, where there is significant domestic production, have increased tenfold.

It would be misleading to suggest that the only problems are in Canada. The U.S. has only 300 Border Patrol agents along the entire, 4000-mile U.S.-Canadian border. Although Congress authorized and funded 1,000 new Border Patrol agents per year since 1996, the Clinton Administration hired only 369 agents in FY 1999.

And the United States has yet to begin the implementation of an entry-exit control system at its borders to monitor cross-border traffic for law enforcement purposes. All the above problems have created a situation where terrorists, and also illegal aliens, alien smugglers, and drug smugglers, are increasingly using Canada as a transit country en route to the United States.

In fact, the fortuitous apprehension of Ressam occurred only because he picked a poor crossing route and panicked during his inspection, which raises the question of how many other Ressams have successfully crossed the border.

The problem is a two-way street. The U.S. also exports terrorists and drugs to Canada. So improved border security will benefit both countries.

Both Canada and the U.S. are sovereign nations and should respect each other's right to determine their own immigration laws. The goal should be to reach mutual solutions to mutual problems, acting with good faith in the interests of our respective nations.

If Canadians want more liberal immigration and drug policies, that is their decision. And if Americans want to act on security concerns, that is our decision. The issue is one of sovereignty, not who is to blame.

Experts from both countries have observed that the border has become an irresistible temptation to international terrorists and smugglers.

As a result, we should focus on two issues: First, terrorism and the smuggling of drugs and aliens. These crimes pose a direct and growing threat to citizens in both Canada and the U.S. Second, the legitimate flow of people and goods across the border. This should be facilitated.

There is too much at stake in terms of bilateral trade to accept anything less than a well-secured border that also facilitates legitimate crossings. In fact, cooperation at the border between immigration, customs, and investigative agencies is already good. This cooperation resulted in the largest-ever alien smuggling bust in Upstate New York and in Quebec in 1998 and triggered the international law enforcement response in the Ressam case.

Ahmed Ressam proved that those in the U.S. who argue that accused terrorists don't enter at checkpoints are wrong. The United States now needs, more than ever, to develop and implement a system to track the entries and exits of foreign nationals.

While it won't stop all terrorists, an entry-exit system will deter them because they could no longer slip across the border with no trace.

Canadian citizens will benefit from such a system through information shared with law enforcement officials about suspected criminals traveling north.

Canadians share our relief that the result of the Ressam entry was an arrest, not a terrorist bombing, and understand that the U.S. must act to protect its citizens.

Congress has authorized a buildup of the Border Patrol at a rate of 1,000 new agents per year. A similar buildup of border infrastructure that responds to both security and congestion concerns is also needed.

Congress has authorized development and implementation of a comprehensive, computerized port-of-entry security system that will allow us to know who enters and leaves our country. When we don't know who comes in, we can't know what comes in, such as bomb-making materials or illegal drugs.

Our Border Patrol and Customs agents are dedicated professionals. But they have too few resources and have said that the Ressam arrest was an exception. "It was pure luck, the unraveling of this in Port Angeles," Vincent Cannistraro, former counterterrorism chief for the CIA, explained.

To protect United States citizens from terrorism, illegal drugs, and alien smugglers, we must know who enters and leaves our country - a legitimate and understandable goal given the security risks we face and the illegal immigration problems we confront.

As we implement this crucial policy as quickly as possible, consistent with efforts to expedite and expand legal traffic, we should also make better use of present and future technologies. Programs to pre-clear business travelers and provide them with a variety of options for quick passage across the border should be expanded.

The twin goals of increasing security while also facilitating legal traffic can be attained.

Canadians want easy access to the U.S. Americans want increased security in an increasingly unfriendly world. Neither request is unreasonable. Given our two nations' long and successful past relationship, there's no reason why we cannot accommodate both interests.

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STATEMENT OF

CONGRESSWOMAN SHEILA JACKSON LEE

Oversight Hearing on Terrorist

Threats to the United States

January 25, 2000

Thank-you Mr. Chairman

A fundamental requisite of sovereignty is the ability of a nation to control its borders. At the same time, we must not forget that a fundamental requisite of our freedom is a balance between control of the comings and goings at the border and our civil liberties.

The border security pendulum may have swung too far on the Texas border -- on May 20, 1997, Marines on patrol at the Texas border looking for drugs shot and killed 18-year old Ezequiel Hernandez while he was tending his family's goats.

Profiling:

We know that our Federal law enforcement officers strive to uphold the best principles of law enforcement in our democratic society. Nevertheless, we cannot tolerate the small percentage of these officers who bring racial bias to the job. No person should be targeted by law enforcement because of the color of his or her skin.

Stopping or searching individuals on the basis of race is not effective law enforcement policy, and it is not consistent with our democratic ideals, especially our commitment to equal protection under the law for all persons. It is neither legitimate nor defensible as a strategy for public protection.

It is simply wrong.

Racial profiling at the border, whether used to fight the drug trade, illegal immigration, or terrorism, should be prohibited. Effective steps must be taken to ensure that law enforcement efforts at the border do not have an unjustifiable disparate impact based on race.

Focus on Effective Methods:

Before we decide what should be done, we should have a clear picture of what kind of security measures are already in place. The nature of these safeguards is such that they are often not publicized. We must first judge the appropriateness of our current approach so that we can make enlightened decisions on where improvements can be made.

The recent border apprehensions in anticipation of Y2K problems were made with good, old fashioned police work, not with repressive efforts that militarize the border, discriminate based on race, or infringe on due process rights or diminish the right to an adequate hearing.

Before contemplating any new and potentially disruptive measures that would have a negative impact on civil liberties, we need to examine what is currently being done to safeguard the U.S. against terrorists and support the efforts that are being used effectively right now.

Cooperation Between U.S. and Canada:

Canada is the United States' best ally in the fight against terrorism.

News reports on recent arrests at the United States/Canadian border suggesting that Canada is doing less than its fair share in protecting both our countries from terrorists are just plain wrong. Within hours of the arrests, Canadian law-enforcement agencies launched a major joint investigation that rapidly identified and linked suspected terrorists across the continent.

Canada and the United States share the same concerns about terrorism and the two-way movement of terrorists between our countries.

The United States cooperates more closely on counter-terrorism with Canada than with any other country in the world. This cooperation was formalized by our 1988 Joint Declaration on Counter-Terrorism, which bolsters information exchange, enhances border controls and strengthens crisis management capabilities.

Attorney General Janet Reno and her Canadian counterpart, Solicitor General Lawrence MacAulay, have jointly praised the work of agencies on both sides of the border. FBI Director Louis Freeh reiterated this support in his recent meeting with Canadian law-enforcement officials.

It has been widely reported that a large number of terrorist organizations have adherents in Canada, but these same organizations are also present in the United States. This is part of the price that Canada and the United States pays for being free and being democratic countries that have a strong commitment to civil rights.

Thank-you Mr. Chairman.

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Written testimony of Martin Collacott to the Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims of the Committee of the Judiciary of the United States House of Representatives

January 25, 2000

Canada along with other countries is faced with an unprecedented movement of illegal migrants organized by international criminal organizations. It is estimated by the UN that four million people are smuggled across international borders each year. Criminals are now believed to make money more from people trafficking than from the smuggling of narcotics.

Canada's refugee determination system has come under severe criticism in recent years because of the ease with which claimants can enter the system, the generous treatment they receive once in it, the high rate of acceptance of claims and the considerable likelihood that they will never be forced to leave the country if their claim is rejected. This has made Canada a favorite target not only for bogus refugee claimants seeking better economic opportunities but also for criminals and terrorists.

While Canada has had a strong tradition of accepting refugees who are genuinely fleeing persecution as defined by the United Nations Convention on Refugees, there is growing concern on the part of the Canadian public over what is regarded as widespread abuse of the system. It is not only very costly but results in many people remaining in Canada who should not be here. This is seen as unfair to migrants who have come here legally, usually after a lengthy processing period, who may also suffer from being confused by the public with large numbers of illegal migrants coming from the same source countries. It is equally unfair to genuine refugees whose processing is delayed because the system is clogged with bogus cases. Other major problems are the opportunities available to criminals and terrorists to use the system to enter Canada as well as the problems created for the United States by large numbers of people gaining entry into Canada by making refugee claims in order to be smuggled across the border.

I a well as other critics of the present system have made a number of proposals to tighten up the system. Many of these are contained in a report issued two years ago by the Auditor General of Canada, who identified so many shortcomings that it cautioned against making patchwork changes and recommended a thorough review of the refugee process. Thus far, however, the government's response has been limited. A major obstacle in the way of instituting fundamental reforms is the existence of a highly articulate and influential lobby, comprised in large part of refugee lawyers and advocacy groups whose funding is closely related to the continued arrival and settlement of significant numbers of refugee claimants in Canada. A similar situation exists in the United States.

Specific recommendations to reform the refugee determination system include the following:

a) Given the very large numbers of persons arriving in Canada, the United States, Australia and many Western European countries without valid travel documents and without plausible grounds for seeking asylum, much wider use should be made of detention until it is determined that they have reasonable case for claiming refugee status or, alternatively, are deported. Experience to date indicates that this will substantially reduce the numbers trying to enter the country. Those who are really fleeing persecution are presumably prepared to put up with this inconvenience. While such detention will be not come without considerable expense, the long term social costs of letting in thousands of bogus refugee claimants, a large percentage of whom disappear if not kept in detention, will be much greater. Canada has shown some progress in this direction - although very limited. After most of those released from the first boatload of Chinese who arrived last summer disappeared, our authorities detained those from the second, third and fourth boats. Relatively few of the undocumented claimants arriving by air - and who, over time, enter the country in much larger numbers than the boat people - are detained, however.

b) Claimants entering the Canadian refugee determination system can be at present be assured of staying in the country for a considerable period of time as well as receiving free legal counsel, welfare payments and full access to the health care system. This extended stay has been made possible in large measure by a decision of the Supreme Court of Canada which conclude that Section 7 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (namely, that everyone is entitled to life, liberty and security) applies to everyone who has managed to set foot on our soil, and not just to Canadian citizens. It will be difficult to make fundamental reforms of the system unless this decision is revisited in some form or other. While there is also considerable scope for improving various aspects of the refugee determination system in the United States, Canada could benefit from the introduction of something similar to the U.S. Expedited Removal System, which allows for the quick deportation of those with manifestly unfounded claims. The average processing time for a claimant in Canada is now just under one year. The government's objective is to reduce it to six months by 2002. The Auditor General recommends reducing it to ten weeks.

c) Canada needs to review its application of the standards outlined in the U.N. Convention on Refugees. At present Canada accepts claims from many persons who are not fleeing persecution as defined by the UN Convention. Many have left their homeland because of civil wars or other conflicts and by UN standards require only temporary protection until they can return home. Still others have been granted refugee status for more personal reasons, such as having an abusive spouse. Canada, in fact, warned the UNHCR back in 1991 that stretching the definition of refugee would make so many people around the world eligible to claim status that the system would become unmanageable - to the particular disadvantage of those requiring protection from persecution. The United States has also stretched the definition well beyond the original intent of the UN Convention in some areas - although not to the same extent as Canada. The result is that many persons who visit the United States with the hope of staying permanently, but who do not meet U.S. refugee standards, simply travel to the Canadian border where they are almost automatically accepted into our determination system.

d) Substantial additional funding is required to make the Canadian system function more efficiently. As well as the resources required for increased detention more need to be applied to the interception of persons with questionable documents at airports abroad before they emplane for Canada. More resources should be used to track rejected claimants and have them removed as quickly as possible. The fact that Canada has one of poorest records for those who fail to get status is a major inducement for bogus claimants. Much if not all of the required funding can be realized from savings resulting from the speeding up of the refugee determination process.

e) Foreign-based terrorist organizations have been attracted to establishing themselves in Canada for a number of reasons. One of these is the fact that it is not only very easy to get into the refugee determination system in the first place but, unless there is very obvious adverse information available on an individual, no security check is usually made until a claim is accepted and application is made for landed immigrant status. A more stringent detention system combined with at least a preliminary security check would improve this situation. A much more effective and expeditious deportation regime, as recommended in the previous paragraph, - particularly in the case of those with connections to terrorist organizations - is also much needed.

f) A further circumstance that has attracted foreign terrorists to Canada has been the ease with which they can raise and transfer funds abroad. The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam are a particularly notable example of a group adept both at bringing large numbers of supporters into Canada through the refugee determination system and at fund raising. One encouraging development is that Canada appears about to sign a United Nations convention which will require our government to pass domestic legislation making it illegal to raise funds for terrorism.

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International Terrorism and Immigration Policy

by Steven Emerson

Testimony of Steven Emerson,

Terrorist Expert and Investigator

Executive Director, Terrorism Newswire, Inc.

Terrornews@aol.com

Introductory comments:

Good morning. Before I begin my prepared comments, I would like to take a moment to express my deepest appreciation to you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this hearing, and, equally important, for standing up to the orchestrated campaign to stop me from appearing. Because of the investigative work I have carried out as a journalist and investigator in exposing the presence of militant Islamic fundamentalists and Middle Eastern terrorists in the United States (see attached bio), I have been the subject of a sustained campaign of vilification, defamation and even a threat to my life during the past five years by militant Islamic organizations operating as self-anointed representatives of the larger Muslim population, whom they decidedly do not represent. But without access to accurate information about my real background to correct the false claims being fabricated about me, some of those who receive this information are unfortunately subject to manipulation. In the end, the aim of this campaign is to prevent me, as well as others, from speaking and writing about the threat of militant Islamic fundamentalism on American soil, and thus prevent the public from being properly informed. The very success of these organizations and their supporters, fronting under the false veneer of being "moderate" and "mainstream," in creating a chilling climate where free speech on this issue has been suppressed, has become a factor in allowing foreign terrorists to operate in the United States below the radar screen and thus avoid the scrutiny from either the media, public officials or law enforcement. Just as significantly, the tactics of various Islamic organizations do a tremendous disservice to the vast overwhelming majority of Muslim Americans who do not support violence or terrorism. Mr. Chairman, your refusal to allow these militants to suppress free speech is to be applauded and lauded.

Overview of international terrorist problem:

Thanks to the quick response of US Customs Agents to behavior deemed suspicious at the Canadian border in Port Angeles on December 14, 1999, Ahmed Ressam was caught trying to smuggle RDX explosives. A wide-ranging investigation, unprecedented in its sweep and scope, succeeded in identifying and arresting other members of the hitherto unknown terrorist cell to which Ressam belonged. A plot to bomb and destroy targets in the United States, although still not publicly identified, had been narrowly averted.

Today the United States and Canada serve as the home for a wide spectrum of international terrorist groups as well as indigenous "home-grown" groups. Certainly, today's hearing focuses our attention on the threat of international terrorism on American soil and the porous nature of US borders. While virtually all foreign terrorist organizations from throughout the world, including Latin America and Asia, have set up infrastructures in the United States, the primary threat of international terrorism on American soil stems from Middle Eastern terrorist organizations, a fact that FBI and CIA officials have repeatedly testified to. These organizations have set up fundraising operations, political headquarters, military recruitment and sometimes even command and control centers. The entire spectrum of Middle Eastern and Islamic terrorist groups now operates on American soil, including Hamas, Hezbollah, the Algerian Armed Islamic Group, the Egyptian Al Gamat Al Islamiya, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the Islamic Liberation Party, the PKK and Al-Qaeda, the organization of Osama bin Laden.

There are various reasons for the emergence of these groups in the United States, which include:

• Ability to operate under our political radar screen
• Ability to hide under mainstream religious identification
• Loopholes in immigration procedures
• Ease of penetration of borders
• Limitations on FBI and other agencies performing law enforcement functions, including INS and Customs
• More sophisticated compartmentalization of terrorist cells around loosely structured terrorist movements
• Exploitation of freedoms of religion and speech
• Absence of a vigilant media
• Exploitation of non-profit fundraising prerogatives and lack of government scrutiny
• Increasing cross fertilization and mutual support provided by members of different Islamic terrorist groups
• Ease of availability of student visas from countries harboring or supporting terrorism
• Failures by universities to keep track of foreign students and their spouses
• Protection afforded by specially-created educational programs
• Ease of visa fraud and the invention of false credentials, from passports, drivers licenses, credit cards and social security numbers
• Blowback from the anti-Soviet mujihadeen that the US supported in Afghanistan.

Despite passage of the anti-terrorism bill and a realization by law enforcement since the World Trade Center bombing that the threat of Middle Eastern terrorism had become part of the US and Canadian landscapes, militants and terrorists continue to use both countries as a base of operations. As water seeking its own level, terrorists will gravitate to those areas that give them the greatest freedom to maneuver. Unless choked off and stopped along the different points of entry--ranging from the visa granting process overseas to the hundreds of unmanned border crossing points between Canada and the United States--terrorists will continue to come to the United States. The list of major international terrorists and militants allowed to enter the United States in recent years or actually granted green cards and citizenship is nothing less than staggering.

??Sheikh Omar Abdul Rahman, head of the Egyptian Al Gamat Al Islamiya, and convicted leader of an interdicted plot to bomb US landmarks, bridges and tunnels in New York

??Musa Abu Marzook, one of the top three officials of Hamas (who founded and operated a "think tank" in Chicago and Virginia

??Ali Mohammed, a top lieutenant to Osama bin Laden (and not insignificantly, enrolled as a Special Forces sergeant at Fort Bragg)

??Wadih el Hage, secretary to Osama bin Laden

??Ramadan Abdullah Shallah, head of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (who served as a professor at the University of South Florida in Tampa)

??Sheikh Abdel Aziz Odeh, spiritual leader of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and unindicted co-conspirator in the World Trade Center bombing (who visited the United States multiple times for fundraising and political recruitment without any knowledge of the INS)

??Ayman Zawahiri, leader of the Egyptian Al-Gihad organization, lieutenant to Osama bin Laden and conspirator in the assassination of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat

??Rashhid Ghannoushi, head of the Tunisian Al-Nahdah

??Anwar Haddam, a leader of the Algerian Islamic Salvation Front (FIS)

??Leith Shbeilat, a militant Islamic leader implicated in an assassination plot against Jordan's King Hussein

??Khalid Mishal, a top leader of Hamas, who, in his speeches in the United States, has called for stabbings

??Kamal Hilbawi, a spokesperson for the Muslim Brotherhood, who has called for attacks on American targets and who has encouraged carrying out of suicide bombings

??Yusef Al Qaradawi, a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood and active supporter of Hamas and other violent groups, who has called for suicide bombings and taking over the United States

??Qazi Hussein Ahmed, leader of Pakistani Jamaat-e-Islami, a militant group that supports violent "jihad" or holy war

??Ramzi Yousef, the top organizer of the World Trade Center bombing

??Sheikh Abdulmunem Abu Zant, a militant Jordanian Islamic cleric, who has routinely called for violence

??Ishaq Al-Farhan, a leader of the militant Islamic Jordan Action Front who has issued numerous exhortations to carry out violence

??Wagdi Ghuniem, a militant Islamic cleric from Egypt, who has called for jihad against Jews and other "enemies of Islam." (Curiously, on one of his recent visits to the United States, Ghuniem was barred from entering Canada because of his terrorist affiliations and sent back to the United States, where he continued his tour exhorting Islamic groups to carry out violence.)

Loopholes and weaknesses of immigration controls:

Foreign nationals who are terrorist operatives routinely utilize false identity documents to illegally enter the US and/or remain here once they have entered. There are no shortages of examples in this regard - the recent Washington State and Vermont arrests clearly show this. The ability of Islamic Jihad leader Abdel Aziz Odeh to have entered the US numerous times, without leaving a record under his real name, is yet another example. Ghazi Ibrahim Abu Mezer and Lafi Khalil were arrested on July 31, 1997 in a Brooklyn apartment by police officers from the New York City Police Department, based on a tip that people in the apartment were intending to bomb the New York subway system. The arrests narrowly averted a series of bombings that could have killed hundreds of commuters. After the arrests, police determined that Mezer and Khalil were in the United States illegally. Mezer was apprehended three times by the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) in the thirteen months prior to the arrest in New York for attempting to illegally enter the United States from Canada. At the time of arrest, the INS had begun formal deportation proceedings against him, but he was free on bail and had filed a request for political asylum based on his fear that the Israeli government would arrest him for membership in Hamas. False documents are as important to terrorists and their organizations as their guns and bombs -- they are tools that help them ply their international trade of death and destruction.

In addition to false documents, alien terrorists and their support operatives frequently engage in immigration benefit fraud. One of the most glaring examples would be asylum fraud. All one has to do is show up at a US port of entry, even without documents, utter the two magic words "political asylum," have any moderately truthful sounding story and one is likely to be processed in - at least temporarily. The tightening of the asylum process over the past couple of years has helped - but, be a fraudulent asylum claimant showing up at a very busy Point of Entry such as JFK Airport or Miami International Airport - and you are likely to remain in detention for only a short time before you are paroled out to (hopefully) appear at a later hearing! If a name (real or false) does not appear in any of the lookout systems and the applicant merely has an alleged "friend" to stay with in the US, then parole from detention is most likely. Of course, it goes without saying, terrorist aliens so released seldom show up again - and the INS, because of serious manpower shortages and conflicting priorities, rarely pursues such absconders. Of course, any number of other immigration fraud schemes abound - marriage fraud, other familial relation fraud, naturalization fraud, work visa fraud (H-1 and L-1 and "E" status - as used by Islamic Jihad officials Ramadan Abdullah Shallah and Bashir Nafi), investor fraud and religious worker fraud.

Smuggling of alien terrorist operatives - apart from the noted utilization of false documents: alien terrorists use established alien smuggling pipelines across both the US-Mexico and US-Canada border. Maritime smuggling along the coasts, particularly via the Caribbean as well as East and West Coast seaports, occurs. How easy can it be for a terrorist operative to bribe his/her way onto a freighter destined to a busy US seaport, and simply be hidden aboard the vessel until Customs and INS have done their routine inspections, then to simply disembark the vessel?

The issue of classified evidence in immigration proceedings is now under assault by editorialists in the media and from some members of Congress. What they forget is that these proceedings are administrative in nature - not criminal - and such evidence, in spite of all the recent hoopla, is only rarely and very selectively utilized. Deportation proceedings ultimately result in a person being removed from the US - not sentenced to prison (as in criminal proceedings) - even though aliens may be detained while those proceedings go forward. As such, it should be remembered that aliens detained hold their own cell keys -all they have to is simply agree to be deported and they can be free - just not in the US. Moreover, Congress itself approved of the Classified Information Procedures Act, in which classified information can be introduced in criminal trials without releasing this information to the defendant.

Unfortunately, too many senior INS managers do not recognize the critically important role INS enforcement branches, particularly the Investigations Division, can and should play in the counter-terrorism and national security arena. These are officials at both the HQ and field levels. INS has but a small contingent of agents dedicated to this work - and, often those do not receive the recognition and support from higher management they should. INS should have at least a hundred field agents assigned to these missions - at least the same it has assigned to Organized Crime Drug Task Force efforts - but in fact INS has less than half that assigned to counter-terrorist efforts in the field. I have been told that it is not unusual for very senior INS officials - especially at headquarters (who should know otherwise), when the topic of counter-terrorism arises in senior staff meetings, to state, "that's the FBI's responsibility" and "what does INS have to do with that"! Certain key, senior INS managers fail to even understand and recognize the very statutes within the Immigration and Nationality Act they are charged with enforcing!

New information on the Algerian and Jordanian terrorist plots:

Last fall, a stateless Mauritanian flew from Germany to Montreal. Within days before and after his visit to a group of Algerian nationals living in Montreal, several members of that group flew to Chechnya; another group traveled to Vancouver and another headed for the Vermont border.

According to a superceding federal indictment released last week, Ressam and a still fugitive accomplice Abdelmajid Dahoumane plotted " to destroy or damage structures, conveyances or other real or personal property within the United States." The plot, which stretches back to at least 1998, according to federal authorities, called for compartmentalized cells to be activated in the United States. No one cell would know about the others, in the event that any of the participants got arrested. Members of another cell belonging to the same group and entering the United States through Vermont border crossings were to rendezvous in a still undisclosed location in the northeast. Ressam was to be met in Seattle by a Brooklyn based Algerian Abdel Ghani Meskini. While Ressam had planned to fly to London after leaving the explosives laden car for someone else to pick up, Meskini was to fly from Seattle to Chicago to help secure additional funding for the Islamic terrorist group. Telephone toll records, released by prosecutors, show that the Seattle cell was in contact with the Vermont-based cell through third party numbers.

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CANADA AND CURRENT TERRORISM CONCERNS

TESTIMONY OF

DAVID B. HARRIS

PRESIDENT, INSIGNIS STRATEGIC RESEARCH,

OTTAWA, CANADA;

FORMER CHIEF OF STRATEGIC PLANNING,

CANADIAN SECURITY INTELLIGENCE SERVICE

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION AND CLAIMS

OF THE

UNITED STATES

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY

OVERSIGHT HEARING

ROOM 2237

RAYBURN HOUSE OFFICE BUILDING

WASHINGTON, DC

10:00 A.M., 25 JANUARY 2000

Copyright (c) 2000 by D. Harris. All rights reserved.

25 January 2000

Check against delivery

CANADA AND CURRENT TERRORISM CONCERNS

David B. Harris, INSIGNIS Strategic Research, Ottawa, Canada

Mr. Chairman, Congresswoman Jackson Lee, and Members of the Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims:

INTRODUCTION

This past April, my testimony before this Subcommittee spoke of discouraging trends connected with the security of our joint United States-Canadian frontier. Suffice to say that Canada is sought out as a haven by terrorists. Fifty international terrorist organizations are represented on our soil. Some of our laws are, frankly, "terror-friendly" in inadvertently establishing immigration, refugee and financial mechanisms that are vulnerable to exploitation by violence-prone groups. Although our security and intelligence community has been highly-professional and determined, political leadership has periodically been lacking in relevant areas.

Much of this situation has stemmed from Canadian citizens' lack of awareness. As I mentioned last April, the fact that Canadians themselves have not been traditional targets of political violence, has meant a failure of popular vigilance, a failure reflected from time to time in a lack of political will on the part of successive Canadian governments.

II INDICATIONS OF CHANGE

Despite such considerations, however, and despite recent, high-profile arrests at the northern border, there are some heartening signs. US and Canadian intelligence and law enforcement organizations have enhanced their already-unparalleled level of cooperation and joint achievement. Indeed, following the latest border scares, Attorney General Janet Reno congratulated Canadian security authorities on their action. Prompted by expanding threats, Canada's Solicitor General, too, announced in December that a major national Counter-Terrorism Strategy is under development.

There is also evidence of some stability in Canadian security budgets whose reductions over the years had caught the Subcommittee's attention. And of some movement to adjust those laws which terrorists exploit to earn taxpayer-subsidized money.

There is nothing like a little arrested terror to focus the mind and bring an end to denial. Recent alleged Algerian terrorists' attempts to use Canada as a staging base for operations in the US, shocked the system and self-image of Canadians. For Canadians, the publicity engendered by the episode has put the lie to their jealously-guarded belief that Canada could never be more than a backwater in the struggle against terrorism. This consciousness is the key to reinforcing their governments' willingness to take and sustain decisive action. Whether the effect will be lasting is unknown, and problems do remain.

III PROBLEM AREAS

Enormous immigration levels continue to guarantee Canada's engagement in international terrorism. Each year, immigration adds about one percent to our 29-million population, a number so large that penetration by terrorism becomes unavoidable - even by terrorists entering Canada from the United States. Immigrants, especially, become the victims of this penetration, as a tiny minority of terror-supporters extorts, intimidates and assassinates members of their Canadian ethno-cultural communities on behalf of foreign causes. Absurd refugee laws commonly see ostensible applicants disappearing underground in Canada and the US, a technique apparently used by some implicated in the recent Algerian cases. Some immigrant community leaders have called for immigration levels and laws to be brought into line.

Moreover, Canada's unique policy of multiculturalism complicates matters by encouraging extremists to confuse the retaining of cultures with the importing of what Canadian counterterrorist officers call "homelands violence."

IV CONCLUSION

We must work together for North America-wide solutions to what is, after all, a continental problem. Today's counterterrorism starts with yesterday's transnational intelligence, and the best intelligence will continue to be the product of mutual US-Canadian cooperation. Technology, too, must be mustered for efficient border security, and, at a time of high-tech forgery, Canada, in particular, must improve its travel document system by using finger printing and comparably reliable identification methods.

Canada and Canadians must face up to the weaknesses in law and attitude underlying its immigration, refugee and terror-financing problems.

Finally, the awaited Canadian Counter-Terrorism Strategy must be a fearless evaluation of Canada's situation and responses, including in relation to the menace of weapons of mass destruction. The best evidence of the Canadian government's political will to fight terrorism - and to remain a worthy neighbour - will be a strategy whose realistic analysis and unsparing solutions come to grips with the expanding danger to this continent.

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The U.S. Policy Response to Canada on the Subject of Border Security

Prepared statement to be given in testimony before the

Committee on the Judiciary

Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims

United States House of Representatives

January 25, 2000

Christopher Sands

Fellow and Director, Canada Project

Center for Strategic and International Studies

Washington, D.C.

It is an honor to be asked to testify before you today on U.S. policy to confront the threat of international terrorism through illegal immigration across the border with Canada, and the efficacy of our current policy to safeguard American lives.

The Timing of this Hearing

This hearing is an important opportunity to evaluate the current threat, and Mr. Smith and the Subcommittee should be commended for undertaking this valuable step in exercising congressional oversight over U.S. policy in this area.

Now is an appropriate time to review this aspect of U.S. policy regarding Canada. Why?

• First, because in the wake of two attempted crossings by alleged members of a terrorist organization in December 1999 there are actions which can be taken now that can improve the U.S. policy position as this issue is debated in Canada.

• Second, we cannot become complacent because there is reason to believe that one consequence of the arrests in December was to advertise the ease of crossing the land border between our two countries, and our attendant vulnerability, around the world.

Today, as close to one month after the first arrest as this year's congressional calendar will permit, it is prudent that the United States take stock of its current position.

The issue facing this committee is nothing less than the security of Americans from outside aggression - not Canadian aggression, but the threat that may be posed by third parties transiting Canadian soil. Canada and the United States have an existing security relationship that addresses these same concerns.

Canada and American security

In 1938, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King met in the State of New York to discuss the defense of North America in light of the second great European war of the century. FDR articulated the reasoning behind a U.S. security guarantee for Canada in those more isolationist times:

"The people of the United States will not stand idly by if domination of Canadian soil is threatened by any other empire."

Canada's Prime Minister King replied that:

"[Canada] shall remain as immune from attack or possible invasion as we can reasonably be expected to make it, and that, should the occasion ever arise, enemy forces should not be able to pursue their way, either by land, sea or air, to the United States across Canadian territory."

Both of these statements make common sense today. The United States has to protect Canada in order to protect itself. And Canada has to protect the United States in order to protect itself - from potential U.S. intervention in Canadian affairs.

The Present Danger

The nature of the threats to the security of the United States has changed. We no longer face a military threat, as we did from Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union. As other testimony given here today will establish in detail, terrorist groups based outside North America are known to have planned attacks on American soil.

The arrest of two Algerian nationals and a potential Canadian collaborator attempting to enter the United States in December 1999 underscored for all of us that the risk of an attack on U.S. civilians is real. More importantly, in the midst of tremendous shared prosperity and historic bilateral trade between the United States and Canada, these arrests reminded us that our mutual border is as easy to cross for criminals as it is for the rest of us.

It is worth pausing for a moment to reflect on the good news: that the suspects in these cases were caught before an attack was carried out, and that the due process of law, and close cooperation between U.S. and Canadian law enforcement, will help to bring these individuals to justice.

Yet regardless of the outcomes of these cases, the arrests last December have important consequences for us today.

First, in the media coverage broadcast around the world by CNN and others, we alerted the world to the openness of the U.S. border with Canada. To those hostile elements around the world that had not discovered it yet, we advertised our vulnerability.

Second, after a well-publicized tightening of border inspection procedures, both Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chrétien and President Clinton reassured the public that everything was under control. Certainly the laudable intention of both was to avoid public panic. But today, a little more than one month later, the tightened security has returned to its previous state.

Our vulnerability has grown, yet our response appears fleeting.

The Open Society and its Enemies

Relations between Canada and the United States are uncommonly close. Canada is the United States largest trading partner, buys billions of dollars of American exports every year, and is one of the leading foreign sources of investment in our companies and communities. But trade alone does not explain the closeness of these two neighbors.

Canadians are a familiar part of American life. They are ubiquitous in popular culture - from Céline Dion to Shania Twain, from Michael J. Fox to Wayne Gretzky, to name just a few. Millions of Americans have relatives in Canada, and millions more have close friends there. Our veterans fought side by side with Canadians in all the major wars of the twentieth century - even in Vietnam, where many young Canadians fought and died as volunteers in the U.S. armed forces. Nearly all our leading companies do terrific business in Canada, and know Canadians as customers, suppliers and even employees. Few countries are as well-represented on the Internet as Canada and the United States, and today an American is almost as likely to meet a Canadian online as along the border.

These forces are deepening the integration of our societies as well as our economies - and making us rich. Canada's contribution to U.S. prosperity is unparalleled in human history. This is why many people in both countries express concern about the potential implementation of new security measures at the border.

Terrorism seeks to make the free society turn itself into a police state, and care is required to avoid this. Security and freedom must be compatible or neither can exist.

Yet we balance these imperatives in domestic law all the time. It is difficult to strike an appropriate balance in some cases, but the accommodation of the rule of law and individual liberty - the lion laying down with the lamb - is the noble work of democratic governments.

The Open Society and its Friends

The worst that Canada may be accused of here today is of realizing somewhat late the nature and extent of the problem. Many Canadians thought the United States was being paranoid. Well, if it is true that even paranoids can have enemies, it is also true that even paranoids can have friends.

It would be a grave mistake to make Canada out to be part of the problem, when Canadians are willing to be part of the solution.

As others will testify today, Canada can and should do much more to screen prospective immigrants and refugee status applicants. While other major developed countries have tightened their immigration rules in recent decades, Canada - a big, largely empty country - has remained generous and welcoming to new settlers. This has drawn desperate migrants from as far as China - as well as those with hidden intentions and criminal associations.

I have spent the past few months in Canada, as a grateful recipient of a Fulbright grant to conduct research in Ottawa, the Canadian capital. Members of Congress would find the debates in Parliament, and the debates of Canadian pundits on the evening news, quite familiar. Canada has, through tough fiscal discipline, eliminated its federal deficit spending and is now reporting annual surpluses. These have awakened demands from all quarters for new spending and tax cuts as constituents seek to reclaim part of these surpluses.

In addition, I can tell you that the Canadian police investigation that has followed the December arrests has been a major story in Canada. Canadians may not have been alert to the threat of terrorists in their midst before, but they are absolutely aware of this daunting reality today.

A Golden Opportunity for Joint Action

Now, as a result, there is a golden opportunity to increase the security of the United States and Canada through joint efforts to improve procedures and invest in personnel, advanced technology and other vital resources. Members of Congress and their counterparts in the Canadian Parliament are surely now ready to fund reasonable measures, and law enforcement and immigration officials in both countries will certainly act, if a consensus on the appropriate measures can be forged.

I urge the members of the Subcommittee not to let this moment pass without decisive action.

No course will be more effective than one that builds a strong consensus in the United States and Canada on the appropriate measures necessary to balance our liberty and personal security.

A Binational Commission on North American Security

To that end, I recommend to you the creation of a Binational Commission on North American Security, to be created in cooperation with Canada's Parliament.

This Commission should be charged with a mandate to promptly consult with law enforcement and immigration personnel as well as with the community of frequent border users (including representatives of the private sector and communities along the northern border) and recommend to Congress and Parliament a consensus agenda of concrete actions to be taken by officials in both countries to secure the safety of Canadian and American civilians in a manner that is technologically sophisticated and as unobtrusive as possible to the flows of family, friends and free commerce that are the lifeblood of our future prosperity.

The recommendations of this bilateral and all-partisan Commission would deserve and likely receive swift action from both countries.

Only by working in cooperation with Canada can the United States address the problems identified with Canadian immigration screening and domestic security arrangements that threaten our communities by allowing dangerous persons into our midst. Canadians have their hand outstretched in friendship, and we must not slap it away in stern judgment of previous nonchalance.

In closing, I remind the members of the Subcommittee that our vulnerability along the Canadian frontier is now widely known. The challenge for Canada's immigration and law enforcement authorities is certain to grow as others attempt to follow the road to the United States through Canada that has now been shown to the world to be an easy one to traverse.

As good neighbors, and in our own fundamental national interest, we must pledge to share our greater resources, experience with terrorism and expertise in security issues to help the Canadians to address the threat posed by international terrorism.

This opportunity for action is yours.

Thank you.

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ESTABLISHING A COMPREHENSIVE STRATEGY

TO COMBAT TERRORISM

Testimony By

Mr. Gary Stubblefield

President

GlobalOptions LLC

United States House of Representatives

Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims

Hearing on Terrorist Threats to the United States

January 25, 2000

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to testify before the Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims. As a career U.S. Navy SEAL and subsequently an international security consultant, I have been involved in planning how to penetrate the border security of potential adversaries as well as protecting U.S. and friendly borders from outside threats for more than 30 years. So I feel well qualified to participate in today's discussions.

As we begin the New Millennium, one of the gravest dangers to our nation's security is the threat posed by terrorists. While the level of state-sponsored terrorism has declined, terrorist groups continue to receive state assistance in the form of money, weapons, training, and safe havens. State sponsors of international terrorism, as listed by the State Department, include Iraq, Iran, Libya, Sudan, Syria, Cuba, and North Korea.

At the same time that state sponsored terrorism is declining, we are witnessing the growth of freelance terrorism. Osama bin Laden, who is believed to have master-minded the bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, is the best example of this new trend. Bin Laden has substantial personal wealth and business contacts. He is believed to be bankrolling and training various Islamic extremist organizations. Bin Laden is part of the World Islamic Front for Jihad Against the Jews and Crusaders, which advocates that it is the religious duty of Muslims to attack Americans wherever they may be.

The most alarming development in terrorism, in my view, is the growing likelihood of a chemical or biological attack. We all recall the deadly nerve gas attack in the Tokyo subway by the Japanese doomsday cult, Aum Shinrikyo, that left 12 people dead and 5,300 injured. What happened in Tokyo must be a wake-up call for what can happen in America. The threat is real. President Clinton, in a news interview last year, said a chemical or biological attack in the United States was "highly likely." Former Senator Sam Nunn said it is no longer a question of if the United States will be attacked by terrorists with weapons of mass destruction, but only a question of when.

In response to the escalating threat of terrorism, we have tightened security at our airports, embassies, and military bases abroad. We have increased funding to our intelligence agencies to monitor terrorist activities. On the diplomatic front, the State Department has sought to increase anti-terrorism cooperation with other countries.

We have directed additional resources to law enforcement for training and to prepare first responders so they can deal effectively with a chemical or biological attack. Congress has boosted the budget for U.S. Customs to enhance security along our borders.

We have also employed military force in retaliation to terrorist attacks. We have also stirred up a hornet's nest by bombing four sovereign nations in the past 24 months, three of which have harbored terrorists or were involved in creating weapons of mass destruction.

Taken as a whole, America has mobilized resources in response to terrorist threats. We are gradually improving our abilities to detect and deter terrorist activities. But the job is incomplete. Much more can and should be done to protect America, its citizens, and its international role.

A continuing and obvious weakness in our defense against terrorism is the inadequacy of security along our Northern border. This is not a new issue. The problem is not difficult to describe. We have only 300 Border Control agents to protect a 4,000 mile border with 90 crossings. Many of the smaller points of entry are not staffed at night. Additionally, when people enter the United States from Canada, there is no requirement to present a visa or other documentation unless they plan an extended stay. We create no record of who enters the U.S. or determine if they subsequently depart.

Put another way, our security is so lax along our Northern border, Ahmed Ressam, who was apprehended with more than 100 pounds of high explosive initiator and four sophisticated timing devices, chose to cross into the U.S. at a checkpoint instead of over an open frontier. He obviously had confidence our security is so inadequate that he could easily slip into the U.S. and did not bother with finding an alternative route that is less protected. Ressem, according to a recent news article, may have been operating in the U.S. since 1997, which means he probably traveled back and forth across the border numerous times over a three year period without being apprehended. Clearly, terrorists such as Ressam believe our border security is a joke.

The inadequate security controls on our Northern border would not be such a concern if Canada had tougher laws to keep out potential terrorists. But as we are all aware, Canada has generous immigration laws. This translates to us through easy crossings from Canada into the United States. As a result, today there are at least 50 terrorist organizations operating in Canada. Canada has become a staging ground for terrorists to raise money, recruit new members, and plan attacks against America.

Canada is fully aware of this problem. A report by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, which is often quoted but nevertheless bears repeating, concludes the following: "Most of the world's terrorist groups have established themselves in Canada, seeking safe haven, setting up operational bases and attempting to gain access to the USA."

Canada is a close friend of the United States. It should be noted that, as a sovereign country, it has the right to establish whatever laws it wants regarding immigration policy. This said, and because Canada has lax immigration controls, we must take this factor into account when determining procedures and allocating resources to ensure America's security.

Ahmed Ressam was apprehended with 100 pounds of high explosives and four timing devices. It is important to understand that he was not plotting to explode four, 25-pound, high-explosive bombs. This type of high explosive is often used as an initiator to detonate a much larger bomb. The timing devices trigger the high-explosives, which in turn ignite a much larger bomb made from materials such as ammonia nitrate or fertilizer. In my view, Ressam was planning up to four massive attacks on the scale of the Oklahoma Federal Building or World Trade Towers bombings.

As horrific as this scenario may seem, the terrorist threat to America is far more serious. We must consider the possibility that the next Ressam who crosses our border may be transporting not conventional explosives, but sarin gas. If terrorists succeed in attacking America with a chemical or biological weapon, casualties will not be in the hundreds, but in the thousands or tens of thousands.

Members of this Subcommittee, this is the threat we face as a nation, and to which we must respond, to protect America. It is critical that we tighten security in areas - such as our northern border - which are clearly lacking for effective security. We must establish a comprehensive, integrated strategy that responds to terrorism along multiple fronts.

To protect America, in my view, it is imperative that we accelerate the establishment of an entry-exit control system. The system must not only control all our border entries, it must also permit tracking aliens that have overstayed their visa permits.

As land ports of entry on our borders improve security, we can expect terrorists to respond accordingly. When future Ressams realize they cannot easily slip across our borders through established check points, they will seek alternative routes in the same manner as drug traffickers and illegal immigrants. The future Ressams will travel to more remote locations that are less secure. So we must also enhance security between check points. This can best be accomplished by technology and by increasing the number of Border Patrol agents and other law enforcement resources. Our goal must be to improve detection and identification capabilities all along our borders and make available law enforcement personnel to effectively respond to violations.

We must not forget our maritime frontiers. These are, for the most part, wide open to entry from the sea. Our scant resources on the land crossings are exceeded only by the inability to adequately monitor and protect our coastlines and harbors from illegal entry or crossings.

As important as it is to improve security along our 4,000 mile Northern border, this action alone will be insufficient to deter future terrorist attacks against the United States. Our ability to combat terrorism is only as good as our weakest link. We can expend vast resources to enhance security along our borders, but will remain vulnerable to attacks if we fail to maintain an effective intelligence network. Creating a cordon sanitaire is not the solo answer to an effective anti-terrorism policy.

Terrorists must understand that America will act swiftly and with certainty if attacked. Taliban authorities in Afghanistan are providing a safe haven for Osama bin Laden and refuse to hand him over to Western authorities, despite sanctions imposed by the United Nations. The U.S. government should publicly announce that it will hold Afghanistan responsible for any terrorist attacks connected to Osama bin Laden and we will retaliate with the full force of American military power to ensure the complete destruction of the Taliban regime. We should make clear that our response will be overwhelming, not just an action like the retaliation by the current Administration following the bombings of the U.S. embassies in Africa.

We should also unambiguously announce that we will consider it an act of war and will respond with overwhelming force if any nation is connected to an attack on U.S. soil employing chemical or biological weapons. Such a declaration would be a variation of the MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction) doctrine, which successfully maintained peace between the United States and the Soviet Union for more than 40 years. Such a policy would ensure no nation miscalculates its support of terrorist groups or misreads America's intentions.

In a recent article, Neil Livingstone, our chairman at GlobalOptions and one of the leading experts on terrorism, states:

"The New World Order lacks the rules and structure that prevailed during the Cold War. A clear statement of this nation's unwillingness to tolerate terrorist attacks on its citizens anyplace in the world, and the consequences that will flow from such attacks, will give much needed shape and form to the international landscape and provide greater protection for our citizens." Livingstone warns, "We cannot afford to wait for the Ressams of this world to carry out their wicked designs but must act decisively and with dispatch to discourage terrorists and their government patrons from even contemplating the murder of Americans."

Thank you for the opportunity to appear before your Subcommittee and I look forward to answering any questions that you may have.

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The Mackenzie Institute

PO Box 338, Adelaide Station Toronto, Ontario M5C-2J4

Tel: 905-771-3835 E-mail: mackenzieinstitute@compuserve.com

The Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims

- Remarks by John C. Thompson, Director of the Institute

26 January, 2000

Introduction

In 1998, following his testimony to a Canadian Senate inquiry into terrorism and public safety, the Director General of the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS) alleged that representatives of some 60 terrorist organizations were present in Canada.

Without providing an exhaustive survey of terrorism within Canada, recent events have graphically demonstrated that Islamic Fundamentalists are present. The Air India bombing of 1985 killed 329 people (most of whom were Canadian citizens) and remains the most lethal aircraft bombing to date. The Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka have a considerable fundraising apparatus established in Canada, while members and supporters of the Kurdish PKK are also present. Over the years, Iranian exiles, radical Black Muslims, the Provisional Wing of the IRA (and their Protestant counterparts), and various Palestinian groups have also surfaced in Canada.

Nor are terrorists the only security threats in Canada. Christopher Andrew's The Mitrokhin Archives, among its many other revelations, details a number of attempts by the Soviet Union to place illegals (agents who operate without a bona fide "legal" cover) into the United States by running them through Canada. This activity began in the 1950s - with some severe interruptions from the RCMP's Security Service - and continued well into the 1970s. While modern espionage tends to be aimed at the acquisition of technology (countering this is a major activity for CSIS), other nations may decide to follow the old Soviet strategy.

If there is significant representation from terrorist organizations in Canada, the same is true for organized crime. To cite one example, participants in the 1990-93 Black Market in cigarettes in Canada included the traditional North American Mafia; Aboriginal organized crime, Bikers, Montreal's Franco-Irish underworld and Lebanese, Sikh, Vietnamese, Jamaican, Chinese and Russian gangs. A senior police officer in Cornwall Ontario (the city closest to the main entry point for contraband) described his town to the author as a "Klondike for Organized Crime."

A Canadian police report was cited in the prosecution of a Vermont gun dealer who had diverted approximately 1,000 handguns into the black market. It listed details of 102 weapons that had been recovered in Canada. Canadian Suspects associated with these weapons included members of Russian Mafiya, Armenian thieves, Mohawk Warriors, the Franco-Irish underworld, Jamaican Posses, Colombians, Vietnamese gangsters, sundry street gangs, Bikers and at least two Mafia families.

In sum, organized crime in Canada is as cosmopolitan as the rest of Canadian society. However, traditional criminal organizations have been joined by numerous new groups.

A characteristic of terrorists and other insurgent groups in the 1990s is that most have had to become self-supporting, usually by participating in organized crime. Some groups, such as the Tamil Tigers or FARC in Colombia, have perfectly fused both activities into a single organization. Most of the terrorist groups that are present in Canada, are there to make money and garner support. Few international groups have ever directed violence against Canada itself. As an example, the Tamil Tigers in Canada engage in fraud, extortion (within the Tamil expatriate community), heroin trafficking and prostitution to fund their war effort in Sri Lanka. A handsome share of the profits of the cocaine market in Canada must be assumed to be in FARC's pockets.

The effects of this hybrid relationship between support for insurgency and organized crime cannot be understated. It is not a new phenomenon, but was largely absent in the Cold War Era. However, those groups that evolve into this pattern have the potential to become extremely powerful. The Tamil Tigers own their own merchant ships and FARC now controls some 40% of Colombia. Historical examples of insurgents who drifted into organized crime include the Mafia and the Chinese Triads - both of which may have more influence than is generally understood.

Most modern organized criminal societies and insurgent support networks are ethnic in character. Criminal societies as diverse as the Mafiya, the Posses and Triads tend to have a core membership based on common experience from a narrow ethnic base. The same is also true of Biker gangs who tend to have a strong white supremacist element. Insurgents around the world tend to belong to a sub-national minority or a particular religious faction. In a cosmopolitan society, this characteristic can add considerable complications for law enforcement agencies - this is certainly true in Canada.

Support for insurgency and organized crime within immigrant communities is an old story. One of the author's great uncles was a member of an Irish gang in New York City that specialized in theft, intimidation and fixing sporting matches in the early 1900s. Typically, his parents had moved into an Irish ghetto and his father died young because of an industrial accident. The combination of societal dislocation, poverty, unfamiliarity with the new society and an absent parent made him a prime candidate for criminal activity. On the other hand, the author's grandfather was a law-abiding and hard-working man for all of his long life. Social conditions make participation in criminal activity more likely, but not inevitable.

Immigration and Canada

Like the United States, Canada is a society of immigrants. Before the Second World War, Canada largely drew from the same sources as the United States -- with the significant exception of involuntary immigration from Africa. There were near identical restrictions on Asian immigration in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries, and little immigration from outside of Europe. As with the United States, immigration rates were especially high in the decade before the First World War. For example, in 1910-1913, Canada averaged 323,800 new arrivals each year - a rate that has not been repeated since.

After the Second World War, annual immigration varied between 80,000 and 200,000. Sources for new arrivals slowly diversified, a trend that accelerated in 1967 when the Canadian government determined that race, colour, religion or sex could no longer be used to determine admissibility. Shortly afterwards, the Immigration Act was changed to reflect three basic goals:

1. To foster the development of a strong national economy in all regions;

2. To facilitate the reunion of Canadian residents with family members from abroad;

3. To uphold Canada's humanitarian tradition.

The Act states that the immigration program should protect the health and safety of all Canadians, and prevent the entry of criminals, spies, terrorists and subversives. However, sorting out the occasional bad apple in all the new barrels is not easy at the best of times. A Supreme Court of Canada interpretation of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (written by Justice Bertha Wilson in 1985) presented a major handicap to enforcing this part of the Act. The interpretation of the Charter held that all non-Citizens were fully entitled to all the same legal protections as citizens from the very moment they set foot in the country.

For some 69 of the last 100 years, Canada has been governed by the Liberal Party. The Liberals, especially since the Second World War, have become adept at garnering the votes of new Canadians (most of whom were admitted into the country and granted citizenship under Liberal government). In 1972, the Liberals also introduced a new policy to support multiculturalism; and this has generally strengthened their support among new Canadians.

The current Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, Elinor Caplan, recently declared that she hoped to boost immigration to more than 300,000 a year (or 1% of Canada's population). To accomplish this, decision making may be decentralized, and it will be easier for foreign students, temporary workers and others to get permanent status without having to return to their home countries to apply. Again, while the vast majority of would-be immigrants will be law-abiding and useful citizens, Canada's record for detecting and deporting the bad apples among them is less than good.

Moreover, Canada has become perhaps the most cosmopolitan nation in the world, and most citizens generally take pride in this accomplishment. But this transition - in combination with Post War sensibilities about racial discussions of any kind - mitigates against candid discussion of problems within particular communities. For example, members of the Jamaican Posses were very active in Toronto in the early 1990s. Typically, most of the victims of their gunplay and home invasions were Canadians of Caribbean origin. Of the three Toronto daily newspapers at the time, only one frequently referred to the Posses by name. The largest circulation English language daily (one of pronounced Liberal sympathy) rarely even described the perpetrators of much of this violence.

Canada is also extremely accommodating to refugee claimants. Pending a hearing to allow landed immigrant status, a refugee will be awarded a series of welfare benefits. Some refugees resent this - an Afghan friend of the author disliked receiving what he regarded as charity. As he was not allowed to gain employment until he had immigrant status, he used the interval to attend government funded language training. The majority of refugees do need this period of support while they adjust to life in Canada.

Some refugee claimants arrive with a full knowledge of Canada's welfare system - general welfare, family benefits, subsidized housing and an allowance to purchase furniture and household effects. Social workers in the Etobicoke area of Toronto were sometimes startled to find that many Somali refugees had precise knowledge of all their entitlements. Some made multiple claims under different names. Perhaps just as disturbing to police in British Colombia are teenage boys from Central American nations who also land with a detailed knowledge of expected benefits, and a clear idea of their legal protections under the Young Offenders Act. Some have been picked up as drug dealers within two days of landing in Canada.

Some refugee communities have used the Canadian benefits system to a wider advantage. Somali warlord Mohammed Farah Aideed was largely funded by Canadian welfare benefits and drug trafficking. Clan members who arrived in Canada forwarded a tithe of their income to the Warlord. His second wife, Khagida Gurhan, and four of his children were living on welfare at the time in London, Ontario. Gurhan also frequently traveled back to Africa to accompany Aideed as he tried to rally support in other African nations.

Partisans of Somali clan warlords are not the only arrivals to abuse Canadian hospitality towards refugees. The Tamil Tigers selected Canada as the best place to transfer some of the supporters (and fund-raisers) as early as 1985. Several boatloads of Tamils (who reached Canada via India, the USSR, East Germany and West Germany) landed off the Canadian coast to claim refugee status.

It is ironic, given the frequent abuse of Canada's refugee system, that some real political refugees have difficulty getting the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) to accept their claims. One case the author was involved in as a special witness concerned an Iraqi army deserter who was threatened with deportation to Baghdad on the eve of the 1991 Gulf War. Another case involved a Peruvian electrical engineer that was targeted by both the Army's counter-insurgency troops and by the Maoist guerrillas in the country.

Despite the problems presented by a tiny minority of new arrivals, Canada continues to draw in large numbers of immigrants and refugees.