[LINK] Terrorism, Canadian-style

[rfmcdonald]

News of the continuing saga of the 2006 Toronto terrorism case, now at trial, has gotten a considerable amount of attention. See Isabel Teotonio's article in The Toronto Star, "Court hears plan to storm Parliament, 'kill everybody'".

The youth accused of belonging to a homegrown terror plot was an ideal candidate to behead the Prime Minister because he was good at chopping wood, according to wiretap evidence heard during his trial in a Brampton court this morning.

Prosecutors played a series of car probes they say captures members of the so-called Toronto 18 plotting to storm Parliament Hill and kill politicians.

During one conversation on Feb. 4 2006, which took place during a trip to northern Ontario where they were allegedly scouting property for a safehouse, one man asks, "What happens at the Parliament?" One of the alleged ringleaders responds, "We go and kill everybody."

Chatter ensues about whether the prime minister is "Paul loser" – a reference to Paul Martin – or the "the other guy Harper." After determining it is indeed Stephen Harper, the alleged ringleader suggests the youth would be a good candidate saying, "I know he'd cut off their heads."

Another man pipes up, "Did you see him, how he was cutting the wood?"

Court has heard that about six weeks earlier some of the group's members attended a training camp near Washago, a town about an hour and a half north of Toronto.

The group is also alleged to have been plotting several truck bombs around the GTA before police busted the group in the summer of 2006, netting 14 men and four youths. Charges have since been stayed against four adults and three youths.

The Globe and Mail's Colin Freeze and Dakshana Bascaramurty have a slightly different take on the talk of beheading the Canadian Prime Minister in their article "Tapes expose tension among terror suspects" has a slightly take on the affair, suggesting that this talk was actually intended to be a sort of funny in-joke.

Tensions between two top terrorism suspects were revealed yesterday as wiretap evidence played in a Brampton court suggested the No. 1 suspect was a big talker with little expertise to contribute to the alleged plot, and his No. 2 was a quiet doer, who set about building detonators in his spare time.

"I built, uh, uh, the first, I mean ... radio frequency remote control detonator," a man alleged to be the No. 2 suspect is heard saying in a tape of a February, 2006, intercepted phone conversation played in court.

"The only problem is that you have to stay 30 away from it ... 30 feet away, which is not so good."

The other suspect, the talker, replied: "So you have to get blown up? ... "

The other person replied that he was tired of his friend failing to come through on never-ending promises to acquire money and handguns: "It's depressing me now because all you got is a pistol."

[. . .]

After the arrests, much publicity surrounded a claim that the accused wanted to behead Canada's prime minister. But an intercepted conversation aired in court suggests the discussion occurred amid laughter.

"What happens at the Parliament," one suspect said.

"We go and kill everybody," said the alleged ringleader.

"And then what?"

"... And we get victory."