Somali Terrorist Charged In Canada Attack Was Previously Deported From The U.S.

Over the past year, amid Donald Trump"s crackdown on refugees and illegal immigrants, Canada has emerged as a willing safe harbor for those whose welcomes (and visas) in the US had expired. This past January, in response to Trump"s executive order on immigration, Canada"s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tweeted “To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith,” adding that “Diversity is our strength."

To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada

— Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 28, 2017

Unfortunately, it has also emerged to be Canada"s deadly weakness. Recall that on Sunday, in a rare - for Canada - terrorist incident, a Somali man stabbed an Edmonton police constable late Saturday night before trying to ram a truck into a crowd of pedestrians while being chased by police through downtown Edmonton Saturday night. Ultimately, four pedestrians and the officer were injured when the U-Haul truck being driven by the suspect struck them.

A few days later, we now know that if only Canada had a slightly less porous border with the US, the attempted murder could have been avoided because as Reuters reports, the Somali refugee accused of stabbing an Edmonton police constable on the weekend and running down four pedestrians was ordered to be deported from the United States in 2011 by a U.S. immigration judge.

In July 2011, U.S. Customs and Border Protection transferred the suspected terrorist, Abdulahi Hasan Sharif, into the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement at Otay Mesa Detention Center in San Diego, Calif., according to Jennifer D. Elzea, acting press secretary for the ICE office of public affairs. Two months later, on Sept. 22, 2011, an immigration judge ordered Sharif removed to Somalia. Sharif waived his right to appeal that decision.

However, under the previous administration"s lax regime, Sharif was released on Nov. 23, 2011, on an ICE "order of supervision" due to a "lack of likelihood of his removal in the reasonably foreseeable future," Elzea said in a statement.  Sharif failed to report to the ICE enforcement and removal operations centre on his scheduled date, Jan. 24, 2012.

"Efforts by ERO San Diego to locate him were not successful," Elzea said, and since Sharif had no known criminal history at the time of his dealings with ICE, he was a low profile target.

Then, some time in 2012, Sharif crossed the border into Canada Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said Monday in Ottawa. Goodale said Sharif arrived through a "regular port of entry" and obtained refugee status at the time, adding that - just like in the US - in 2012 immigration officials had no reason to red flag Sharif.

Then, in 2015, a complaint led police to probe Sharif’s alleged extremist ideology, but officers found no grounds for criminal charges after what the Royal Canadian Mounted Police described as an “exhaustive investigation.”

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It"s not known at present whether Sharif made an asylum claim while in the United States. If he did, and that claim was rejected, normally Sharif wouldn"t be able to make a claim in Canada under the Safe Third Country Rule, said Calgary immigration lawyer Michael Greene quoted by CBC. But Canada has made exceptions for minors or people with family in Canada, Greene said. "An asylum seeker or potential refugee claimant, even if they"ve been in the U.S., can still in some cases make a refugee claim here," he said.

A spokesperson for the Office of the Minister for Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada confirmed in an email statement Tuesday that Sharif "entered Canada from the United States through a regular Port of Entry in 2012 and was found to be a refugee‎ later that year. "According to U.S. authorities, he was not detained for criminal activity," the spokesperson added.

"In general it is to be noted that only individuals who are inadmissible, including for serious criminality, would be ineligible to make an asylum claim. Being detained for immigration purposes in another country would not prevent someone from being able to make an asylum claim in Canada."

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Fast forward to this week, when Sharif, who faces 11 charges including five counts of attempted murder, made a brief first appearance Tuesday in an Edmonton courtroom wearing an orange jail uniform. At his court appearance, Sharif had bruises on his forehead and cheek that Edmonton police said resulted during two vehicle crashes on Saturday night. A Somali interpreter helped him during the proceedings.

He had a Somali interpreter, although he did not speak. He occasionally looked down or clasped his hands in front of him and still bore facial bruises that police say he sustained while evading capture. A community leader, Mahamad Accord, who did not speak to Sharif but learned about him from the local Somali community, said Sharif was from a Somali ethnic minority and little known in the community.

Sharif’s lawyer, Chady Moustarah, said he had stepped in on short notice to help someone without representation but that the accused would have to find another lawyer going forward. Sharif remains in custody until his next court appearance, scheduled for Nov. 14.

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Will the terrorist incident be a wake up call to Canada? It appears not: Canada"s Public Safety Minister Goodale said that events in Edmonton over the weekend in no way indicate that Canada"s screening process needs to be enhanced, or that the system failed.

Pakistan Hands Down First-Ever Death Sentence For Blaspheming On Facebook

A Pakistani counter-terrorism court just handed down the first death penalty for blaspheming on social media on Sunday, according to Reuters. The ruling is the latest step in an intensifying crackdown on dissent on social media by the government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

Taimoor Raza, 30, was convicted for making derogatory remarks about the Prophet Mohammad, his wives and companions, according to Shafiq Qureshi, a public prosecutor in Bahawalpur, a city about 300 miles south of provincial capital Lahore. Raza was arrested last year after a debate about Islam on Facebook with a man who turned out to be a counter-terrorism agent. He was one among 15 people arrested by the counter-terrorism department last year, accused of blasphemy, according to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan and Reuters.

Raza’s brother, Waseem Abbas, told the Guardian that the family was “poor but literate”, and belonged to Pakistan’s minority Shia Muslim community.

“My brother indulged in a sectarian debate on Facebook with a person, who we later come to know, was a [counter-terrorism department] official with the name of Muhammad Usman,” he said.

As Reuters reports, blasphemy is a highly sensitive topic in Muslim-majority Pakistan, where insulting the Prophet Mohammad is a capital crime for which dozens are sitting on death row. Even mere accusations are enough to spark mass uproar and mob justice.

"An anti-terrorism court of Bahawalpur has awarded him the death sentence," Qureshi told Reuters. It is the first ever death sentence in a case that involves social media.

Authorities have asked Twitter and Facebook to help identify users sharing blasphemous material, and have distributed text messages encouraging Pakistanis to report fellow citizens, according to the Guardian. Human rights defenders have expressed concern that the zealous application of the country’s blasphemy laws provides a tool for people to carry out personal vendettas, particularly because nobody is ever punished for making false accusations.

“The casual manner in which death sentences are handed in blasphemy cases coupled with the lack of orientation of Pakistani courts with technology makes this a very dangerous situation,” Saroop Ijaz, a lawyer with Human Rights Watch in Pakistan, told the Guardian.

“Such sentences will embolden those who want to wrongly frame people,” he said, noting with concern that Saturday’s sentence was handed down by an anti-terrorism court, not a regular court. “The confusion between national security and religion is very alarming,” Ijaz said.

The death sentence is part of a larger campaign of suppression: The Federal Investigation Agency recently detained dozens of social media users for posting “anti-military” content, including journalists and supporters of the opposition Pakistan Tehreek-e Insaf (PTI) party, one of whom shared a satirical photo of prime minister Nawaz Sharif.

While Raza is the first person sentenced to death for blasphemy on social media, several others are on death row for alleged blasphemy in public. Among them is Asia Bibi, a Christian woman convicted in 2010 after a row with two Muslim women in a village in Punjab. With a long-awaited final appeal adjourned, Bibi is still in solitary confinement.

In Pakistan, blasphemy is so contentious that the mere mention of unfounded allegations can ignite mass uproar. In April, a mob at a north-western university took 23-year-old Mashal Khan from his dormitory and lynched him, angered by accusations that Khan had offended Islam.

Last week, a joint investigation concluded the baseless allegations had been a conspiracy by some students and university staff.

In May, a 10-year-old boy was killed when a mob tried to storm a police station in Balochistan in anger at a man held on blasphemy charges. Four people were sentenced to death for blasphemy last year, according to the HRCP.