Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird announced the requirement, dismissing Syrian government claims that al-Qaeda was responsible for two suicide attacks in the country. “Canada will continue to put the squeeze on the Assad regime,” he said. “We will not sit idly by, not while Assad and his thugs continue to violate the rights of the Syrian people.”

However, Baird could not say how much money and property Canadian banks were holding for the 33 senior Syrian government and military officials and 10 primarily state-run companies affected by the asset freeze. “The financial institutions will be required immediately to review their accounts to find out how much is available and the RCMP will work with that. Until those reviews have taken place, we can’t say to what extent their assets are here.”

In addition to the asset freeze, Baird said Canada will prohibit all imports from Syria, with the exception of food. Nor will Canadian companies be allowed to make any new investments in the country or export equipment, including software for the monitoring of telephone and Internet communications.

“Assad is cut off. His disgusting brand of violence must stop and come to an end, he must go,” the minister said, reiterating the government’s call for all Canadians still in Syria to leave by any means necessary. “The Syrian people have endured a violent repression of their calls for basic freedoms and the rights that are essential to human dignity.”

This new round of sanctions is the fourth imposed by the federal government since May in response to the Assad regime’s crackdown on opponents.

Baird’s rhetoric appeared to please members of the Syrian National Council (SNC) opposition movement who were in Ottawa Friday to meet with the minister and Foreign Affairs officials. The organization, which claims to represent all the main factions opposed to Assad, wants Canada to take the lead in encouraging other western governments to recognize the SNC as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people.

Ahmad Ramadan, a member of the SNC executive committee, described the meeting with Baird and his bureaucrats as “very successful, very constructive.”

In a later interview he noted that the fact Baird was willing to meeting formally with the SNC is a de facto recognition of the organization’s legitimacy. But Ramadan also said the purpose of the meeting was not only to gain recognition for the SNC, but also to discuss what role Canada might play in aiding the transition to a post-Assad Syria, particularly in regard to ensuring stability in the country.

SNC delegates asked Baird to withdraw Canada’s diplomatic mission from Damascus as a way to further delegitimize the Assad regime and, according to Ramadan, were told “it would happen soon.”

The SNC wants the international community to establish safe havens within Syria where protesters and those opposed to the Assad regime can be safe. “We asked the Canadian government to help convince some countries, some governments in the UN Security Council to bring forward a resolution that will help in the protection of civilians in Syria,” said SNC representative Obaida Nahhas.

Baird shied away, however, from questions about possible Canadian and international military involvement in Syria.

The United Nations says more than 5,000 people have died since mass protests against Assad erupted in March. The violence continued on Friday with reports of two suicide bomb attacks on security service bases in the Damascus, which killed 44 people and injured 166 others. They were the first suicide bombings in the country since the uprising began, and the first against the powerful security services in the heart of the capital.

Syrian authorities blamed al-Qaida for the attacks, which came a day after the arrival of an advance team making preparations for Arab League observers to oversee a plan to end the violence.

The Syrian government claims that more than 2,000 security force personnel have been killed in attacks by armed rebels since March, but the regime’s behaviour has received considerable condemnation from both Arab and Western countries. So far, though, the UN Security Council has failed to agree on any formal resolution on Syria.

Russia and China have already vetoed one resolution proposed by European countries condemning the Assad regime. They accused the West of engaging in regime change in Syria. For their part, the European countries say a proposed Russian resolution on Syria is not tough enough.

Baird, meanwhile, questioned the credibility of claims that al-Qaeda was behind Friday’s bombings, citing previous Assad denials that any violence was taking place within the country. “If it wasn’t so serious it would almost be comical,” he said.

The minister predicted that Assad’s regime would fall sooner or later. “Assad will fall, the government will fall, it’s only a matter of time.”

Baird voiced support for the SNC, saying it had made progress in establishing its credibility as a possible partner as Canada and its allies push for Assad and his government to step aside. However, he stopped short of fully endorsing it.

Nonetheless, Ramadan said the minister had reassured them such recognition was on the horizon, but that their lack of a presence on the ground in Syria was a key stumbling block. “We have been told that it is coming,” he said. “Mr. Baird told me they will be working on this.”

Ramadan also dismissed the Syrian government’s claims that al-Qaida was responsible for the twin suicide bombings. “The regime itself is responsible for these explosions in order to divert the world’s attention from the violations of human rights that the regime itself is committing against the civilian population,” he said.

The SNC representatives met later at Carleton University with members of the Syrian Canadian Council to brief them on what has been taking place in the country and to outline the SNC efforts to establish itself as legitimate political alternative to the Assad regime. About 25 people attended the meeting.

The SNC representatives acknowledged that nine months ago, few could have imagined Assad’s regime would be on the brink of collapse. Now, though, as Ramadan put it, “Assad has lost all legitimacy, domestically and internationally. He is going to fall.”

Asked whether a post-Assad Syrian government would end hostilities with Israel and sign a peace accord with the Jewish state, Ramadan equivocated. “The new Syria will be a true factor for stability in the region, particularly with its neighbours.

“The new Syria will demand the return of the territories under Israel occupation,” he added in reference to the Golan Heights.

ottawacitizen

“There is a feeling of optimism, a feeling of participation,” Leslie Campbell, a director with the Washington, D.C.-based National Democratic Institute, said Monday from Cairo. “Outside of many polling stations, you got the feeling that this is a turning point, that they’re getting to cast a ballot for the party of their choice.”

He said the positive tone of the Egyptian election comes as a relief after violent protests last week had many worried about how this process would play out.

“Most Egyptians were very discouraged about the future, discouraged about where the revolution was going,” he said.

The overall elections, which consists of multiple rounds, will not result in a new government until the new year. The current round was scheduled for Monday and Tuesday. It marks an important milestone in being the first chance Egyptians have had to choose their government since the fall of former president Hosni Mubarak amid protests nine months ago.

Campbell noted that because turnout was higher than expected, polling hours were extended by two hours Monday.

He said there was a heavy presence of military and police at polling stations, but from what he could tell, voters were comforted rather than threatened by it.

“I talked to a couple of Egyptians and I said, ‘How do you feel about all this security?’ and they said that they felt reassured; it gave them a feeling that things were under control.”

Now based in Washington, Campbell is a Canadian who has previously worked for Canadian politicians, such as former federal NDP leader Audrey McLaughlin and ex-Manitoba premier Gary Doer, who is now Canada’s ambassador to the United States.

Because of the distractions the protests caused leading up to this election, Campbell said campaign efforts only became highly visible in the days just prior to voting.

He said campaigning continued during voting, with many candidates and party agents greeting people waiting in line outside polling stations. In some instances, political organizations were providing snacks and drinks for those waiting to vote, Campbell said.

“Some of these polling places were extremely lively with the campaigning, with the brochures, with the get-out-the-vote efforts,” he said. “Let’s put it this way, you really had a sense that there was a contest.”

While it’s his understanding that campaigning so close to a polling station on election day is illegal in Egypt, as it is in Canada, Campbell said he did not see police or military trying to prevent such activities. He added that people were generally happy to get more information on the people and parties running for office.

canada.com

The Canadian and Irish boats with 27 activists from the US and eight other countries on board had set sail from Turkey on Wednesday.

They were carrying medical supplies for the coastal enclave.

The navy said no-one was hurt in the operation and the boats would be towed to the Israeli port of Ashdod, north-east of Gaza.

The Irish Saoirse (Gaelic for freedom) and the Canadian Tahrir (Arabic for liberation) were about 50 nautical miles from the Gaza shoreline when they were contacted by the Israeli navy and told to turn back, the flotilla organizers said.

The navy said it “advised the vessels that they may turn back at any point, thereby not breaking the maritime security blockade” or could sail to Ashdod or an Egyptian port.

“The activists refused to co-operate,” AFP quoted the navy as saying.

This time there appeared to be little prospect of a violent confrontation. An organizer on the Canadian boat, Ehab Lotayef, a Canadian electrical engineer of Egyptian origin, said in a video message on Wednesday after leaving Turkey that the participants “are not going to challenge Israel physically. We are a peaceful mission that is committed to the safety of the personnel on board” the two vessels, he said.

Mr. Lotayef added that the goal was “to say that the blockade is illegal and inhumane.”

“We would want to see everybody manage to go to Gaza freely from any country in the world,” he added.

BBC & New York Times

The Israeli military spokesman’s office said the country’s navy was “prepared to contact” the vessels and had “completed the necessary preparations in order to prevent them from reaching the Gaza Strip”.

The Canadian boat Tahrir and the Irish boat MV Saoirse left the port of Fethiye in southwest Turkey on Wednesday after Turkish authorities gave them permission to sail to the Greek island of Rhodes.

Al Jazeera’s Casey Kauffman, on board one of the ships, said that in total it would be a 50-hour journey, and they were currently one-fifth of the way there.

“Everyone on the boat wants to get to Gaza,” he said, adding that while the activists are prepared for the possibility of an Israeli interception, the initiative will not be wasted.

“It will still bring attention to the situation in Gaza, and the blockade of the Gaza Strip.”

Lieutenant-Colonel Avital Leibovich, an Israeli military official, would not say how the boats might be stopped, saying only “we will have to assess and see if we are facing violent passengers.”

Describing their journey as a “provocation”, she said Israel would offer to unload any aid supplies on board and deliver them to Gaza.

Sailing under the flag of the Comoros Islands, the Tahrir is carrying six activists, a captain and five journalists.

The Saoirse – sailing under the US flag – has 12 Irish nationals on board, none of whom are journalists.

‘Support from Turkish society’

David Heap, a member of the steering committee on board the Tahrir, told Al Jazeera that the activists chose to leave from Fethiye because of the strained relations between Turkey and Israel.

“The Turkish government has been creating more distance from Israel diplomatically and we know there is support from Turkish society for what we are doing.

“Our judgment was that the Turkish state would not interfere with us if we didn’t make too much of a public issue of our plan to depart from there,” Heap told Al Jazeera.

t will take at least a couple of days before the boats reach the Palestinian waters of the Gaza Strip, where they expect to be approached by the Israeli navy.

“We have some distance to cover between where we are now and Palestinian territorial waters of Gaza.

“Obviously we are going to avoid going through Israeli territorial waters.

“Our plan is to go directly from international waters into the territorial waters of Gaza – within a couple of days.

The activists say the new attempt the break the siege on the Gaza Strip is part of a campaign they call “freedom waves”, implying that more such efforts will follow.

Both ships were part of previous attempts to break the siege on the Gaza Strip that was stalled when the Greek government refused to let a flotilla leave from its shores in July this year.

The Tahrir, the larger ship of the two, was intercepted by the Greek coast guard with more than 30 pro-Palestinian activists onboard.

Two of them were detained for defying Greece’s ban on setting sail to Gaza. The vessel was stopped about 10 minutes after it left port on the island of Crete.

The Irish boat allegedly suffered damage when it was sabotaged while waiting to join the flotilla from Turkish waters. The ship has since been repaired and kept in dry-dock in Turkey.

aljazeera

Engineer Abdullah Almalki, 40, was arrested in Syria in 2002 on the basis of information provided by Canadian authorities who suspected him of terrorism. He returned to Canada in 2004 and was cleared of all accusations.

In an interview with CBC at a demonstration in Ottawa against Syria’s months-long crackdown on pro-democracy protests, Almalki said Canada was contributing to repression through its oil interests.

“The oil and gas revenues do not go to the benefit of the Syrian people — it goes to the Assad regime,” he said, referring to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, whose family has ruled the country for four decades.

“Nowadays they’re being used to supply the killing machine, to supply the rounds, the bullets and the salaries of the thugs of the government who are killing day in, day out.”

The Canadian oil firm Suncor has invested some $1.2 billion in Syria in a partnership with Syria’s state-run General Petroleum Corporation to exploit oil and gas fields in central Syria.

Canada, along with the United States and European countries, has imposed a series of economic and political sanctions on Syrian officials and banned the supply of any arms that could be used against protesters.

The West has yet to impose sanctions on Syria’s oil and gas industry, seen as a key source of income for the government.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Friday called on all countries to cease buying oil and gas from Syria in order to protest the violence against demonstrators, but did not mention any countries specifically.
AFP

Hassan Diab, a Lebanese-born Canadian who taught sociology at both the University of Ottawa and Carleton University, was arrested in Gatineau, Que., in November 2008 at the request of French authorities.

Ontario Superior Court Justice Robert Maranger signed the committal order on Monday morning in an Ottawa courtroom, giving Justice Minister Rob Nicholson the final decision on whether to transfer Diab to French authorities.

Maranger ordered Diab taken into custody, saying Canada’s extradition treaty with France requires him to rule the 57-year-old must be surrendered. But the judge also said France has presented a “weak case” that is “unlikely” to result in a conviction.

Diab, in a statement following the ruling, denied any role in the bombing, while his lawyer René Duval said his client would appeal the decision.

“I am innocent of the charges against me,” Diab said. “I will take every legal opportunity to clear my name and I look forward to the day in which I can reclaim my life.”

France alleges Diab was a member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine who made and planted a bomb that killed four people and injured more than 40 others on Oct. 3, 1980, outside the Copernic Street synagogue in Paris.

But Diab insists his case is one of mistaken identity.

Stamps in Diab’s 1980 passport indicated he was not in France at the time of the bombing. But his handwriting allegedly appears on a hotel registration card — evidence his lawyers have vigorously disputed.

At his extradition hearing last November, Diab’s lawyer argued French investigators are basing their allegations on “secret, unsourced intelligence.”

A spokeswoman for Nicholson said Monday the justice ministry does not comment on matters of extradition.

In France, Diab would face charges of murder and attempted murder and face life in prison if convicted.

CBC

Reports of the killings, including in the southern town of Izraa and the Damascus suburb of Douma, could not be independently confirmed because Syria has expelled foreign journalists.

Ammar Qurabi, the head of Syria’s National Organization for Human Rights, confirmed at least 11 dead on Saturday. A total of 112 were killed Friday — considered the deadliest day of the uprising, with security forces beating back protesters with bullets, tear gas and stun guns.

The violence and the likelihood that more protests may occur prompted Canada’s Foreign Affairs Department to advise Canadians against travel to the country and Canadians living in Syria to leave by commercial means while they’re still available. The department said those requiring emergency assistance should contact the Canadian Embassy in Damascus.

Over the last five weeks, funerals of demonstrators have often turned into anti-government protests. During Saturday’s procession in Izraa, thousands of people were shouting slogans against President Bashar Assad’s regime as they carried coffins through the streets.

Also Saturday, two members of parliament and a religious leader resigned to protest the killing of demonstrators during the uprising against Assad.

The two legislators, Nasser Hariri and Khalil Rifai, are from Daraa, a southern region that unleashed the protest movement in mid-March. Activists in touch with the politicians confirmed the resignations.

In addition, Sheikh Rizq Abdul-Rahim Abazeid stepped down from his post as the mufti of Daraa. “I cannot tolerate the blood of our innocent sons and children being shed,” he said.

Each Friday, growing numbers of people in cities across the country have taken to the streets despite swift attacks from security forces.

The heavy security crackdown on Friday and Saturday came after Assad warned a week ago that any further unrest would be considered “sabotage” after he made the gesture of lifting a decades-old state of emergency, which had given security forces almost blanket powers for surveillance and arrest.

Journalists banned from trouble spots

With foreign journalists unable to get into Syria and others prevented from gaining access to trouble spots, much of the reporting in the country has depended on video phone footage distributed by opposition activists.

Syrian human rights groups have called on the government to set up a judicial investigation committee to prosecute those who shot at protesters and release all political detainees.

Some 300 people have been killed since the uprising began last month.

Several world leaders have condemned the crackdown on protesters.

“This outrageous use of violence to quell protests must come to an end now,” U.S. President Barack Obama said Friday.

Jerzy Buzek, president of the European Parliament, urged the Syrian government to stop the “bloodshed,” allow media freedoms and release “all prisoners of conscience.”

Photo: Syrian anti-government protesters hold up a bloodied national flag during Saturday’s funeral procession for slain activists in Izraa. This image was captured on a mobile phone and sent to AP.

CBC

Canada also declared a Yemen-based group affiliated with al Qaeda a terrorist organization on Friday, a move that allows the government to prosecute Canadians linked to it.

Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula was blamed for this year’s attempt to destroy planes using bomb-laden toner cartridges as well as a foiled attempt to blow up a plane near Detroit on Christmas Day 2009.

The designation makes it illegal for Canadians to work with the group or contribute money to it, and it gives law enforcement officials the authority to seize financial assets the group may have in Canada.

Dialogue

Mrs. Hilary Childs-Adams, Ambassador of Canada to Lebanon said following a meeting with MP Bahia Hariri in Sidon on Friday that dialogue is the only way to resolve the impasse in Lebanon.

Reuters

In the third quarter, the 6-foot-6 El Khatib scored 16 points, making all five field goal attempts and three free throw attempts.

“It was a very tough very tough game,” Fahed said. “Both teams were playing very physical.”

Matt Freije(notes) nailed a 3-pointer to put Lebanon up 66-64 with about 5 minutes left, and Canada never led again.

“For our team to be successful, we cannot be out-hustled in a game,” Canada coach Leo Rautins said.

Joel Anthony(notes) of the Miami Heat scored 10 of 17 points for Canada in the first half. Denham Brown added 13 points and 6 assists.

Lebanon, which is making its third consecutive worlds appearance, shot 21 more free throw attempts than Canada.

Canada hadn’t qualified for a major tournament since finishing 13th at the 2002 worlds in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Lebanon’s next Group D opponent is France. Canada plays Lithuania, which beat New Zealand in its opener. AP

Lebanon team pose for a photograph before their game against Canada at FIBA Basketball World Championship in Izmir August 28, 2010.

Lebanon's Fadi El Khatib (L) and Matt Freije (R) defend Canada's Denham Brown during their FIBA Basketball World Championship game in Izmir August 28, 2010.

photo: Police inspect the interior of a Canadian Forces recruitment center where an explosion occurred at 3 a.m., on Friday July 2, 2010 in Trois-Rivières, Quebec, Canada.