Poilievre asks public safety minister to declare Iran-backed group linked to synagogue attack a terrorist entity

OTTAWA – Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is calling on the federal government to list Kata’ib Hezbollah, a paramilitary group linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), as a terrorist entity under the Criminal Code.

In a letter addressed to Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree on Sunday, Poilievre said U.S. authorities recently arrested Mohammad Baqer Saad Dawood Al-Saadi, an alleged senior commander of Kata’ib Hezbollah, who is accused of coordinating 20 attempted and completed terrorist attacks in Europe and North America.

“Those allegations include two attacks here in Canada: the March 10 shooting at the United States consulate in Toronto and an attack against a Canadian synagogue,” wrote Poilievre.

“He also allegedly said he was running multiple teams and sought help carrying out further attacks against Jewish and other targets in Canada and the United States,” he added.

Kata’ib Hezbollah was founded in 2007 and has approximately 7,000 to 10,000 members, according to the office of the U.S. Director of National Intelligence. In 2009, the U.S. State Department listed the group as a terrorist organization. The group primarily operates in Iraq, but also possibly in Bahrain, Iran, Lebanon and Saudi Arabia.

Poilievre said, “there is no justification for the delay.”

“Jewish Canadians have watched their synagogues, schools and businesses targeted by shootings, vandalism, firebombings and threats,” he wrote. “Iranian Canadians who escaped the brutality of the Islamic Republic have faced surveillance, harassment and intimidation from the same regime on Canadian soil.”

The letter also called on Anandasangaree to investigate whether the group’s members have established networks in Canada, investigate any linkages between Iranian terrorist proxies and organized crime and disclose how many individuals connected to the Iranian regime and its proxies have been identified, denied entry, investigated, detained or removed.

During testimony in front of a House of Commons committee in March, Anandasangaree was pressed by the opposition why the government had only deported one Iranian official. The minister cited the need to follow due process as the reason for the delay and said there are 24 individuals who have been identified as former IRGC officials. The minister said his government was in the process of removing them.

National Post

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