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It's the
world's fastest growing industry, with
profits estimated at $1 trillion, and it
poses a greater security challenge to
Western democracies than anything they faced
during the Cold War.
It's the global Mafia, a new, virulent form
of international organized crime.
Canada is one of its strongholds. According
to the Canadian Security Intelligence
Service, ``there are approximately 18 active
transnational criminal organizations
represented in Canada.'' Not only do they
increasingly co-operate to slice up the
criminal profits in Canada, but they also
use Canada as multi-national fulcrum to plan
and co-ordinate their international criminal
ventures.
The reason: they face a much lower risk of
detection and prosecution than in the United
States or in Europe. As Oliver Buck Revell,
former assistant director of the FBI, put it
in a recent interview with the National
Post:``Canada is a particularly weak link in
the international law enforcement effort.''
But, in Ottawa, no one seems to be
concerned.
Despite the hard-nosed pledge of former
Solicitor-General Andy Scott that
``organized crime is the government's
number-one law enforcement priority'', an
effective federal strategy to fight against
the new breed of transnational criminals is
sadly lacking.
Consider the area of money laundering. In
May 1998, the federal government issued a
consultation document that in part,
acknowledged the importance of imposing
controls on cross-border movements of cash
and monetary instruments -- tough measures
already in effect in the U.S. But, a new
hill containing such a measure has yet to be
drawn up. As a result, it is still harder to
import cheese into Canada -- due to
restrictions by the ministry of Agriculture
-- than a suitcase filled with dirty money.
While Germany is in the process of
abolishing banking secrecy, Canada remains
an internationally known soft-spot for money
laundering. The list of our legal and
regulatory weaknesses is a lengthy one. We
don't have mandatory suspicious transaction
reporting requirements by banks.
And we don't have mandatory disclosure
requirements for bringing cash and monetary
instruments in or out of Canada. Thus,
criminal financiers crowd our borders --
eager to enter and launder their ill-gotten
gains.
For more than a decade, Canada has been
criticized by legislators and
law-enforcement officials of the
industrialized nations for its loose rules
against financial crimes. Yet, nothing has
been done. Every time a discussion takes
place on how to solve this problem, the
Charter of Rights and Freedom and the
Privacy Act are cited.
This happened when many law enforcement
agencies proposed the introduction of
legislation similar to the RICO Act in the
United States, an effective tool for
prosecuting organized criminals. Opponents
raise concerns over perceived reductions of
personal rights and privileges; none talked
about the duties and responsibilities of
citizens in a democracy.
The result: criminals are more protected
than their victims. Organized criminal
organizations have long been present in
Canada -- though not with their current
intensity and transnational co-operation.
They were already here in the 1800s, when
the Markham Gang preyed on the burghers of
early Toronto.
They were here in the 1950s and 1960s when
former attorneys general Kelso Roberts and
Allan Lawrence -- in denial -- depicted
Canada as an oasis of peace without Mafia or
mobsters. Lately, Canada
has become a ``welcome wagon'' for organized
crime, a revolving door that lets everyone
in -- regardless of their criminal past.
After the great Soviet meltdown, for
example, many mobsters that used to operate
in Russia and in the former USSR Republics,
chose Canada as their destination.
RCMP Superintendent Ben Suave, who heads the
Toronto-based Organized Crime squad, warned,
``they are trying to corrupt politicians and
police with bribes and blackmail. They are a
threat to our national security.'' In other
countries this statement would have been
sufficient to appoint a royal commission in
order to find a solution to this dangerous
problem. Sadly, not in Canada. Our
politicians sit idly by. None will act until
there's a loss of life -- as occurred in
Quebec when efforts against outlaw
motorcycle gangs were intensified only after
the death of several innocent people. |
