Terror suspects wanted to behead Canadian prime minister
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Authorities during a hearing at the Ontario Court of Justice further alleged that one of the suspects, Steven Vikash Chand, also plotted to take over media outlets, including Canadian Broadcasting Corp.
The details of the charges ? notably the purported plot to take political leaders hostage and behead them if Muslim prisoners were not freed in Afghanistan ? added a chilling dimension to a case that has led U.S. authorities to toughen security along the border and unsettled Canada’s large Muslim community.
Police say they expect more arrests, and intelligence officers are probing whether 12 adults and five juveniles arrested over the weekend had any ties to Islamic terror cells in the United States and five nations in Europe and Asia.
Chand, a 25-year-old restaurant worker from Toronto, was one of 15 suspects who made brief court appearances Tuesday. They were held behind a glass enclosure, brought in as groups of four or five, chained together in ankle shackles and handcuffs.
Chand, bearded with shoulder-length hair, blew a kiss to supporters as he was led away as formal bail hearings for him and the 14 others were postponed until at least Monday.
“There’s an allegation apparently that my client personally indicated that he wanted to behead the prime minister of Canada,” said Chand’s lawyer, Gary Batasar. “It’s a very serious allegation. My client has said nothing about that.”
Speaking outside the courthouse, Batasar said the charges were based on fear-mongering government officials.
“It appears to me that whether you’re in Ottawa or Toronto or Crawford, Texas, or Washington, D.C., what is wanting to be instilled in the public is fear,” he said.
He also suggested that Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who expressed happiness at the arrests, should “keep out of the case.”
In Ottawa, Harper appeared to take the alleged beheading threat in stride. “I can live with these threats as long as they’re not from my caucus,” he joked.
The Ontario Court of Justice in Brampton, a small city just west of Toronto, had said earlier that the suspects faced charges that included participating in a terrorist group, importing weapons and planning a bombing. The specific details were made public Tuesday.
Lawyers and family members said they were being given too little information about the case, and charged that the suspects’ rights were not being respected.
Rocco Galati, a lawyer for suspect Ahmad Mustafa Ghany, 21, told the judge that his client’s constitutional rights had been violated because he was only able to interview him in the presence of an armed guard.
“The right to private counsel was afforded even at Nuremberg,” Galati said.