Treason Law

It seems like such an anachronism; an anti-treason law. So out of the 18th, 19th Century. Who might have thought that in the 21st Century with all our advances in civil law and the security of nations we would have to resurrect something like a treason law? But who might have thought that there would erupt on the world scene a dread ideology born out of a religion that exhorted its faithful to violent jihad; that there would be a need?

If there had been a treason law, Canadians of Serbian descent who went abroad to fight with the Serbs against NATO troops seeking to bring an end to the Balkan conflict between Albanians, Serbs, Croats and Muslim Bosnians, would have faced a far sterner penalty for their choice than did occur. Any country must consider that its population stands with it at times of conflict. Yet people are conflicted over loyalties between their countries of origin and their country of later migration.

During the Second World War people of Italian descent felt dreadfully uneasy about their country of origin being part of the Axis group while their adopted country was part of the Allied group, and choices had to be made, difficult ones. Those, despite their difficulties and the anguish that they caused, appear light-weight in comparison to the current situation where some Muslim Canadians feel compelled to answer a call to jihad.

That jihad is directed against the Western, democratic, enlightened countries of the world, primarily Christian, where battle cries of Crusaders! and Infidels! are heard to ring out along with Allahu Akbar! There is a problem within Canada of a stealthy infiltration of Islamists, just as that same problem exists in the Middle East, in Africa, in Europe and the United States of immigrants who have aligned themselves with the concept of political Islam.

The steadily growing phenomenon of political Islam where violent jihad is enjoined in a battle against the values of the West, to create conditions for Islamofascism to take the ascendancy with an eventual acceptance of Sharia law globally under a universal caliphate subjugating the West to its will as a reflection of historical longing to create a renaissance represents a real problem.

And real problems require real consequences resulting from dealing with those problems. When young Canadian men are recruited in Canadian mosques to go overseas and receive training in violent, militant jihad so they may take part in what Islamists consider a struggle to overcome Western influence and power, or return home to launch terrorist attacks, it is a problem requiring to be addressed.

The Criminal Code of Canada currently discharges an obligation to charge someone if they assist "An enemy at war with Canada, or any armed forces against whom Canadian Forces are engaged in hostilities, whether or not a state of war exists between Canad and the country whose forces they are", the conviction of which is an automatic life sentence in prison.

But a law to be enacted for "high treason" would see someone so charged and found guilty stripped of citizenship. If such a law were to be enacted, the "life sentence" in prison which might represent 20 to 25 years' imprisonment would also mean that without citizenship, the eventually discharged prisoner would find no place within Canada to resume residence.

Were such a law to be enacted it would mean by definition that someone like Omar Khadr and his extended family, would be in line for having their citizenship revoked. It would mean that they would have to return to Pakistan or Egypt permanently. It would mean that they would have no place in Canada, to foment their brand of hatred, and to receive all the benefits of Canadian citizenship.