A Grave Issue, Accountability
When citizens become alarmed about a situation that they feel has the potential to imperil them it's somehow heartening to learn that they take up the initiative to state their apprehensions, to take steps to turn the situation around, or at the very least ensure that those whose activities are causing them distress are made fully aware of it, and the reasons for that concern. Call it democratic action, social activism, worldly awareness, self responsibility, but it's an integral part of our society to take steps to resolve such issues.
This is precisely what has occurred when some very aware members of the public formed a delegation and brought their case before the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. For the purpose of airing their concerns, for the larger purpose of attempting to persuade the Commission that the McMaster University low-power nuclear facility in Hamilton poses a potential threat to the health and safety of residents, not to speak of the wider Canadian community should vital materials and information fall into the wrong hands.
One of the delegation, Michael Devolin from Tweed, Ontario ventured that, in the face of public fear and objections and the very real possibility that something could conceivably go awry, political correctness should be pushed aside for the urgent purpose of weighing the possibility that some members of the university staff might represent a hidden danger to the community and to the country.
"I have the right in this country to feel fear for my life," Mr. Devolin stated: "I strongly object - precisely because of the fact that many of its staff are not only Muslims, but also, and more importantly, because [they] originate from countries where the generally desired efficacy of Islam as a religion is hatred and acts of violence".
This is the kind of observation that makes most Canadians wince, a stab at Canadian openness and acceptance of others not reflective of traditional Canadian culture, society and religion. But given recent activities throughout the world by Islamic fundamentalists, turned toward terrorism as a fearsome type of persuasion, perhaps understandable.
All the more so when he is joined by another member of the delegation, a Syrian man living in Ottawa whose stand on the issue is unequivocal and damning: "This country is the most naive country in the world," according to Georges Jarpour, questioning McMaster's commitment and ability in preventing a terrorist event through the use of the nuclear facility.
"I could be a jihadist, who would know? I could have a bomb in my bag... If I had a bomb strapped to my chest, would anyone know? Welcome to the world of the Middle East" he warned with the admonition that security officials are complacently lax and "need to think like a terrorist, not like a Canadian".
Most of us would like to think, actually do think, that these peoples' fears are more imagined than real, and the potential of harm emanating from this source is not at all likely. But do we really know? "Is there even the slightest possibility of the knowledge they (the Muslim staff) garner from McMaster university's nuclear research programme one day becoming complicit in catastrophic acts of terrorism?" asked Mr. Devolin.
McMaster's president, Peter George, clearly aghast at the very suggestion of such an unlikely scenario, calling into question the reliability of the university's security apparatus, and even more so, labelling staff at the university as potential terrorists, termed the presentation "deeply racist and offensive" replete with "scandalous allegations".
Indeed, McMaster has launched a lawsuit against author Paul Williams whose book claims that al-Qaeda agents have infiltrated the reactor, and absconded with a significant amount of nuclear or radioactive materials. This, to serve the purpose of a planned detonation by terrorists in manufacturing their own nuclear devices to make a significant jihadist impact in North America. And wouldn't it just?
Dr. George had his work cut out for him in the face of that strenuous opposition, in assuring the Nuclear Safety Commission panel that the university's board of governors take safety and security on campus as a high priority. "No material has been lost or stolen" he asserted. The university arranged for extensive upgrades to their security infrastructure prior to their request for renewal. The final decision on the operating license will be released in 30 days.
Yet isn't it a sobering thought that this low-grade reactor could feasibly be infiltrated, and materials slip away? After all, Canada has somewhat of a history of enabling questionable administrations in their pursuit of nuclear energy. Kindly, innocent Canada, incapable of believing that scientists from abroad could possibly seek to deceive, and turn Canada's assistance in achieving civil-use nuclear generation to bomb-making.
In fact, Canada sold to India and assisted in the operational set-up of a plutonium-producing unit in the mid 1950s. Canada, in its great naivete, dismissed the military potential it was enabling, because India assured this country it had no intention whatever to step beyond peaceful pursuits. The rest is history. India managed, quite handily to explode its first nuclear bomb in 1974.
But there's a lot more history, too. India's neighbour Pakistan, nervous about that very potential, and stating their concern to Canada ten years previously, then set about ensuring that it had adequate deterrent capability against the threat of an Indian nuclear device. Their nuclear scientist of note procured his training through work at a Dutch-British-West German nuclear facility in the Netherlands.
And it was their nuclear scientific champion, Dr. Abdul Quadeer Khan who so generously sold out nuclear weapons science and technology to other solid world citizen countries like Iran, Libya and North Korea. Not the most stable countries in the world, ruled by the most highly intelligent and principled leaders by a long shot.
That's about how reliable Canada's safety and security intelligence- and scientific-sharing community is. We're so wedded to our image as a peaceful and helpful nation, that we cannot conceive of other countries conducting scientific espionage on our soil, or wheedling restricted data or obtaining materials from our storehouse of resources.
We're the quintessential babes in the woods.
This is precisely what has occurred when some very aware members of the public formed a delegation and brought their case before the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. For the purpose of airing their concerns, for the larger purpose of attempting to persuade the Commission that the McMaster University low-power nuclear facility in Hamilton poses a potential threat to the health and safety of residents, not to speak of the wider Canadian community should vital materials and information fall into the wrong hands.
One of the delegation, Michael Devolin from Tweed, Ontario ventured that, in the face of public fear and objections and the very real possibility that something could conceivably go awry, political correctness should be pushed aside for the urgent purpose of weighing the possibility that some members of the university staff might represent a hidden danger to the community and to the country.
"I have the right in this country to feel fear for my life," Mr. Devolin stated: "I strongly object - precisely because of the fact that many of its staff are not only Muslims, but also, and more importantly, because [they] originate from countries where the generally desired efficacy of Islam as a religion is hatred and acts of violence".
This is the kind of observation that makes most Canadians wince, a stab at Canadian openness and acceptance of others not reflective of traditional Canadian culture, society and religion. But given recent activities throughout the world by Islamic fundamentalists, turned toward terrorism as a fearsome type of persuasion, perhaps understandable.
All the more so when he is joined by another member of the delegation, a Syrian man living in Ottawa whose stand on the issue is unequivocal and damning: "This country is the most naive country in the world," according to Georges Jarpour, questioning McMaster's commitment and ability in preventing a terrorist event through the use of the nuclear facility.
"I could be a jihadist, who would know? I could have a bomb in my bag... If I had a bomb strapped to my chest, would anyone know? Welcome to the world of the Middle East" he warned with the admonition that security officials are complacently lax and "need to think like a terrorist, not like a Canadian".
Most of us would like to think, actually do think, that these peoples' fears are more imagined than real, and the potential of harm emanating from this source is not at all likely. But do we really know? "Is there even the slightest possibility of the knowledge they (the Muslim staff) garner from McMaster university's nuclear research programme one day becoming complicit in catastrophic acts of terrorism?" asked Mr. Devolin.
McMaster's president, Peter George, clearly aghast at the very suggestion of such an unlikely scenario, calling into question the reliability of the university's security apparatus, and even more so, labelling staff at the university as potential terrorists, termed the presentation "deeply racist and offensive" replete with "scandalous allegations".
Indeed, McMaster has launched a lawsuit against author Paul Williams whose book claims that al-Qaeda agents have infiltrated the reactor, and absconded with a significant amount of nuclear or radioactive materials. This, to serve the purpose of a planned detonation by terrorists in manufacturing their own nuclear devices to make a significant jihadist impact in North America. And wouldn't it just?
Dr. George had his work cut out for him in the face of that strenuous opposition, in assuring the Nuclear Safety Commission panel that the university's board of governors take safety and security on campus as a high priority. "No material has been lost or stolen" he asserted. The university arranged for extensive upgrades to their security infrastructure prior to their request for renewal. The final decision on the operating license will be released in 30 days.
Yet isn't it a sobering thought that this low-grade reactor could feasibly be infiltrated, and materials slip away? After all, Canada has somewhat of a history of enabling questionable administrations in their pursuit of nuclear energy. Kindly, innocent Canada, incapable of believing that scientists from abroad could possibly seek to deceive, and turn Canada's assistance in achieving civil-use nuclear generation to bomb-making.
In fact, Canada sold to India and assisted in the operational set-up of a plutonium-producing unit in the mid 1950s. Canada, in its great naivete, dismissed the military potential it was enabling, because India assured this country it had no intention whatever to step beyond peaceful pursuits. The rest is history. India managed, quite handily to explode its first nuclear bomb in 1974.
But there's a lot more history, too. India's neighbour Pakistan, nervous about that very potential, and stating their concern to Canada ten years previously, then set about ensuring that it had adequate deterrent capability against the threat of an Indian nuclear device. Their nuclear scientist of note procured his training through work at a Dutch-British-West German nuclear facility in the Netherlands.
And it was their nuclear scientific champion, Dr. Abdul Quadeer Khan who so generously sold out nuclear weapons science and technology to other solid world citizen countries like Iran, Libya and North Korea. Not the most stable countries in the world, ruled by the most highly intelligent and principled leaders by a long shot.
That's about how reliable Canada's safety and security intelligence- and scientific-sharing community is. We're so wedded to our image as a peaceful and helpful nation, that we cannot conceive of other countries conducting scientific espionage on our soil, or wheedling restricted data or obtaining materials from our storehouse of resources.
We're the quintessential babes in the woods.
Labels: Canada, Crisis Politics
posted by Pieface | 4:52 PM
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