RCMP deputy commissioner Mark Flynn testifies at the Foreign Interference Commission in Ottawa on Thursday, Oct. 3, 2024.PATRICK DOYLE/The Canadian Press
Iran is intimidating and bullying the Canadian families of Flight 752 victims to prevent them from criticizing Tehran, the RCMP has told the public inquiry into foreign interference.
On Jan. 8, 2020, Iran shot down Ukrainian Airlines Flight 752, a civilian airliner, killing all 176 people on board, including about 55 Canadians and 30 permanent residents and others with ties to Canada.
Mark Flynn, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police’s deputy commissioner responsible for federal policing, told the commission headed by Marie-Josée Hogue that transnational repression – when countries reach beyond their borders to silence citizens or former citizens – is the biggest foreign-interference threat from Iran.
“Iran targets Canada-based relatives of Flight PS752 victims to discourage them from criticizing the state,” Deputy Commissioner Flynn told the inquiry in prehearing interviews made public Thursday.
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Iranian anti-aircraft missiles struck the plane shortly after it took off from Tehran’s main airport. Iran has said it was an accident. The plane was shot down several hours after Iran had fired missiles at U.S. and coalition military bases in Iraq in retaliation for the U.S. assassination of Iranian military commander General Qassem Soleimani.
Deputy Commissioner Flynn told the inquiry that Iran’s pressure campaign means the RCMP must take a “layered approach” to dealing with, and protecting, families of the Flight 752 victims in Canada. Speaking to reporters outside the inquiry Thursday, he said the force not only investigates, but also provides support and informs government departments on their plight.
Families of people slain on the flight have been suing Iran in Canada’s courts under the Justice for Victims of Terrorism Act and other federal laws.
“Some of my clients – at least half of them – have requested anonymity and the courts have sealed their identities,” said Toronto lawyer Mark Arnold of Gardiner Miller Arnold on Thursday.
In an interview, he said he is representing nine Iranian family members of 14 victims in the Canadian lawsuits. “Their families were threatened and they feared reprisals,” he said.
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Separately, the RCMP told the inquiry how the Mounties are working to disrupt foreign interference rather than just collect evidence for a prosecution.
“RCMP traditionally conducted investigations with a view to gathering evidence for a prosecution. Now, in certain circumstances, the RCMP may focus on disrupting foreign actor interference-related activities rather than developing a case for a more serious offence, such as one under the Security of Information Act,” said a summary of a prehearing interview with Deputy Commissioner Flynn released Thursday.
“Deputy Commissioner Flynn explained that this approach contrasted with historical RCMP practices,” the prehearing interview said. “Previously, the RCMP would have sent plain clothes surveillance units and attempted to covertly collect information, potentially over a period of years.”
The deputy commissioner told the inquiry the RCMP’s approach to Chinese-run police stations operating illicitly in Canada was an example of how the force conducted disruptions. He said the Mounties had sent uniformed officers to Canadian neighbourhoods in which these suspected stations were operating. The RCMP had also parked marked police vehicles outside the front of four of these locations to show their presence, according to earlier testimony given at a Commons hearing in 2023.
The force’s probe came amid global concerns raised by Spain-based human-rights organization Safeguard Defenders that the Chinese government was secretly operating more than 100 illegal police centres in upward of 50 countries that the organization said were part of Beijing’s growing transnational repression. It said that these operations monitor Chinese diaspora communities and play a role in coercing individuals to return to the People’s Republic of China to face criminal proceedings.
RCMP assistant commissioner Brigitte Gauvin and RCMP deputy commissioner Mark Flynn speak to reporters after testifying at the Foreign Interference Commission in Ottawa on Thursday, Oct. 3, 2024.PATRICK DOYLE/The Canadian Press
Speaking to reporters Thursday, Deputy Commissioner Flynn said: “We are simply saying that prosecution is not the gold standard – gold standard meaning how we’re going to be measured on whether or not we’ve had success.
“We’re going to employ, and have been employing more recently, all of the possible options and tools which would include disruption, as well as other things, to have a greater public safety impact,” he said.
The Canadian Security Intelligence Service assessed that a key purpose of the illicit Chinese police stations was “to collect intelligence and monitor former PRC [People’s Republic of China] residents living in Canada as part of the PRC’s broader transnational anticorruption, repression, and repatriation campaign,” according to an unclassified summary of intelligence held by federal security and intelligence authorities in Ottawa.
Back in 2022, the Chinese embassy in Canada denied it was operating police stations on Canadian soil. It said regional governments in China had set up “service stations” in Canada to help its citizens process paperwork and Chinese driver’s licences.
In November, 2022, the Canadian government summoned China’s ambassador over the police stations.
Chinese officials told Global Affairs Canada (GAC) that the stations would cease running, the intelligence summary released Thursday said.
“On November 30 2022, GAC received a formal notification from the PRC embassy that what they referred to as ‘overseas Chinese service centres,’ were no longer in operation.”
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The same documents said “the government of Canada continues to monitor for any indications of additional activity of these stations in Canada.”
A 2023 RCMP strategy document released at the inquiry indicated that Canada’s national police force is facing growing pains as it tries to get officers up to speed on the threat of foreign-actor interference – and that Parliament may eventually need to consider developing new laws and new tranches of funding.
Funding and staffing probes into foreign-actor interference remain a problem for the RCMP. According to the 2023 document, Mounties in the field lack stable funding for investigators, whereas Mounties at national headquarters need more civilian analysts to study the phenomenon.