Tamils’ highway closure was ‘wrong way to protest’: Ont. premier

Tamils’ highway closure was ‘wrong way to protest’: Ont. premier

Last Updated: Monday, May 11, 2009
CBC News [Ontario]

Photo: Toronto Star

The protest that shut down one of Toronto’s major roadways on Sunday moved to midtown and to Queen’s Park on Monday, where members of the city’s Tamil community are demanding the federal government do more to help end the civil war in their native Sri Lanka.

Premier Dalton McGuinty assailed the protesters’ tactics, saying the bloodshed in Sri Lanka does not justify blocking streets.

“I understand the passions which are here. But having said that, there is a right way and a wrong way to protest,” said McGuinty.

He said the demonstrators are welcome to protest on the front lawn of the legislature or Parliament Hill.

On Sunday, a protest by thousands of members of the city’s Tamil community, including women and children, blocked and shut down the Gardiner Expressway in downtown Toronto.

For more than five hours protesters jammed the highway demanding the federal government impose sanctions on Sri Lanka until it signs a ceasefire with Tamil rebels.

Toronto Mayor David Miller issued a statement Sunday night saying that while he understood the protesters’ deep concern over what is happening in Sri Lanka, “Endangering public safety by occupying the Gardiner or other public highways is not the right way to make that statement.”

Siva Vimal, a spokesman for the protesters, said they ended the blockade only after receiving a promise from federal Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff’s deputy chief of staff that their concerns would be brought up in Parliament, which the Liberals and the NDP did during Monday’s question period.

The protest was mostly peaceful. Police took three people into custody, charging them with assaulting an officer. Police estimate 5,000 people took part in the demonstration, which ended shortly at midnight.

Some protesters then marched to Queen’s Park and by mid-morning another group began demonstrating near the busy corner of Yonge Street and St. Clair Avenue where the Sri Lankan consulate is located.

In April, Tamil protests shut down a section of University Avenue for more than three days for a protest outside the United States Consulate. Toronto police moved in and forced the demonstrators onto the sidewalk and reopened the street once the crowd dwindled.

On Monday, police shut down University Avenue for several hours from Dundas Street West to Queen Street West, in front of the U.S. Consulate.

At least 50 Tamil Canadians gathered in Calgary at the U.S. Consulate on Monday, pleading that the United Nations intervene in the ongoing civil war in Sri Lanka.

Sunday’s Toronto protest was the fourth major Tamil protest in the city this year.

About 200,000 Sri Lankan Canadians live in the Toronto area, which is home to one of the largest Tamil populations outside Sri Lanka.

Sri Lankan Canadians are calling for foreign governments to help arrange a ceasefire between Sri Lankan government troops and the rebel Tamil Tigers, a rebel group known formally as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.

In 2006, Canada added the Tamil Tigers to its official list of terrorist organizations.

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Two Esquimalt sailors charged with sabotage

Two Esquimalt sailors charged with sabotage

By Keith Vass – Victoria News [British Columbia]
Published: August 13, 2008

Two Canadian Navy petty officers charged with corrupting a Department of National Defence database in Ottawa are now stationed at CFB Esquimalt.

The two sailors, Petty Officer (second class) Sylvia Reid and Petty Officer (second class) Janet Sinclair, were stationed at the Canadian Armed Forces Support Unit in Ottawa last year.

Armed Forces investigators announced Tuesday that they have laid charges of sabotage, conspiracy and wilful property damage against each sailor. The charges are under the National Defence Act.

Both were transferred to Esquimalt while the investigation in Ottawa was ongoing and arrived in early August, said CFB Esquimalt public affairs officer Lt.-Cmdr Nathalie Garcia.

Sinclair, a member of the Armed Forces since 1987, previously served as a sonar operator and Reid, a sailor since 1994, has worked as a naval combat information systems operator.

While Sinclair was initially assigned to serve on ***HMCS Regina*** and Reid was assigned to Maritime Forces Pacific Headquarters, both will now be reassigned to jobs that will not involve contact with computers or sensitive information.

What those jobs will be hasn’t been determined.

“It isn’t easy to find jobs that protect us as well, that’s part of the issue,” said Garcia.

“There is some manual labour, but these people are senior in terms of their rank. It could be manning a small work party, I can’t actually tell you because there’s hundreds of little jobs.”

Capt. Paule Poulin, with the Canadian Forces Provost Marshal’s office, said she could not specify either the nature of the database alleged to have been tampered with or what damage was done.

It is now up the director of military prosecutor to review the file and determine if the charges will go to court marshall, Poulin said.

If it does, dates and results will be made public, but the hearing could be closed to the public.

“That would be up to the judge to decide. In general they’re open unless there’s a compelling reason to close them,” said Poulin.

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Conservative Office Attacked in B.C.

Conservative Office Attacked

[Posted by anon to vicindymedia.org, June 27, 2008]

In the early hours of the morning of June 24th, the constituency office of Conservative MP Russ Heibert (South Surrey/White Rock/Cloverdale BC) was the target of revolutionary action.  All windows of the office were shattered by a group calling itself the ‘South Surrey Situationists’ who hoped to shatter the image of a peaceful Canadian society. The action was in specific response to the conservative governments insistence on deporting US war resisters overriding legislation which would allow them to stay. If the conservative government continues to oppress those who participate in unjust and illegal wars, such as the one in Iraq, they hold no authority to govern, the group says, and will continue to be attacked by the forces of justice.

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Ottawa Solidarity

Ottawa Solidarity

[Posted by Anarchsits Against Authority to ottawa.indymedia.org, 11.04.2008]

The actions of those in the anti-CANSEC march were completed with the smashing of the windows of the Army Recruitment Centre on Slater St.

While others showed their solidarity with “Alex”, arrested arbitrarily by the police, by making a presence at the police station, we chose to show ours in the night by attacking the system itself. In an act of opposition to this heavyhandedness of the state, the windows of the Army Recruitment Centre on Slater St. and the Scotiabank on Elgin St. were smashed on the night of Thursday April 10th.

During our march against the war profiteers who were having their conference at the Ottawa Congress Centre, the police showed their ruthlessness and their commitment to the capitalists and the state with their completely unjustified arrest of our comrade. We acted in a clear rejection of capitalism and the war and repression that accompany it.

Fire to the prisons and the state!

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Ottawa: Attack on police station and fire set…

Ottawa, Canada: Attack on police station and fire set…

[Contributed by Anonymous to infoshop.org/inews, April 11, 2008]

The morning of Thursday April 10th, a black bloc was called together to “shut down” CANSEC (secrity and weapons fair) and attack the system it expands. From the beginning of the demonstration an overwhelming police presence was mobilized to intimidate our small bloc.

This repression characterizes the continuing crackdown on subversion taking place across “Canada.” Allies everywhere are facing exaggerated sentences for blockades (at Tyendinaga), land reclamations (at Six Nations), or even for the fabrications alleged by our exploiters (in the case against John “boy” Graham).

Here in “Ottawa” it was no different, they kidnapped one comrade after our bloc smashed up a military recruiting centre.

Odds against us, greatly outnumbered and repressed, our determined bloc moved on.

Because of this obscene repression and because of the courage of our comrades we chose to act.

Let them never get away with this!!

While many moved to the jail holding our fellow companion in a show of solidarity, tonight we take up arms to express ours!

The community police station, on Somerset west of Bank, was attacked with rocks and paint bombs, and we set fire to a newspaper distribution box in front to draw attention to our attack and to highlight our rage towards the pigs.

The police implement surveillance and weapons technology (that which is paraded and whorshipped at CANSEC) for profiling people, locking them behind walls of borders and jails, for militarizing the cities and mowing down any resistance to this ever expanding system. The implementation of this technology and the demand for it only grows as the influence of the institutions that wield it expands over the planet with the help of projects like the SPP, for spectacles like the Olympic games, and to defend capitalism and the G8 that manipulate it. It is clear to all that CANSEC, its technology, their police, etc are all of one class: the one we grovel to as we get up for work, as we check our bank accounts, pay the rent and bills, the ones we cringe before when crossing their path…

Vancouver Integrated Security Unit (VISU), for example, are spending their million dollar budget on gadgets sold at CANSEC to repress the mounting revolt against the colonization of our lives and lands. Colonization continues (through Progress) to impose a sterile territory, social relations, and hostile existence on us all.

In “Ottawa” this colonization of life means streets endlessly shaded by skyscrapers, homeless forecefully excluded from the remnants of social life drifting through downtown streets. It means being watched by cameras wherever we set foot, the mechinization of relationships, to be alienated from the means to our survival. It means unforgettable repression and
unforgivable abuse!

No words can express our contempt for this system, its defenders, and those who profit from it (off our backs)!

Tonight was ours, tomorrow we can only ACT to insure this. NOW COMRADES!
Until we are all free!

– Hooligans who Hate Hierarchy

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CANSEC Arms Fair Opening Night Shut Down

CANSEC Arms Fair Opening Night Shut Down

[Contributed by Anonymous to infoshop.org/inews, April 08, 2008]

Tuxedoed corporate war profiteers and their government backers were forced to flee the Ottawa Congress Centre tonight as alarms sounded, fire trucks were called, and police searched in vain for the nefarious anarchists that shut down the opening night of CANSEC 2008, Canada’s largest arms fair.

Even the multi-million dollar surveillance and security technology on display, the presence of uniformed police, and the assertion by security forces that they had been gathering extensive ‘intelligence’ on CANSEC resistance could [not] prevent a group of Ottawa anarchists from infiltrating the event and simply pulling a fire alarm.

CANSEC 2008 is the nation’s largest arms fair, and brings together war profiteers, government repsentatives, and private buyers to drool over the latest in military, surveillance, and security technology. CANSEC represents the reality of Canada’s foreign and domestic polices – we are world leaders in death, mutliation, war and occuption.

This action was taken in response to PGA Bloc Ottawa’s call for autonomous actions to disrupt the arms fair, and in support of the PGA Hallmarks. Plus, we really, really liked their CANSEC video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Udxk9QExKY

We hope tonight’s shut down will merely mark the start of two days of active resistance to CANSEC 2008.

FROM KANDAHAR TO PALESTINE, OCCUPATION IS A CRIME!
SHUT DOWN THE CANSEC ARMS FAIR!
SHUT DOWN THE WAR MACHINE!

For info on CANSEC 2008 resistance, visit pga.roadnetwork.org

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Vandals deface national Peacekeeping Monument

Vandals deface national Peacekeeping Monument

Friday, April 4, 2008
CBC News

An Ottawa monument dedicated to Canadian peacekeepers has been defaced with graffiti apparently targeting the mission in Afghanistan.

On Friday, an anarchist symbol and the words “dead Afghan civilians” and “no more” were spray-painted in black on the pale stone wall that makes up the lower part of the peacekeeping monument on Sussex Drive, at St. Patrick Street, near the National Gallery.

A spokesperson for the Ottawa police service was unable to determine Friday afternoon whether police had received any complaints or whether they were investigating.

The Peacekeeping Monument was erected in 1992 as a project sponsored by the Department of National Defence and the National Capital Commission.

Sculptures of three peacekeepers stand on top of the wall.

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Anarchists Attack Recruiting Center

Canada: Anarchists Attack Recruiting Center

On the night of sunday September 9th anarchists shattered the windows of the army recruiting center in Victoria, bc. Further encouraging the momentum of recent autonomous actions. Taking inspiration from the action on Thursday against the recruiting center in Vancouver and the actions on friday targeting city hall and a security van in Victoria. This action was carried out to illustrate two sides of the same useless coin which is the canadian state and its occupation of lands afar [Afganistan for example] and the territories of turtle island [North america]. Let our relationship to this system break like the thin glass that stands between us and the world without domination we desire.

-the unrecruitables

[Published on friendsofgrassynarrows.com, September 11, 2007]

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Victoria BC Actions

victoria bc actions

on the night of september 7 the locks of victoria city hall were glued shut and the tires of a posscan security company van were slashed. these small actions and the action on the night before where a army recruiting center was attacked can be seen as preemptive strikes against nato’s visit to victoria this saturday and sunday. however we also want to contribute to a momentum of actions that target both goverment and corporate interests directly and continually as the ineffectiveness of traditional peaceful protest becomes more and more obvious to us at least. from ongoing neo-imperialist wars outside of canada (afganistan as one example) to the every day social war (gentrification, orwellian surveillence technologies, racism and domination against native peoples, etc) inside canada big business and goverment continue to hold hands as they screw us over. we desire optimistically that actions against the state and capital, in whatever form, don’t stop when nato leaves town.

[Published on friendsofgrassynarrows.com, September 8, 2007]

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Canadian Armed Forces Recruiting Center Attacked

NATO NOT WELCOME!
Canadian Armed Forces Recruiting Center Attacked

Thursday September 6, 2007

Early this morning the recruitment center on Georgia Street was attacked by anti-war activists. Buckets of red paint where thrown against the window and a sign reading ‘Bring the War Home’ was posted to the front door.

The action co-insides with the imminent arrival of top NATO commanders who are holding a meeting in Victoria.

In a statement forwarded to several anti-war organizations the message read in part, “This small act was made in hopes to escalate anti-war activity. Our marches and speeches have done little to end this war. While the majority of Canadians desire its end, the government, military and their corporate sponsors continue killing unarmed civilians in Afghanistan.”

“This paint represents the blood spilled in the occupation of Afghanistan, where NATO’s generals don’t care about civilians bombed in their homes or starving in camps, and where human lives are extinguished as cannon fodder for illegal war”.

“This paint represents the blood spilled in the occupation of Canada. From Innu territory to Gustafson Lake.”

“By bringing the war home we mean to inflict economic and political damage upon the war machine. Our actions will intensify.”

“Unlike most mainstream anti-war organizations we do not call for the troops to be brought home to further colonial genocide on indigenous land. We fight to abolish state terror at home and abroad.”

[Published on mostlywater.org, September 7, 2007]

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