Canadian Recruitment Center Bombed
Canadian Recruitment Center Bombed
July 03, 2010
Associated Press
MONTREAL - A group with anti-globalization and anti-military views opposed to the invasion of Afghanistan claimed responsibility Friday for an explosion that ripped through a Canadian military recruitment center, said police.
Provincial police Sgt. Eloise Cossette said no one was injured in the blast, which blew out the glass doors of the center in Trois-Rivieres, Quebec, at 3 a.m. local time early Friday morning. She confirmed that local police received a bomb threat call minutes before the explosion. The center was closed at the time of the blast.
Montreal newspaper La Presse said it received a letter from an organization called Initiative de Resistance Internationaliste (Internationalist Resistance Initiative) claiming responsibility for the explosion.
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Cossette said that a copy of the letter had been forwarded to provincial police.
"It's a group that we know. We are still looking at other possibilities and we're trying to find out who did this and make arrests. That is our goal, to arrest those responsible," said Cossette.
In portions of the statement published on La Presse's website, the group said it aims to "ensure that political, economic and military powers cannot continue their enterprise of indoctrination justifying their imperialist venture, without impunity."
The letter denounces "corporate oligarchy" and a gas pipeline project in Afghanistan, rails against Canadian "imperialism," and makes passing reference to the Queen's visit to Canada.
"The soldiers of the Canadian Army, let it be very clear, they are not 'ours', they belong to the one to whom they foolishly pledge allegiance, Her Majesty Elizabeth II."
Queen Elizabeth II is on a nine-day visit in Canada and is in Ottawa meeting the Liberal leader of the official opposition party Michael Ignatieff.
The recruitment center is located in the downtown area of the city on the north shore of the St. Lawrence River between Montreal and Quebec City.
Canadian Forces spokesman Maj. Paule Poulin would not comment when asked if the Forces had any previous knowledge of Resistance internationaliste.
Opposition to the Canadian Forces' mission in Afghanistan has been stronger in Quebec than any other province in the country.
A Canadian Press Harris-Decima poll last year found that 54 percent of Canadians surveyed opposed the government's commitment to have troops in Afghanistan, while 39 percent supported it.
Canada has 2,900 soldiers in southern Kandahar province in Afghanistan.
The Internationalist Resistance Initiative had claimed responsibility for two previous attacks in Quebec in the mid-2000s, including the 2004 bombing of an electrical tower close to the Canada-U.S. border in eastern Quebec on the eve of President George W. Bush's first official visit to Canada.
Two years later a Canadian prominent oil-industry executive's car was firebombed in the driveway of his home north of Montreal. Originally thought to have been an accident, the explosion was investigated by the provincial police's anti-terrorism unit after the group claimed responsibility.
