Canadian Diplomats Suing Their Government

"Throughout the crisis, Canada downplayed the seriousness of the situation, hoarded and concealed critical health and safety information, and gave false, misleading and incomplete information to diplomatic staff."
"[Global Affairs] actively interfered with the plaintiffs' attempts to receive proper health care, including going so far as instructing hospitals to stop testing and treating them."
"Despite knowing of the risks of Havana Syndrome early on, Canada continued to put its diplomats and their families in harm's way by sending them to Havana and requiring them to stay there despite becoming aware of the high and growing risk that they would sustain the brain injuries associated with Havana Syndrome."
Statement of Claim, $28-Million Lawsuit

"We knew there was something [happening] but we just couldn't figure out what was going on. Living in Cuba [as diplomatic staff] we understood that our houses were bugged."
"It just hit me, 'Holy crap, this [symptoms such as nausea, headaches, nosebleeds, hearing and eye problems from an unknown source] is going on in my house'."
"At the low point, I thought I was going to throw up. I was nauseous like you wouldn't believe. I don't know whether I went back to sleep or passed out."
Diplomat Allan (names withheld)

"My belief 21 months later is that decisions were made that simply did not prioritize us, not our health, not our safety and not that of our families."
"I am angry, yes. I am disappointed and I am sad. I am sad because there is no justification for not having considered the personal and lifelong impact this was going to have on us."
Diplomat Baker (generic names used for anonymity)

A view of the Canadian Embassy in Havana, Cuba, on Thursday, Oct. 29, 2009. (Franklin Reyes/Associated Press)

Five Canadian diplomats assigned to posts in Cuba, and 14 of their family members have filed a law suit against the federal government resulting from the mysterious illness they suffered while posted to Cuba and living in Havana. According to the suit the Canadian government which is responsible for the well-being of all Canadians and in particular their staff abroad, failed to inform, protect, treat and support them at a time of need.

Canadian families in Havana, the lawsuit states, "have been targeted and injured, suffering severe and traumatic harm by means that are not clear but may be some type of sonic or microwave weapon". And nor have Canadians been the sole targets. In fact American diplomats have been exposed and have suffered identical symptoms and injuries in their posting to Cuba. The affliction they all suffer from is now known as Havana Syndrome.

The government of Cuba claims to be just as mystified regarding the source of the syndrome as the U.S. and Canadians. Co-operation between all three governments to find the source of the problem has been welcomed, but no answers to the questions have resulted. The United States decided to dramatically reduce the number of diplomatic staff until such time as the matter can be more fully understood. It took Canada quite a while longer to decide not to permit family members to accompany diplomatic staff assigned to Cuba to accompany them.

Two years ago healthy diplomatic staff and their family members were beginning to experience peculiar symptoms; nosebleeds, headaches that appeared to have no explanation. Excruciating headaches would afflict them upon waking in the morning followed by nausea and problems with vision. The Allen family received no warning or information from the embassy or from Global Affairs, but a neighbouring U.S. diplomat who knew of the problem and whose own experience echoed that of the Allens, disclosed the situation to him.

Their feelings of fear, extreme irritability, nausea, headaches, nosebleeds had an unknown cause, but the situation was known to those who had earlier gone through the trauma. At the point when Allen was informed he was also told that a dozen Americans had been evacuated from Havana once it was ascertained that something strange was causing them to suffer those headaches, nosebleeds, hearing and eye problems. The Americans too were sworn to secrecy about the issue.

Eventually the Allen family was sent to the University of Miami for testing. A doctor there had examined about twenty Americans with similar symptoms, who had also been based in Havana. He diagnosed all four members of the Allen family with traumatic brain injuries similar to symptoms from concussions, recommending the children not return to Cuba: "They need to be away from Cuba for awhile".

Yet according to the lawsuit the Canadian embassy refused to send the Allen children back to Canada. The very fact that the Canadian diplomatic staff who knew about the situation were ordered to be silent about the issue, not to discuss anything with other staff newly arrived, knowing nothing of what was transpiring, did not impress these newly-diagnosed Canadians very positively.

Another diplomatic family, Diplomat Davies, wife and two young children were experiencing strange things in their house in Havana in the spring and summer of 2017 where the young daughter was increasingly unable to concentrate at school, suffering from nausea, tinnitus, sensitivity to light, visual impairment and sudden nosebleeds. Mrs. Davies lost her sense of balance, reported hearing high-pitched sounds. "I no longer knew where was up and where was down", she informed her husband after a strange fall.

She was diagnosed with damage to her vestibular system; parts of the inner ear and brain that process sensory information, was hypersensitive to light and noise, suffered from headaches, dizziness and muscle twitching. By all these accounts it is manifest that the government of Canada has failed in its obligation to its employees, to keep them safe from harm and to respond to their needs. The diplomats and their families are now undergoing tests at Dalhousie University's Brain Repair Centre.

The research and tests there have pointed out leakages in their blood brain barriers consistent with symptoms of concussions. When Global Affairs appeared to hesitate about the need to ensure that these people were given swift medical attention, several of the families travelled to University of Pennsylvania after officials there had offered to assess and treat Canadians, but the offer was turned down by the federal government.

All sound reasons to demand attention and remedial action, even if it was recognized that such would only be forthcoming through the compelling action of a lawsuit.

A Peculiarly Aggravated Hardship Post

"[Their symptoms are comparable to head injuries suffered as a result of a car crash] where you have gone high speed to stopping instantly with airbags deploying."
"I know many different things can cause injury to the brain ... however, this sounds and looks like trauma. It looks like a concussion. What caused it, I have no idea."
"I am interested in the cause. Normally the trauma is easy to identify. It helps me with prognosis. With this I can't even speculate, I just don't know the trauma."
Dr. Shawn Marshall, medical director, Acquired Brain Injury Rehabilitation Program, The Ottawa Hospital

A man walks beside Canada's embassy in Havana, Cuba. Desmond Boylan/The Canadian Press

A year and a half ago it was revealed that American and Canadian diplomats serving their countries' embassies in Cuba had been struck by a series of conditions mysteriously contracted. There was no detectable physical force that assailed them, rather some mentioned that they became conscious of strange sounds impacting their hearing for which they were unable to account, and soon afterward stranger symptoms occurred in a range of effects from dizziness to forgetfulness, extreme fatigue and generalized unwellness.

Medical attention was required and it was given but the source of the illness much less its impact continued to puzzle doctors. People suffering various symptoms still remain affected a full year and more on. Some are unable to return to work. Tests indicate that they have suffered brain trauma of some kind from some unknown source. But the answers remain elusive. And the two missions remain operational. Now Canada's Department of Foreign Affairs has announced that another -- the thirteenth Canadian -- diplomat has returned to Canada struck with the same symptoms.

Both governments continue to study the situation, trying to understand just what is now being referred to as "Havana syndrome" is. There have been few answers that can be relied upon to explain the nature of the attacks and who is responsible for them. The government of Cuba attests that it is as puzzled as any of those affected and has stated its willingness to cooperate in any way it possibly can with the U.S. and Canadian investigators. Speculation has gone further afield, to China or Russia.

Given the Russian Federation's penchant for mischief it seems likely, though logically improbable, that Russian President Vladimir Putin who enjoys nothing more than causing consternation to the global community by his volatile and disturbingly violent moves is likely to be involved. A man who walks away from sanctions imposed because he orders another country's territory invaded and its border altered to benefit Russia, who sends military personnel and weaponry to support insurgents, who dispatches assassins to another country, and whose chief of secret service suddenly dies is capable of anything.

Both the U.S. and Canada believe their diplomats have been targeted using an unknown technology, and both the FBI and RCMP are investigating. Some feel microwaves causing sonic attacks are involved, an advanced technology not known to researchers. The attacks all occurred at homes where diplomats were living in Havana. Canada made changes at the mission after 12 of its diplomats and family members including children were attacked; for one thing Havana was changed to an "unaccompanied" post; family members no longer encouraged to join diplomats.


Some of the victims describe a strange sound they likened to "sheet metal in the wind", and then their noses began bleeding. Some struggle to cope with daily life and others have returned to work, but all reported a range of symptoms known to occur with traumatic head injuries; dizziness, difficulty walking, headaches, lack of concentration. These are the types of symptoms ordinarily associated with post-concussion syndrome, despite an absence of physical trauma.

Dr. Marshall has been treating some of the affected diplomats posted to Havana and returned to Canada. Though American researchers point to microwaves as unconventional weapons possibly the cause of the trauma, nothing has been confirmed. Dr. Marshall is in touch with researchers in the U.S. himself intrigued and anxious to know the cause. Moreover, Dr. Marshall believes that among those he is treating some were exposed more than once.

These were strange incidents occurring at night when the diplomatic staff and their families were in their private residences. Afterward they began experiencing difficulty walking, stumbling, unable to tolerate light and noise and had problems sleeping. Though the syndrome still affects some of his patients dramatically, Dr. Marshall is encouraged that others are improving. Therapies include pain medication for headaches and difficulties with sleep; counselling for irritability and mood problems; vision therapy and physiotherapy.


Sources within the government state that of the dozen Canadians previously affected, one reported feeling a sensation of waves or pulses arriving strangely through the atmosphere before symptoms occurred whereas in all other instances, those affected became aware of their injuries only when they began to experience symptoms. In the latest case, the individual was unable to recall any particular incident that might have triggered his symptoms.

A view of the Canadian Embassy in Havana, Cuba. A 13th person has reported 'unusual health symptoms' while stationed there. (Franklin Reyes/Associated Press)