Today, the Canadian parliament has voted to dismiss two anti-terror laws that were adopted in the country during the aftermath of September 11th. Considered the equivalent of the US Patriot Act (in spirit though, not in depth) the laws allowed terror suspects to be detained with charges for days and gave interrogators the ability to “compel” witnesses to testify. While the laws were technically in place, they were never actually used in even a single case since they were enacted. The laws were viewed by all political parties, except the Conservative Party which runs the minority government and opposed their rejection, as neither relevant or needed in dealing with terrorist plots. Hopefully more countries follow the Canadian lead and stop sacrificing the rights of their citizens purely on fear.
[tags]Canada, patriot act, united states, conservative, terrorist[/tags]