The Ottawa Citizen published my letter to the editor (read it in full* below) on June 3rd, 2024 in response to the article “Nine Arrested at Protests Opposing CANSEC Military Trade Show.”
I had originally written in response to the article “Protests expected at CANSEC 2024 starting Wednesday morning” but that letter needed to be re-written into the past tense, as well as to a shorter length, in order to be published.
*: Note the significant edit that was made to this letter, in strikethrough below and explained at bottom.
Wrong arrests at CANSEC gathering
The police targeted the wrong people over the CANSEC arms trade convention in town last week.
The “Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes Act” is Canada’s domestic application of international law responsibility. Some of the weapons manufacturers and clients at CANSEC surely meet the law’s criteria.
Here’s what Section 6 says: “Every person who … commits outside Canada (a) genocide, (b) a crime against humanity, or (c) a war crime, is guilty of an indictable offence … Every person who conspires or attempts to commit, is an accessory after the fact in relation to, or counsels in relation to, an offence referred to (above) is guilty of an indictable offence.” Then it says if the person is present in Canada, they can be prosecuted here.
The International Court of Justice issued orders to Israel to prevent the commission of genocide in Gaza, but Israel continues to violate these orders,[*removed by editors] and the International Criminal Court has been asked by its chief prosecutor to issue warrants against leaders of both Hamas and Israel.
While they visit Canada, even the international participants at CANSEC are subject to Canada’s law for what they may have committed elsewhere. But instead of escorting anyone out of CANSEC in handcuffs, Canada seems to be giving them the proverbial “get out of jail free” card.
Such impunity isn’t part of any “rules-based international order” we can accept.
Greg Macdougall, Ottawa
Note on the edit (in strikethrough above):
The part of the sentence about Israel continuing to violate the International Court of Justice’s orders was removed from the letter without my knowledge prior to publication. The segment directly after that – about the International Criminal Court – was also modified as part of that edit, to simply say “and the court has been asked by its chief prosecutor…” – which made it seem to refer to the ICJ and not the ICC. That is how the letter was published in the print edition of the newspaper, and in the online version until I emailed them.
The Citizen is publishing a correction in Wednesday’s paper: “Due to an editing error, a Monday letter contained incorrect information about legal jurisdiction. The International Court of Justice issued orders to Israel to prevent the commission of genocide in Gaza, and the International Criminal Court has been asked by its chief prosecutor to issue warrants against leaders of both Hamas and Israel.“
ALSO:
Here is a short video I made from the afternoon #ShutDownCANSEC protest.
This was a protest that turned into a sit-in occupation on Wellington Street in front of Parliament that lasted pretty much the whole afternoon.
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The main website of the protests was World Beyond War: this page to organize the protests in advance, this release on the day of, and this post with followup actions.
*Also see this documentation of the history of opposing CANSEC as well as previous military weapons trade events in Ottawa, from COAT: Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade.
One demonstrator was arrested at the afternoon protest, while earlier in the morning, seven demonstrators were arrested outside the EY Centre where they’d directly blocked entrance to CANSEC.
As it turned out, one CANSEC attendee was also arrested … but not for anything to do with international law.
This Instagram post from Palestinian Youth Movement – Ottawa explains what happened, including with videos of the assault, which appears to be a hate crime or ‘hate-motivated.’ It is only because some of the arrested protesters were also in custody overnight, that we now know the preferential treatment police gave this man.
This CANSEC delegate who was arrested is apparently Peter Henschel of Switzerland (not to be confused with Ottawa Police Services board member Peter Henschel). David Mikha’El Henschel of Switzerland, as reported by the CBC on June 5th.
This is how the total number of arrests was nine, as reported in the Citizen article headline – though I’m unaware of any news reports yet that specifically report on the arrest of the CANSEC delegate as such.
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