Edmonton criminologist Bill Pitt, seen here at home, says CSIS suspects every major city has cells working on terrorist causes around the world.

By , QMI Agency January 22, 2011 http://www.torontosun.com/news/canada/2011/01/22/16990841.html

EDMONTON – If there was one terrorist plying his trade in Edmonton, there are likely more where he came from, said a local criminologist.
“Terrorist cells typically have four to seven people in them,” said Bill Pitt, a former Mountie who now teaches at Grant MacEwan University.
Pitt said CSIS suspects every major city in Canada likely has a couple of cells working for a variety of terrorist causes around the world.
After the RCMP arrested Sayfildin Tahir-Sharif earlier this week on suspicion of orchestrating deadly suicide bombings in Iraq in 2009, they were quick to say the accused posed no threat to anyone in Edmonton.
The FBI alleges that Tahir-Sharif, a Kurd who came to Canada from Iraq in 1993, did most of his work online, coordinating from his north Edmonton apartment an operation involving a group of Tunisian suicide bombers and accomplices in Iraq.
They accuse him of quarterbacking an attack in the northern Iraqi city of Marez that claimed the lives of five U.S. soldiers and left dozens more injured.
Tahir-Sharif was quietly arrested Wednesday morning at his home.
Pitt said most terrorist activity uncovered in Canada involves raising money here for operations overseas. For example, a small number of Sikhs in the Vancouver area are suspected of financing much of the Khalistan separatist movement in northwestern India. Radicals within Toronto’s Tamil community allegedly did the same for the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka.
He said in some cases, extremists will infiltrate legitimate charitable groups and skim money from them, then launder the cash through shady overseas banks in places like Cyprus or Russia.
A former senior CSIS official calls Canada’s immigration system a “disaster” that allows radicals and extremists from around the world to set up shop here.
“We have 300,000 people come here every year,” said David Harris, who is now a private security consultant in Ottawa. “We cannot begin to screen credibly a fraction of these numbers.”
But a University of Alberta expert said that’s not the problem at all.
In fact, said political scientist Andy Knight, Canada’s screening system is admired by other countries. We scrutinize (and frequently reject) applicants at embassies before they get here, not after.
“It’s actually much harder to get into Canada from places like Africa and the Middle East than it is to get into Europe,” he said.
Knight says a much bigger danger in Canada is the radicalization of immigrants after they arrive.
The problem, he says, is “xenoracism,” where new arrivals can’t gain full acceptance into Canadian society, like professionals whose qualifications aren’t recognized here and end up barely scraping by with menial jobs.
They become bitter and disenfranchised, he said, “and sometimes it can push them into the arms of radicals” who slowly indoctrinate them.
“It’s not about colour,” he said. “It’s about people’s perception of foreigners.”
Tahir-Sharif is being held in the Edmonton Remand Centre and is expected to appear in court Jan. 27. The FBI is trying to extradite him to the U.S. but his lawyer says he’ll fight the extradition.