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| Great White North |
| Ex-Canadian PM sought support of terrorist group |
| 2007-02-21 |
| Paul Martin solicited the support of the terrorist International Sikh Youth Federation in his failed bid for the federal Liberal leadership in 1990, The Vancouver Sun has learned. Martin made an impassioned speech to the ISYF's national convention in which he said he was honoured to "meet friends who share the same belief in this country, the same belief in peace, the same preparedness to defend themselves." At the time of Martin's spring 1990 speech, the ISYF had already been identified as a terrorist group by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service. Four in the group had been convicted in B.C. of the attempted assassination of a visiting Indian politician. Other B.C. members had met with a young would-be assassin who shot newspaper publisher Tara Singh Hayer in 1988. The Martin speech came two years after then Conservative external affairs minister Joe Clark warned Canadian politicians to steer clear of the federation, the Babbar Khalsa and the World Sikh Organization because of terrorist links. The ISYF was banned in Canada in June 2003 by the Liberal government of Jean Chretien. |
| Posted by:John Frum |
| #1 Sadly, there is nothing remotely surprising about any of this. The federal Liberal party specializes in this sort of thing; I am only surprised Martin is not related by marriage to some Sikh pistachio oil baron or some such. |
| Posted by: Excalibur 2007-02-21 16:14 |