Journalist Defends Reporting on Election Interference

A journalist whose reporting helped raise concerns about possible Chinese meddling in Canadian democracy told a committee of MPs on June 20 that he stands by his work.

Sam Cooper, who recently left Global News to start his own online news site, told MPs that other countries, such as Australia and the United Kingdom, have faced similar disclosures about Chinese attempts to influence elections, and have followed up with laws designed to counter foreign interference.

But in Canada, said Cooper, that has not happened.

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‘Russian soldier’ in Ukraine was deep fake agitator in China

Suspect used AI to mock up videos, including one claiming he had seized Zelensky’s car

“Hello, Chinese friends,” the soldier in Ukraine tells his admirers many thousands of miles away. “I’m from Chechnya, Russia. Behind me is a nuclear power plant in Ukraine. We just conquered this place and caught some big fish. One of them was a US consultant.”

The bearded man, who just happened to speak Mandarin, soon became a social media sensation on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, popping up across Ukraine to issue regular updates from the battlefield. “Salute. The red flag stands tall, Huzzah,” he says in another video from the front line, in front of a car. “The extended Lincoln behind me is Zelensky’s car that we’ve seized.”

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‘Don’t become a target’ of Chinese intelligence, CSIS warns Canadians

The Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) issued a rare public warning Tuesday detailing how it says China’s intelligence service is targeting and recruiting Canadian citizens to supply information to Beijing.

The allegation comes as Canada continues to reckon with Chinese interference in the country, which has ranged from allegations of meddling in elections to using so-called “police stations” to monitor and threaten Chinese nationals or those with family in China.


3 Are Convicted of Harassing Family on Behalf of China’s Government

The defendants, including a private detective who said he did not realize he was working for an intelligence operation, pursued people living in New Jersey.

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TikTok video, explosive-making instructions at centre of Calgarian’s terrorism charges: court docs

A 20-year-old Calgary man facing terrorism charges is accused of posting a video to TikTok that facilitated and contributed to ISIS and al-Qaeda activities, court documents reveal.

Zakarya Hussein is also accused of creating and possessing instructions on how to make explosives.

Hussein was charged Friday with four offences: two counts each of facilitating a terrorist activity and participating in or contributing to a terrorist group activity.

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Ottawa allowed in half of foreign nationals red-flagged as security risks, audit finds

Of the 7,141 cases where security screeners sent IRCC a ‘non-favourable’ recommendation during the years covered by the audit, 3,314 were allowed into Canada

OTTAWA – Nearly half of foreign nationals flagged by security agencies to the Immigration Department for ties to serious offences including war crimes, espionage and terrorism were allowed to take up residency in Canada between 2014 and 2019.

An internal audit of the Immigration National Security Screening Program found that immigration officials ultimately approved temporary or permanent residency, or refugee applications for 46 per cent of the more than 7,000 cases where the Canadian Border Security Agency (CBSA) recommended against applicants being allowed into the country.

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Sikh leader killed outside Surrey, B.C., temple warned by CSIS he was in danger

The president of a Sikh temple in Surrey, B.C., who had been warned by Canada’s spy agency that he was in danger, was shot and killed on the gurdwara grounds on Sunday, prompting a new flare-up of old tensions that have simmered since the Air India bombing 38 years ago.

At a news conference Monday, RCMP confirmed Hardeep Singh Nijjar was found in a truck outside the Guru Nanak Gurdwara suffering gunshot wounds. He died at the scene.

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5th Columnists: Canadian politicians linking abandoned Chinese exclusion law to a foreign agent registry

It’s without question one of the darkest episodes in Canada’s modern history.

For 24 years starting in 1923, the Canada Immigration Act barred almost any Chinese person from migrating to this country, an ugly extension of the earlier “White Canada” policy and a response to widespread fear of what some called the “yellow peril.”

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Canada’s Housing Crisis: Inevitable Crash and Economic Turmoil Predicted

Bank of Montreal economists Doug Porter and Robert Kavcic, in an article titled “Catch-’23: Canada’s Affordability Conundrum,” go into detail about a difficult issue which has been a concern for years, especially in urban and suburban areas.

There seems to be no easy way out of this situation despite the assurances of politicians. Single-family housing in Canada is simply too expensive relative to the income of the majority of residents. Recent interest rate increases have further exacerbated this problem to the point of an economic and social crisis. Porter and Kavcic point out the naiveté of the mainstream explanation that this is just a supply problem.

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Justin Trudeau will be remembered for his ‘leadership’ — not ‘the trash and the rumours,’ says sketchy Ex-Pm who took cash in envelopes from sketchy German

Justin Trudeau will be remembered for his ‘leadership’ — not ‘the trash and the rumours,’ Brian Mulroney says

OTTAWA — It wasn’t the flattering words, but the bitter context, that made Brian Mulroney’s introduction of Justin Trudeau on Monday night an extraordinary political moment.

Far from Parliament Hill, in Nova Scotia the former Progressive Conservative prime minister hailed Trudeau for his “leadership” of Canada through repeated crises, saying that’s what history will remember, not “trivia and the trash and the rumours that make the rounds” in Ottawa.


Mulroney: nothing wrong accepting envelopes of $1,000 bills

OTTAWA – Former prime minister Brian Mulroney cited the brazen public nature of his cash transactions with Karlheinz Schreiber as evidence today that there was nothing untoward in their business arrangement.

Mulroney told a public inquiry that he accepted an envelope stuffed with 75 one-thousand-dollar bills from Schreiber at a hotel at Montreal’s Mirabel Airport and then climbed into a car with his RCMP escort with the envelope in full view.

Grifters or what?

h/t Mauser

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Liberals, Conservatives take 2 seats apiece in 4 federal byelections

Voters in four federal ridings are sticking with the status quo, returning two Liberals and two Conservatives to Parliament after byelections in Manitoba, Ontario and Quebec.

CBC News projects Liberals Ben Carr in Winnipeg South Centre and Anna Gainey in Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount and Conservatives Arpan Khanna in Oxford and Branden Leslie in Portage-Lisgar will win their respective races.

That means the party standings in the House of Commons are unchanged after Monday’s vote.

All were safe seats for the LibCons, Bernier and the PPC will just have to soldier on.

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Alberta, Saskatchewan Premiers Won’t Implement Ottawa’s Sustainable Jobs Act

The Prairie provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan are united in their opposition to Ottawa’s sustainable jobs act and net-zero plan.

Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe told reporters on June 14 that his province will not be implementing Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s ‘Just Transition’ legislation, as Bill C-50 has been called, and will also not be taking part in any discussions.

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Canada Needs to Convene a “9/11 Commission” on China’s Election Interference

It is in America’s interest to find out the salacious details of foreign interference in democratic elections, especially when it occurs in our northern neighbor.

Unless its wildfires cause the skies in New York City to turn the color of a sci-fi dystopia, Americans tend not to think much about Canada. But you know who has not forgotten about our neighbor to the north? China’s ruler, Xi Jinping.

As part of China’s unfriendly competition with the West, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) chairman appears to have overseen a far-reaching and complicated effort to advance Beijing’s interests through direct interference in Canada’s 2019 and 2021 federal elections.

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Giant U.S. subsidies begin luring Canadian clean tech companies and talent to move south

The timing couldn’t have been better for Calgary-based Kanin Energy to open an office in Texas last year. It was just as the U.S. government unveiled its massive climate bill, including tens of billions of dollars in new subsidies and other incentives for clean energy.

Kanin Energy develops facilities that use high temperature waste heat from industrial facilities to produce electricity. The new U.S. subsidies now cover up to half the cost of those projects.

“Not only are we seeing a lot of traction in Houston and Texas and in the United States in general, now there’s all these incentives that have really turbocharged our economics for our projects,” Janice Tran, the company’s CEO, said from her office in Houston. “So it made even more sense to actually kind of double down and grow here.”

It’s corporate welfare on a massive scale and the tax payer foots the bill.

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President of Sikh temple in Surrey, B.C., shot dead in gurdwara parking lot

The president of the Guru Nanak Sikh Gurdwara in Surrey, B.C., was shot dead Sunday night in the temple’s parking lot, according to members of the province’s Sikh community.

Hardeep Singh Nijjar’s death was confirmed by the temple’s vice-president and Sikh community groups, and he is being mourned widely on social media.

… The vice-president of the gurdwara, Amandeep Singh Johal, told CBC News that Nijjar, 45, was an activist with the Sikh independence group Sikhs for Justice.

In 2016, CBC News reported that the government of India was seeking Nijjar’s extradition from Canada on charges related to extremism.

India behind this? I would not be surprised given Junior’s select tolerance for extremism.


More … Hardeep Singh Nijjar: Khalistani leader shot dead inside gurdwara in Canada

h/t DM

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