(Ottawa) The Commission on Foreign Interference must broaden the scope of its investigation to also scrutinize Iran’s attempts to interfere in the country’s affairs, argues the Conservative Party in a letter sent to Judge Marie -Josée Hogue.
The lawyer who represents the Conservative Party during the work of the Commission, Nando De Luca, argued that Tehran has been engaged in “a campaign of intimidation” against Canadians of Iranian origin for a long time and that the federal government is doing little case of this threat.
“Iranian foreign interference constitutes an active and present threat to Canada, against which the current government has not taken appropriate measures,” Mr. De Luca argued in his letter. The Press got this letter on Tuesday.
Last weekend, former head of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) Richard Fadden recommended that Iran be included in the list of countries that are in the crosshairs of the Commission on Foreign Interference . Mr. Fadden must testify before Commissioner Marie-Josée Hogne this Wednesday.
In his letter, Mr. De Luca alluded to the plot foiled by the FBI in the United States and sponsored by Tehran, which aimed to kill an Iranian dissident taking refuge on American soil as well as an Iranian woman who accompanied him. According to American authorities, the contract was given to an important member of the Hells Angels in Canada, Angel Damion Ryan. The latter is co-accused with another Canadian in this case.
Mr. De Luca recalls in his letter a study published in 2021 by Professor Ahmed Al-Rawi, director of the Disinformation Project at Simon Fraser University, in British Columbia, in which he affirmed that the Iranian authorities were engaged in misinformation for many years in Canada.
His study “reported a decade of Iranian disinformation, microtargeting with the aim of changing votes in Canada between 2010 and 2019.” For example, his study concluded that Iranian trolls spread false reports about Stephen Harper shortly before the 2015 Canadian election, “suggesting that the CIA had installed him in power and that he was a supporter of ISIS [le groupe État islamique] “.
To bolster his argument, Mr. De Luca also cited former national security advisor Jody Thomas, who told a parliamentary committee last March that “the greatest threat of foreign interference to Canada comes from the Party People’s Republic of China, although other states, such as Russia and Iran, are also trying to covertly or coercively interfere in our affairs.
“Given the many high-profile examples of Iranian interference in Canada, both with regard to our democratic process and attempts to suppress political expression in Canada, it is of the utmost importance that the Commission also take an interest in Iran,” concluded the lawyer.
Asked to comment on the Conservative Party’s request, a spokesperson for the Commission, Michael Tansey, indicated in an email to The Press that the work of the Commission will be guided by its mandate and by the information obtained through its investigation. “In accordance with its mandate, the Commission intends to conduct a thorough and proportionate review and assessment of the interference by China, Russia and other foreign states or non-state actors. »
The Conservative Party argued for the addition of Iran to the countries of interest at a time when experts invited the Commission to favor transparency in the treatment of information affecting national security that it will obtain from the federal government if it wants to maintain the confidence of Canadians in its work as well as in Canadian institutions as a whole.
Otherwise, the public and the media risk finding themselves in “a black box effect,” argued law professor at the University of Montreal Pierre Trudel.
“The black box effect is essentially an effect by which the public finds itself kept in ignorance,” he explained to Judge Marie-Josée Hogue, who chairs the Commission.
“He often doesn’t know what it is, what it’s about, what it’s about, why the information can’t be disclosed, and so it gives the impression that we have to take his word for it. “, he added.
To avoid any perverse effects, the Commission must ensure that it explains without nuance why the disclosure of certain documents could harm national security. On Monday, one of the Commission’s lawyers, Gordon Cameron, said that around 80% of the documents received by the Commission are classified.
With The Canadian Press