“I know what is in the files
and they are simply not inter-
ested in getting to the bottom
of it because it is potentially
very embarrassing politically
for the Canadian fovern-
ment.”

— RCMP Cpl. Robert
Read

WHEN Robert Read
said that he had just
been suspended by the
RCMP for allegedly
breaching the Official
Secrets Act.

Read, you will recall, was
assigned to investigate
alleged corruption and
improprieties at the

‘Canadian Consulate in
Hong Kong, the third such
investigation since former
Foreign Services Officer
Brian McAdam blew the
whistle on the scandal.

«. “After discovering evi-
deace of the corruption in
our consular operations
which reached into the
upper echelons of the feder-

* al government, Read was

* inexplicably taken off the
file.

He then fought to have
the investigation reopened
going through several levels

Of RCMP bureaucracy, the
Public Complaints
Commission; the auditor
general, then finally, the
media in the form of. |
Vancouver Province news
editor Fabian Dawson.

‘The Province broke the
Sidewinder story shortly

after the Read revelations, . *

and it has been much dis-
cussed in this space as well
asthe ‘national press. «
“The Sidewinder report
alleged the government of
the"People’s Republic of
China and various high
ranking triad gangsters. were
conspiring to obtain signifi-
‘ant influence in Canada
through a variety of means.
‘Last October, the
Toronto Globe & Mas!
reported ‘that CSIS ‘director

crime and
punishment

general Barry Denofsky
ordered the destruction of
all copies of the report and,
amazingly, all ether material
associated with the file — ¢-
mails, drafts, notes and all
other bits and pieces with
any link to the investigation.

“CSIS spokesman Phillip
Gibson confirmed the
destruction of the material,
saying, “We do not report
conspiracy theories ...
rumour and innuendo.”

The resulting outcry in
the media and in the House
of Commons prompted the
civilian watchdog of CSIS to
announce an inquiry investi-
gating allegations that the
original Sidewinder report
was suppressed because of
political pressure. It is
expected to complete its
investigation and release the

‘results to Parliament within

weeks.

~ Last week.CSIS director
Ward Elcock spoke publicly .
for the first time on the
issue in an interview with
the Otrawa Citizen. Elcock
denied it was public pressure
that shut the report down,
still tocing the party line
that the report was based on
rumour and innuendo, not
facts...

“There were some dis-
agreements about what the
facts. were, what you could
say in that paper,” he said.
“And while we thought it
was an interesting theory,

‘we don’t publish papers on
‘ the basis of just, theories. We

publish papers.on the basis
of the facts we-can put in
the papers,” he was quoted.
as saying in the Citizen
story. .

He didn’ t tery to explain

why, if they thought it was
“interesting,” they ordered
everything shredded.

But the shredding of the
Sidewinder materiz: couldn't
prevent loyal agents and
officers trom helping to get
the story in the public eve.
And so we learned this
weekend, not all the docu-
mentation was destroyed in
the shoddy attempt to cover
up what may well prove to
be the most important story
of the last decade.

In Saturday's Globe &
Mail, reporter Andrew
Mitrovica quoted segments
of the document obtained
by him through sources that
obviously thought Elcock’s
comments were the last
straw.

At the time the report
was produced in 1997, the
Criminal Intelligence
Directorate of the RCMP
objected strenuously to a
CSIS executive request to
file a watered-down version,
so frightening were its find-
ings.

In the end, the RCMP
investigators who had
worked in the project were
left dangling in the wind,
and CSIS bowed to the
political pressure to soften
the blow of the report. The
disclosure left CSIS to ulti-
mately claim they had -
destroyed the file in its
entirety because it was

~ unsubstantiated rumour.

In the foreword to the
report, investigators fearful

of the spin that would be
attempted said, “... this
report presents concrete
facts, not just ideas or spec-
ulation.”

Then this: “This docu-
ment does not present theo-
ries but indicators of a
multi-faceted threat to
Canada’s national security
based on concrete facts
drawn from the data banks
of the two agencies
involved, classified reports
from allied agencies and var-
ious open sources.”

Much of the information

Public Ir information mtn

on. ‘the.

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: Planning De
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in the report has already
been made public through
various sources.

But the absence of the
documentation until now
has allowed the spin put out

by CSIS senior management.

The document itself
describes how Beijing’s spies
and the triads worked in
concert in matters like steal-
ing high-tech secrets, engi-
neering control of Canadian
firms in real estate, security,
media and other influential
sectors, money-laundering
and political influence
through substantial party
donations.

The aftermath of the
Sidewinder collapse is also
shocking. The inter-agency
peeing contest and political
interference in the manage-
ment of CSIS has left the
agency woefully inept for its
intended purpose.

One CSIS agent caught
up in the fallout told me,
“We're so handcuffed now,
we couldn’t find an elephant
in a zoo. If it’s not open-
source material, we can’t use
it.”

This episode shows
what's wrong with our gov-
ernment. We have allowed
Beijing and its criminal part-
ners to steal our sovereignty,
piece by piece:

They have bought and
paid for our political leaders
through campaign donations

~ and ensured their co-opera-

tion.

When the people we pay
to protect us from this insid-
ious corruption try to inves-

Wednesday, May 3, 2000 - North Shore News ~ 7

| Sidewinder spins huge security scandal

tigate, they and their mes-
sage is stifled and mini-
mized.

Last week a Federal
Court judge allowed a con-
victed Chinese espionage
agent to remain in this
country after immigration
officials tried to remove
him.

Our immigration minister
is in China playing footsie
with the Chinese govern-
ment on the subject of ille-

gal aliens, pleading with
them to please, take their
citizens back.

Meanwhile, Prime
Minister Chretien is plan-
ning another trade mission
to China next year to
bestow some more of your
hard-earned tax dollars on
the communist regime.

By the way, Cpl. Robert
Read is still on suspension.

—lknight@direct.ca

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