OUR COMMUNITY : OUR WAY : OUR VOICE ! **Rally in opposition to SHAM community consultation**

They want to claim “ethnic” support for their ‘National Security’ strategy? Let’s tell CSIS, the RCMP and CBSA loud and clear what our communities think about their campaign of humiliation, dehumanization and fear- in our own way and with our own voices! We don’t need an invitation to say “Not one more detention! Not one more secret trial! No to border militarization and racist criminalization!”

A RALLY & “PEOPLES’ CONSULTATION”
SUNDAY NOVEMBER 26th 3 P.M.
Westin Bayshore Hotel 1601 Bayshore Drive

Please bring your placards, banners and especially anything that will make a lot of noise!

Background Information:

In order to put forward the image of a “culturally sensitive” approach and a “democratic framework”, the Canadian Cross-Cultural Roundtable on Security Secretariat has set up a supposed community consultation on issues of National Security. A COMMUNITY CONSULTATION THAT OUR COMMUNITIES WERE NEVER INVITED TO!

The Secretariat describes the event as an opportunity for the RCMP, the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS) and the Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA) to “clarify” the role of their agencies and “public expectations regarding the roles and responsibility of Canadian society in maintaining the national security of Canada”.

But whose security are they referring to? These agencies are the same that have criminalized our sisters, mothers, brothers and fathers through racial profiling, arbitrary detentions, and secret trials in their self serving “War on Terror”.

They didn’t consult us when:
* Last year alone, they deported about 13, 000 of our community members, detained non-status children, and forced others into sanctuary.
* They built Guantanamo North – the 3.2 million dollar maximum security prison in Ontario to keep security certificate detainees locked up indefinitely under secret evidence.
* They created the Integrated National Security Enforcement Team  (INSET), passed the Anti-Terrorism Act, or considered implementing that national biometric ID card.
* They decided to create Fortress North America through the so-called Smart Border Declaration with the U.S.

Though security culture in Canada pre-dates the current Conservative government, the plans to militarize the border and further integrate de-humanizing border policies with the U.S. are proceeding at an alarming rate under Harper’s administration. Biometrics are already being tested at airports across the country, legislation to arm the border guards in September of 2007 has been passed, and Conservative support of accelerated deportations is clear. The Conservatives have also committed $1.4 billion dollars over the next 2 years for a beefed up border and policing
strategy.

The result of all of these policies has been an increasing sense of fear and insecurity in immigrant and refugee communities and the stereotyping and criminalization of racialized and indigenous peoples as “security threats”. We will not be silenced. Join us in our own “peoples’ consultation” through a loud and defiant rally.