Two fascinating items: First, I heard a fascinating story from a Globe and Mail photographer about the famous photo of a handcuffed Zundel is a government van soon after he’d been deported to Canada. Secondly, it’s great to see German supporters of free speech rallying for Ernst Zundel. As we learn more about the specifics of his case, we can develop a strategy here in North America to continue the battle.

We will not let Canada’s politicized legal system forget their shameful treatment of this gentle publisher.

The Canadian legal system -- legal, doesn't mean justice -- exposed itself this week at utterly corrupt and political.

 Two years in solitary confinement, without a charge, is simply a wholesale violation of human rights. Mr. Zundel was punished for propagating the wrong views. The power of the Jewish supremacist lobby showed itself with naked clarity.

Pierre "The Assassin" Blais murdered Ernst Zundel's rights to a fair hearing and reasonable bail and made a mockery of Canada's national security. The CSIS Act -- and he ought to know, he was the boss of CSIS -- sets out clearly what a threat to national security is. It involves espionage, sabotage, sedition or acts of serious violence (arson, assassination, bombing) to further one's views. The Act makes it clear that non-violent dissent is NOT a threat to national security. Blais made unfashionable opinions and associating with unpopular people the new definition of a threat to national security. Blais stretched the definition of national security to what you'd expect in a totalitarian state. Any opposition to the government and their powerful backers is a threat to national security. That didn't used to be the way in Anglo-Saxon democracies ruled by Common Law.

I thank Mark Weber Director of the Institute for Historical Review for this timely report.

GERMANS RALLY IN MANNHEIM FOR ZUNDEL’S FREEDOM

‘To protest the detention of Ernst Zundel in Germany, some 40-50 activists of the “Rhein-Neckar National Resistance Action Center” rallied on Wednesday, March 2, in the pedestrian shopping zone in central Mannheim. They distributed leaflets demanding freedom for Zundel and all other political prisoners, and the abolition of the laws that ban “Holocaust denial” and restrict free speech. The “National Resistance Action Center” ( www.ab-rhein-neckar.de ) pledges further actions for Zundel’s freedom. “

Globe and Mail

The Globe and Mail is doing a major article for its weekend insight section about where the deportation of Ernst Zundel leaves Canada’s free speech movement. The reporter is Christopher Sulgan and he’s interviewed a number of us activists. I had to correct him about such misnomers as “White Supremacist Movement” and “neo-Nazis.” I explained to him that these are smears and that “the White Supremacist Movement” is a figment of CSIS’s imagination. Responding to their political masters, they’re obsessed with “White Supremacist” conspiracies but wouldn’t know Osama bin Laden is he rode down Rideau Street on his camel. I added that no one I know calls himself a “White Supremacist”. It’s similar to Mao’s China. No one would call himself “a running dog of U.S. imperialism”, “a splittist” or a “comprador.” There were terms of abuse used in intra-party fighting. Most of us self-identify as populists, free speech supporters or immigration reformers. This will likely be a major article. Whether is will be another smear remains to be seen.

To illustrate the article, the Globe sent out ace photographer Louie Palu, an engaging  professional with a permanent five o-clock shadow. He had nearly been killed on recent assignments to Afghanistan and the Northwest Frontier province of Pakistan.  Mr. Palu  snapped the famous photo of Ernst Zundel is a government van soon after he’d been deported to Canada in February, 2003.

It’s clear from Palu’s story that the Canadian  Government had intended to railroad Mr. Zundel and were very uneasy about press photographers. Mr. Palu had been sent by the Globe to Fort Erie, Ontario as soon as it had been learned that Mr. Zundel was to be deported there the second time. The first time, the Canadian authorities had turned Mr. Zundel back. The only photographers were Mr. Palu from the Globe and a television crew from CTV, a company owned by the Globe’s owner Bell Media. Apparently, the assignment was too difficult or uninteresting for other media. The photographers camped outside the tiny immigration building in Fort Erie. The authorities were ratty  and rough. They threw the photographers and reporters out of the building an off government property. [So much for freedom of the press and the public’s right to know!] It was a cold February day and the media waited almost none hours in the cold outside the building. They knew Mr. Zundel was there, as an eagle eyed reporter could see him on a television monitor sitting in some sort of room.

The Globe reporter and photographer watched the back entrance and the CTV crew watched the front. After dark, the CTV saw Mr. Zundel being spirited into an unmarked white van. The Globe reporter driving and Mr. Paul in the passenger seat, camera cocked, gave chase. The distance down the Queen Elizabeth Highway from Fort Erie to the Niagara Region Detention Centre in Thorold takes about half an hour to cover at the speed limit. The white van tore off down rutted country roads, circling back and forth trying to lose the reporters. Why? What id they have to hide? At times, the government agents hit speeds of 140 km. Hey, doesn’t speed kill? The Ontario Provincial Police in Niagara Region, although drugs are rampant in the area, are fanatical about setting up speed trap gauntlets and raking in the revenue. Sadly, they weren’t out on one of their revenue raising raids that evening. After a nearly two hour chase, the van pulled up to the gates of the Niagara Region Detention Centre. It had to stop for the gates to be opened. Mr. Palu leaped from his car and could see Ernst Zundel waving  behind somewhat tinted windows. Manually putting his flash on full, he got to snap that famous picture of political prisoner Ernst Zundel, handcuffed and smiling in the van.

                                                                                    Paul Fromm

                                                                                    Director

                     CANADIAN ASSOCIATION FOR FREE EXPRESSION