Iran’s growing influence could go unnoticed when investigation begins, experts warn – National | globalnews.ca

The long-awaited public inquiry into foreign interference in the election will begin Monday and will examine how countries such as China, Russia and India may have attempted to meddle in Canadian democracy.

But some national security experts warn that Iran’s growing influence may be overlooked, despite the extent to which the regime has “extended its tentacles” into Canada.

“Any country about which we have substantial information about their involvement in foreign interference should be included,” Dick Fadden, former head of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, told host Mercedes Stephenson in an interview with The west block.

“Ignoring Iran, given the public information we have about Iran, will only raise questions that (the commission) will not be able to answer,” added Fadden, who is expected to testify at the inquiry on Wednesday.

Judge Marie-Josée Hogue, a judge at the Quebec Court of Appeal, is leading the investigation and will have just three months to present her findings on one of Canada’s most complex national security challenges. Her interim report is due May 3 and her final report is due at the end of the year.

The commission’s terms of reference direct it to examine how China, Russia and other “foreign state or non-state actors” may have attempted to influence the 2019 and 2021 federal elections.

On Wednesday, India was added to the list. The commission requested records related to that country and complaints of interference on Canadian soil.

But Iran has not been mentioned openly, despite growing concerns about its attempt to intimidate Iranian Canadians.

A Global News investigation by current affairs program The New Reality suggested that associates of the Iranian regime were operating in Canada, including some who threatened Iranian diaspora communities in the country.

Last November, the RCMP acknowledged it had received “reports of foreign interference committed by or under the direction of the Islamic Republic of Iran.”

TO 2019 report of the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP) wrote that Canada’s “close allies and like-minded states” are concerned about Tehran’s growing reach.

“Notable concerns included the political interference activities of Russia and China and their efforts, along with those of Iran and Turkey, to influence and intimidate ethnocultural communities,” the report reads.

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Fadden warns that Canada’s public inquiry may not be able to delve deeper into Iran and other facets of foreign election interference, due to the commission’s tight deadline.

“I think (Hogue) is operating within a time frame that makes it almost impossible to address all of the issues in a substantial way,” he said.

Both he and Vina Nadjibulla, vice-president of research and strategy at the Asia-Pacific Foundation of Canada, agree that Canada is playing catch-up and is years behind its allies when it comes to tackling the problem.

“We have been much slower to recognize the real threat that foreign interference poses to our democracy and our way of life,” Nadjibulla told Mercedes Stephenson on The West Block. “This is not an exercise just to make a consultation. We need to see real changes to be able to better defend ourselves against these threats, which will persist for years to come,” he stated.

For Fadden, a more realistic time frame to conclude the investigation is a year, possibly a year and a half.

“Probably then we will be in an election and no one will pay much attention. But we are not going to have many opportunities to deal with foreign interference,” he stated. “I don’t understand why it took so long for the government to accept that we needed a public inquiry.”

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