The Dominion - Montebello

Questions Persist about Provocateurs at SPP Summit

Moira Peters — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 09:33:30 +0000

As protester is acquitted of charges from 2007 Montebello protest, questions resurface about police-incited violence

TORONTO—A Quebec court ruling in January 2011 found police acted illegally in trying to shut down a protest in Montebello, Quebec, in 2007, when they arrested two women on a downtown street. This ruling has led to renewed calls for an inquiry into another police action—one now well-known, thanks to Youtube—at that same protest: the alleged use of undercover officers to incite violence.

On August 20, 2007, the heads of state of Canada, Mexico and the US met at a summit in Montebello to discuss the proposed Security Prosperity Partnership (SPP), an agreement that would have harmonized trade and security measures between the three countries. A protest against the meeting took place throughout the day.

Late in the afternoon, when the number of demonstrators had dwindled, a line of riot police attempted to disperse those who remained on the streets. While most of the protesters were pushed backwards by police, activist Leila Martin and another person sat on the ground, clinging to each other, as the police swept over them. They were arrested for obstructing police, who were carrying out orders to shut down the demonstration.

Martin was offered a discharge if she pleaded guilty to the charge, whereby she would not receive any fine, jail time, or a criminal record. She was advised to take the deal by her court-appointed lawyer. She told him, “I don't actually think I am guilty and I think my freedom of assembly was violated.”

Her lawyer told her that if she pleaded not guilty he would refuse to represent her.

“You won't represent me then,” she told him.

Martin then went about the work of learning how to prepare her own defense, reading all the court cases she could find which involved charter challenges. She made sure that her charter challenge emphasized why she was protesting the SPP.

Martin did most of the research around presenting her case, and eventually acquired a lawyer, Denis Barrette, who helped her finish writing her charter challenge and represented her in court.

Martin told The Dominion that with support, it is possible to prepare one’s own charter challenge. (She said she would encourage anyone in a similar position to write to her, "and I would help them do it.")

When the matter eventually went to court, Judge Lapointe ruled the Charter of Rights and Freedoms had indeed been violated.

“The approach [of the] RCMP against the two women arrested, including the accused, is incomprehensible,” said Quebec Court Judge Real Lapointe in his January ruling, acquitting the charge brought against activist Martin.

“Police decided to end the demonstration. We will not know why. In itself it is surprising, in the presence of a largely peaceful and festive crowd who met...to express opinions and positions. This expression of their deepest beliefs is a right guaranteed by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms of this country and gives the rally itself a special character and importance.”

The RCMP and Surete du Quebec (SQ—Quebec police) chose not to comment on the ruling.

Judge Lapointe said another factor that supported the argument of the defense was testimony that during the protest police used agents provocateurs—a term used to describe the use of undercover officers to try and provoke activists into committing illegal acts.

Lapointe was referring to an incident earlier in the protest. Dave Coles, President of the Communication, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada (CEP), confronted three undercover police officers dressed in black and wearing masks over their faces. The officers were posing as Black Bloc, and one of them, who would later be identified as Sergent Jean-Francois Boucher, held a large stone in his hand. The event was caught on video.

“These three guys are cops, everybody; put the rock down, cop,” said Coles on the video. As Coles confronted the three undercover officers, Boucher shoved him. The officers also swore at Coles, and continued to push him and others gathered at the scene.

Coles and others activists, including some dressed in Black Bloc, continued to yell at the undercover officers and tried to remove their masks. Eventually the three jumped into the line of riot police, where they were handcuffed and led away.

“They are trying to create a riot so they can suck us all in to get beat up,” said Coles on the video, which went viral on Youtube and has been watched more than a half-million times.

At first the RCMP and SQ denied allegations that the men were in fact police officers. But three days after the incident, on August 23, 2007, the SQ released a statement explaining the men were indeed undercover members of their force, but denying that the officers had committed an illegal act.

The three officers, Sergeants Boucher, Joey Laflamme and Patrick Tremblay were part of an undercover team code-named “flagrant delit,” which roughly translates to “caught red-handed.” The team’s official role, according to a report by the Quebec Police Ethics Committee, was to “melt into the crowd to identify the perpetrators of crime and stop them.”

“It is wrong for a state to use its own security forces, police, provocateurs, undercover agents, to evoke violence. That's not democratic. We have a voice, we had a right to [speak], and we had a right to assemble,” Coles told The Dominion in a telephone interview.

Coles began asking for a public inquiry into the event. He wanted to know who gave the orders to use agents provocateurs. Instead of being granted an inquiry, the channel offered to him was to bring a complaint before the official body for dealing with police wrongdoing in Quebec, the Police Ethics Committee.

On May 19, 2009, the Commissioner of the Committee dismissed six of the eight complaints brought forward by the CEP. Five months later, on October 19, 2009, the Committee overturned the Commissioner’s ruling and started a new investigation, stating, “If the infiltration of police officers to stop the authors of criminal acts is acceptable, not all acts committed by [police] to this end are legitimate just because the original goal is desirable.”

The Committee released its final report on March 14th, 2011, finding that Boucher had breached the police code of conduct by swearing at and pushing Coles, but dismissed charges of inciting violence and abusing his authority. The charges against the other two officers were all dismissed.

Coles does not think the Committee was asking the right questions. He wanted to know who gave orders for undercover police to incite protesters in Montebello in 2007.

“They were able to box us into a corner,” said Coles about the way his complaint was handled by the Committee. “It was all about the conduct of three policemen rather than who gave the political orders for agent provocateurs to go in and disrupt the assembly.”

Coles said he felt encouraged by Judge Lapointe’s ruling, and he has renewed his call for an inquiry into the actions of police at Montebello—especially the use of agents provocateurs.

“What is happening more and more and more in Canada, as witnessed through the G8/G20, is that the state thinks that if they don't like what you have to say, they will go in and mess it up so that the message isn't clear,” said Coles.

No clear evidence has emerged that agent provocateurs were used at the G20 protests. However, some activists like Coles still have their suspicions.

A week after the G20 protests, on July 2, 2010, Le Devoir, a Quebec daily newspaper, ran a story entitled, “G20: la police aurait utilise des agents provocateurs”—“G20: The police reportedly used agents provocateurs.”

The article refers to a video in which “plainclothes police, disguised as protesters, some armed with batons and sticks, took cover behind a cordon of police. One of them dressed all in black with a hood over his head, as [in the style of] Black Bloc.”

However there is no indication in this video that the alleged plainclothed officers were provoking or inciting activists.

"As far as [using] officers dressed as Black Bloc, I will not say we didn't. I will not speak to our techniques," said Sergeant Michele Paradis, an RCMP spokesperson, when asked about police tactics during the G20. "I won't speak to the manners we will use to keep the community and the [G20] delegates safe."

Meaghan Gray, spokesperson for the Toronto Police Service, had a less ambiguous answer, saying in an email that undercover officers did not dress as Black Bloc.

In response to an access-to-information request on the "use of so-called agent provocateurs or undercover Black Bloc infiltration policies" at the G20, nine pages were released by the RCMP and made available to The Dominion. These documents mostly deal with the structure of undercover operations. In addition to these nine pages, another four pages were redacted in their entirety.

Only one page—a set of media talking points—speaks about agents provocateurs. It reads, “None of the Integrated Security Unit partners use so-called agents provocateurs,” and, “In fact, the role of police is to de-escalate tension and preserve the peace.”

“I don’t believe that. In fact, there is just no evidence that the police were trying to diffuse anything,” said Coles.

Coles said many wrongdoings at the G20 have already been exposed, but he expects many more will be revealed.

“A lot of this stuff is going to be uncovered a lot more [easily] than it was for us at Montebello,” he said. He believes the number of photos and videos taken in Toronto is what will make a difference. “I think social media is going to help us to uncover the facts and force an inquiry.”

His union, the CEP, is one of many groups, including the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA), the National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE), the federal New Democratic Party and Amnesty International, calling for a public inquiry into police actions at the G20.

"The suggestion that police informants may have endorsed or supported the commission of acts of vandalism is particularly concerning," said NUPGE and the CCLA in a recent report on police actions during the G20. They "believe an independent inquiry into this aspect of G20 policing is necessary to investigate the extent of undercover operations and address the limits on what police infiltrators can and cannot do while on assignment."

Tim Groves is an investigative researcher and journalist based in Toronto. He twitters @timymit.

molatov provocateur

At the Gates of Fortress North America

dru — Sat, 15 Sep 2007 23:46:32 +0000

Opposing the Security and Prosperity Partnership: Demonstrations in Montebello

Military helicopters hovered as protesters converged in Montebello, Quebec, a relatively remote Canadian town in which the political leaders of North America gathered for a two-day summit on August 20. The Fairmont Château Montebello, the location for the critical trilateral meetings, became a Canadian fortress surrounded by a high metal fence and thousands of police from throughout the country.

Throughout the summit, over 1,000 protesters converged to oppose the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP), a North American governmental and corporate initiative aimed at developing greater integration of trade and security policies from Mexico to Canada. Critics view the SPP as a post-9/11 development of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), a trade treaty widely unpopular among labour unions, indigenous communities and social justice activists across the continent.

Corporate influence is central to the entire SPP process, within which, according to official documents, "high-level business input will assist governments in enhancing North America's competitive position." Entirely absent from the process are environmental groups, labour unions and representatives from indigenous communities.

Major corporations represented by institutions like the Canadian Council of Chief Executives and the North American Competitiveness Council have strongly advocated for the institutionalization of the SPP. Both organizations were also strong backers of NAFTA. According to the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA), NAFTA negatively impacted the majority of Canadians: "Income inequality expanded in Canada during the 1990s," after the implementation of NAFTA "as the top 20 per cent of families saw their incomes increase, while the bottom 20 per cent saw their share drop."

Critics of the SPP argue that the initiative will be a blow to working people in North America. "The founding premise of the SPP is that an agenda of economic free trade and national security will result in human prosperity," writes No One is Illegal -- a grassroots anti-colonial immigrant and refugee rights collective in Vancouver -- "yet we know that the so-called 'prosperity' of previous free trade agreements such as NAFTA have only brought corporate prosperity, with increasing rates of poverty and displacement for the majority of people."

The Montebello summit included multiple sessions between the North American leaders on "integrating" more than 300 areas of policy -- including health, safety and environmental standards -- between Canada, the US and Mexico, according to official documents. Although details of the meeting have not been revealed, government officials had stated that areas of discussion at the closed-door meetings included water exports, environmental policy, immigration controls and military power in North America.

A stated aim of the Security and Prosperity Partnership is to "increase border security" in North America, according to internal documents outlining the trilateral initiative. One area of focus is the creation of a co-ordinated no-fly list between the US and Canada. Canada recently announced the creation of its own no-fly list, while the US list now includes half a million names.

Migrant rights organizations such as No One is Illegal, operating in multiple Canadian cities, were centrally involved in organizing the demonstrations against the SPP. The initiative has been slammed as an attempt to model North American security regulations after extremely stringent European laws, widely referred to as "Fortress Europe." In 1999, the BBC reported on "Fortress Europe," writing that harmonized immigration legislation in Europe would "lower the drawbridge for the few but keep it firmly up for the many."

In light of the SPP standards, migrant rights organizations in North America expressed concerns of attempts to create "Fortress North America," a match to the exclusionary European model.

“Debate surrounding the SPP has grown because the initiative encapsulates so many important issues in post 9/11 North America concerning domestic repression justified through language of ‘national security’, said Harsha Walia of No One is Illegal in Vancouver. “The SPP also promotes an economic system which displaces people throughout the global south, specifically in Latin America, while implementing security policies in Canada and the US which attempts to halt peoples ability to flee the economic destitution created by the economic polices promoted through the SPP.”

Secret discussions at Montebello also revolved around the "War on Terror," linking North American foreign policy in both Latin America and the Middle East, while demonstrators in Canada called for a withdrawal of Canadian forces from Afghanistan. Block the Empire, a Montreal collective active in opposing the Canadian military participation in the NATO mission in the Kandahar province of southern Afghanistan, was strongly represented at the demonstrations in Montebello.

Also present at the demonstrations in Montebello were members of the Centre for Philippine Concerns from Montreal, who decried the Canadian and US support for the current government of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo in Manila, Philippines. Human rights groups such as Amnesty International accuse the Arroyo government, a key Western ally in Asia, of carrying out hundreds of assassinations of leftists as part of the "War on Terror" in the Asia-Pacific region.

Demonstrators faced police violence in Montebello. Federal and provincial police forces used chemical gas --"tear gas" -- rubber bullets and clubs to push demonstrators away from the location of the trilateral summit. Following the demonstrations in Montebello, the Quebec Provincial Police were forced to admit to the use of under-cover police provocateurs within the demonstration, after a widely-circulated online video picked up by news media clearly depicted undercover agents carrying rocks during the demonstration.

SPP: Riot Police

Tear Gas

Helicopter

SPP: Riot Police

SPP: Demonstrators

SPP: Flags

SPP: Tess Tesalona

SPP: No One is Illegal

SPP: Tear Gas

SPP: Graveyard

Letter to Council of Canadians

dru — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 19:37:26 +0000

[Andrea from People's Global Action picked up the CoC's petitions at the anti-SPP demonstration and decided to make a few points while offering to deliver them.]

Dear Maude and Staff at the Council of Canadians,

I just wanted to write to let you know that the 10,000 petitions you delivered with great fanfare to the gates of the Chateau Montebello last week are safe. You know, the ones in the three clear plastic bins with the blue lids. The ones featured in that photo on your website ( www.canadians.org).

From Montebello: What Stephen Harper's Video Feed May Have Missed

Stuart Neatby — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 23:56:59 +0000

CopsInGraveYard.jpg

Photo: IMC Montebello

The tear gassing appears to have started around 5:30 PM. By that time, much of the corporate media had left Montebello, and many of the demonstrators had left for Ottawa and Montreal.

‘They’re going to wait for the media to leave before they start to clear the demonstrators,’ my friend Kabir had remarked 20 minutes before. It ended up being a dead-on prediction.

Bringing the SPP Out of the Shadows

hillarybain — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 15:47:36 +0000

Protesters mobilize against new trade and security talks

This article originally appeared in Siafu.

Pesticide limits are barriers to trade that must be eliminated. Integrated, high-tech border and secretive security measures are needed to ensure our safety against terrorists. Closed-door meetings between the leaders of Canada, Mexico and the US are advised only by a panel of 30 top CEOs from each country.

At first glance, many may dismiss this list as the fears of the isolationist far-Left, what New York Times columnist and author Thomas Friedman derided as the new Flat-Earthers who would deny the supremacy of globalization. But for those who are following the movements of the Security and Prosperity Partnership(SPP), these fears are slowly becoming a reality –- one that takes its next form at the so-called “Three Amigos” summit in Montebello, Quebec.

On August 20 and 21, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, US President George W. Bush and Mexican President Felipe Calderon will meet in this small resort town to discuss the next steps of the SPP. And while many Canadians have never heard of the partnership, activists from across North America are planning to make their presence felt at the "3 Bandidos" summit and hope to shed some light on what many are describing as 'NAFTA Plus'. On August 19, a march will proceed from Ottawa City Hall to the Parliament buildings, starting at 1pm. On Aug 20, the first day of the meetings, a broad-based protest in Montebello begins at noon.

The SPP was founded in 2005 at a meeting in Waco, Texas, between Bush, then-Prime Minister Paul Martin and then-Mexican President Vincente Fox. Proponents of the partnership hail it as a simpler way of ensuring that Canada, Mexico and the United States can gradually move beyond barriers on trade and safety issues. The partnership, reads the Canadian government’s website on the SPP, “is a dialogue […] by which the three countries can resolve unnecessary barriers to trade and a means to improve our response to emergencies and increase security.”

But for critics of both the North American Free Trade Agreement(NAFTA) and the Free Trade Area of the Americas(FTAA), the SPP is the next step in submerging the rights of citizens to the rights of big business and –- more recently –- the ability for the US to carry out its War on Terror. “It is quite literally about eliminating Canada’s ability to determine independent regulatory standards, environmental protections, energy security, foreign, military, immigration and other policies,” Maude Barlow, head of the Council of Canadians, stated in testimony to the parliamentary Committee on International Trade last May.

Because the SPP is not a formal treaty, but rather an ongoing round of discussions between various government officials on everything from border security to the further elimination of perceived barriers to trade, the partnership does not need to be approved or discussed in parliament or go before public hearings. Its meetings, like the one being held in Montebello, are held behind closed doors. The only official consultative body was formed in 2006. The North American Competitiveness Council(NACC) consists of 30 top businesspeople, 10 from each country, who serve as advisors on the policy being developed and discussed at the various SPP meetings (other encounters under the auspices of the SPP are held regularly by lower-level members of cabinet on issues of trade and security). The Canadian SPP website heralds this body for ensuring the private sector’s voice is heard in these ongoing discussions, but remains silent on what role the public’s voice should play in these discussions.

Over past months, more information has been emerging about what the SPP engenders. A 2006 report from SPP trade talks, revealed in the media in early May, calls pesticide-residue limits in Canada a “trade irritant.” In response, Canada announced it would be lowering its restrictions on pesticide residue on fruits and vegetables in order to better “harmonise” with US regulations –- already found to be some of the lowest in the world.

Organisers for the days of protest are hoping to highlight these types of questions and force debate about the SPP onto the public agenda. "If we can get it out from the cover it's under now, then it's a big success," Rick Arnold, a co-ordinator with Common Frontiers, a group opposed to free trade in the Americas, recently told the Ottawa Citizen. But even holding a public discussion on the SPP has proven difficult. Plans by the Council of Canadians to hold a forum on the SPP on August 19 in Papineauville, a 15-minute drive from Montebello, were put on hold when the Surete du Quebec, the US Army and local police informed the community centre where the event was to be held that they could require use of the centre for security reasons and asked them to cancel the event -- which they did. Instead, the debate will now take place on the same day in Ottawa, featuring representatives from nearly all major political parties (including the Green Party) –- the exception being the Conservative party.

While recent so-called anti-globablization demonstrations have often been portrayed by corporate media outlets as violent actions dominated by black-clad hooligans, that kind of description is hard to apply to the groups organising for Montebello. Ranging from political parties like the New Democratic Party and networks like the Council of Canadians, to anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist groups like People's Global Action, the groups represent the gamut of issues that many feel are at stake: environmental standards, immigrant rights, labour standards and minimum-wage, freedom of speech and transparent democracy, to name a few. The groups hope to ensure that local residents know what is happening in their backyard by organising a series of workshops and events, both leading up to the summit and across the country on the day of. These will include public meetings in communities around Montebello to discuss the demonstration with local residents, a national day of protest on August 16 against the summit's planned security measures (including a Summit of the Americas-type fence around the Chateau Montebello) and solidarity rallies in Vancouver and other Canadian cities on August 20.

While the talks may be held securely in the aptly named ‘castle,’ it's clear that the issues being discussed may not be hidden away for much longer.

SPP Poster