CSIS & CSE

Arthur Porter says he is too ill to travel to face Quebec fraud allegations

Sujets: 
Corruption, Quebec, Construction industry, CSIS & CSE
Scores: 
3

Jeff Todd And David McFadden – February 28, 2013

Arthur Porter, the former head of Canada’s spy watchdog, says he has late, stage-four cancer and is too ill to travel from the Bahamas to Canada to face investigators over allegations of fraud in one of the country’s priciest infrastructure projects.

Dr. Porter said if Canadian investigators want to question him they should fly to the Bahamas. “I don’t want them to think I would chicken out on anything,” he told The Associated Press during an interview in his home in an upscale, gated community. “So if they want to come here, absolutely no problem.”

Former Canadian spy watchdog sought in corruption probe

Sujets: 
Corruption, CSIS & CSE, Construction industry
Scores: 
3

Brian Daly – February 27th, 2013

Dr. Arthur Porter, former head of Canada's spy watchdog, is one of five men facing arrest for alleged kickbacks involving the McGill superhospital. Quebec's anti-corruption unit is also looking for Pierre Duhaime and Riadh Ben Aissa, both fired last year from Montreal engineering giant SNC-Lavalin.

SNC is building the $2.3-billion McGill University Health Centre (MUHC), a massive complex that Porter oversaw until his resignation early last year. Quebec's permanent anti-corruption squad says Porter and the other suspects face charges including fraud against the government, conspiracy and recycling proceeds of crime.

Opinion: The truth about spy services

Sujets: 
Espionage, CSIS & CSE
Scores: 
0

Andrew Mitrovica – October 8, 2012

I have more faith in my basement to protect my family and me from a terror attack than I have in any so-called intelligence service. I came to this understanding after spending perhaps too much time monitoring the conduct of intelligence services, particularly Canada’s spy service, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS).

Indeed, it was once my full-time job as the Globe and Mail’s “national security” reporter. Eventually, CSIS’s media relations staff refused to answer my questions because I made public plenty of their soiled laundry, and I didn’t play by their rules.

Snoop and spy is already here, thanks to Liberals

Sujets: 
CSIS & CSE, Privacy, Espionage
Scores: 
0

Andrew Mitrovica – February 17, 2012

By any political measure it has been a pitiful and, to some extent, humbling week for the beleaguered Vic Toews.

The public safety minister has earned the justifiable wrath of frothing opposition members, a bevy of pundits of various political pedigrees, and, decidedly more mutedly, even his caucus colleagues, for his bellicose championing of the so-called “protecting children from Internet predators act.”

Experts say spy case could be damaging

Sujets: 
RCMP, CSIS & CSE, National security, Espionage
Scores: 
0

Murray Brewster and Jim Bronskill – January 17, 2012

The Harper government hunkered down Tuesday in an attempt to weather an unfolding spy drama involving a naval officer who worked at one of the most sensitive and secure military intelligence centres in the country.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Defence Minister Peter MacKay, the military and the RCMP turned aside questions on the case of Sub.-Lt. Jeffrey Paul Delisle, who's charged with communicating information to a foreign entity.

Canada’s top spy watchdog resigns following revelations

Sujets: 
CSIS & CSE, Conflict of interest, Watchdogs, Prime Ministers Office (PMO)
Scores: 
0

Kathryn Blaze Carlson and Brian Hutchinson – November 10, 2011

Arthur Porter, the chair of Canada’s spy review board, resigned on Thursday amid revelations of his business dealings with a notorious international lobbyist and his own close ties to the president of Sierra Leone.

“Dr. Porter has submitted his resignation to me, and I have accepted it, effective immediately,” Prime Minister Stephen Harper said in a statement on Thursday afternoon.

Spy review board chief offered me job: Senator

Sujets: 
CSIS & CSE, Conflict of interest, Watchdogs, Prime Ministers Office (PMO)
Scores: 
0

Brian Hutchinson – November 8, 2011

The federally appointed chairman of Canada’s spy review board and “Ambassador Plenipotentiary” to his native Sierra Leone offered a Canadian senator the position of honorary consul general to the African country, the National Post has learned.

Arthur Porter, a Montreal-based physician who also serves as the chief of executive of the McGill University Health Centre (MUHC), one of Canada’s largest public health-care providers with almost 12,000 employees, approached Conservative Senator David Angus and asked if he “would ever be interested” in the position as consul general to Sierra Leone in Montreal.

Canada’s spy watchdog’s questionable $200,000 deal

Sujets: 
CSIS & CSE, Conflict of interest, Privy Council Office (PCO), Appointments process, Watchdogs, Prime Ministers Office (PMO)
Scores: 
0

Brian Hutchinson – November 8, 2011

The head of Canada’s spy review board wired $200,000 in personal funds to a notorious international lobbyist in a questionable aid-for-infrastructure deal in Africa, the National Post has learned.

Arthur Porter, the federally appointed chairman of Canada’s Security and Intelligence Review Committee (SIRC), described in three interviews how he directed cash from a foreign bank account to Ari Ben-Menashe, a jet-setting, Montreal-based businessman who often acts as a middleman in negotiations between the Russian Federation and developing countries.

National Security Whistleblowers

Sujets: 
Whistleblowers, Foreign Affairs, CSIS & CSE, Richard Colvin, Afghanistan, National security
Scores: 
0

June 16, 2011

Canadian security agents have come forward in the past in hope of exposing significant wrongdoing.

The Unknown Soldier

A Joint Task Force 2 soldier raised allegations in 2006 that Canada's most elite unit may have been complicit in war crimes in Afghanistan. The complaint, never verified, has led to a sweeping and ultra-secretive internal military probe known as Operation Sand Trap. The soldier, whose identity has never been revealed, no longer serves with JTF2.

For soldiers and spies, whistle-blowing remains a risky business

Sujets: 
CSIS & CSE, National Defence, National security
Scores: 
4

Colin Freeze – June 15, 2011

Five years after Parliament ordered federal departments to protect whistle-blowers “as soon as possible,” soldiers and spies still lack crucial protections that would allow them to highlight wrongdoing without risk to their careers.

When Canada’s security agencies were broadly exempted from a 2006 law to protect whistle-blowers within the federal bureaucracy, they were directed to come up with parallel systems. The ones that have been put in place have been lagging or found lacking – the military, for example, has never followed up on a directive to designate a senior official to be a sounding board for soldiers.

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