Epidemic of Espionage

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"When it comes to security the Canadian government and Canadians at large are naive to the point of being stupid," said Juneau-Katsuya from his Ottawa office Friday.

"If it wasn't for the fact that terrorism kills people I would say by far -- by very far -- the greatest national security issue is economic and industrial espionage in Canada."

Juneau-Katsuya says when he was chief of the Asia-Pacific desk for CSIS in the mid-1990s, he had one of his analysts do research into how much money Canada was losing annually to espionage conducted by other countries against the Canadian government and companies (economic espionage) and spying done by foreign corporations against Canadian corporations (corporate espionage.)

"At that time my analyst was able to factually demonstrate that we were losing an average of $1 billion a month in Canada," says Juneau-Katsuya, who worked for five years as an RCMP officer before spending 17 years with CSIS as a spy-catcher, including on the KGB desk in Montreal.

"At the same period of time in the U.S., an American society for industrial security was estimating that the U.S. was losing about $2 billion a month.

"When you consider that the U.S. is at least 10 times bigger than us that means that we are not just bleeding we are hemorrhaging at a much faster rate," he says. "

Scroll down to the post titled "Chinese Spying- rest assured"- June 17.During this period CSIS' manpower was reduced by about 800 or they lost about 28% of their staff level.One of the whistleblowers, RCMP Cpl. Robert Read was turfed when he spoke to the media after he tried to keep gangsters out of the country but didn't get much help.We've had Adscam and problems with security issues, yet dedicated civil servants who tried to blow the whistle to protect Canadians were sidelined.Yet there is still no effective whistleblower legislation.




Question Period- Hansard excerpts - June 16/2005

National Security

Hon. Stephen Harper (Leader of the Opposition, CPC): Mr. Speaker, for some time there has been growing evidence of a large spy network being operated in Canada by the Chinese government. Today the former head of the CSIS Asia desk confirmed reports from defectors that close to a thousand Chinese government agent spies had infiltrated Canada.

The Prime Minister has been evading answering this. I want to ask him very directly. Did the Prime Minister explicitly raise this violation of our sovereignty when he met with leading Chinese government officials in Beijing earlier this year?

Right Hon. Paul Martin (Prime Minister, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I dealt extensively with Canada's interests. I dealt extensively with Canada's sovereignty and the need to respect state sovereignty between countries.

It is also well known that Canada maintains a vigorous counter-intelligence program to safeguard Canada's security. It is also very clear, and Canadians can rest assured, that we maintain a very strong law enforcement and security system that will enable them to be assured of their own protection and security.

Hon. Stephen Harper (Leader of the Opposition, CPC): Mr. Speaker, judging from that answer, the Prime Minister did not explicitly raise this issue. Not only does a foreign spy network undermine our security, it is in this case damaging our economic interests.

Today the former head of the CSIS Asia desk has said that the Chinese government is engaged in industrial espionage that costs our economy $1 billion a month.

Would the Prime Minister tell us whether he or anyone in his government has ever issued a formal protest of any kind for this type of activity in Canada by the Chinese government?

Hon. Pierre Pettigrew (Minister of Foreign Affairs, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, we always take all these allegations very seriously. Clearly, we enjoy a very constructive dialogue with China. We work with the Chinese. We expect from them respect for our sovereignty. When they are here, they are meant to respect our Canadian laws.

When things are brought to our attention, we refer them to the appropriate authorities in our country.

Hon. Stephen Harper (Leader of the Opposition, CPC): Mr. Speaker, those are non-answers to a serious question of security and national sovereignty. We should be getting answers and they should be coming from the leader of the country.

It is a matter of public record that a foreign government is spying on the activities of Canadian citizens and engaging in industrial espionage. Would the Prime Minister tell us whether his government plans to do anything at all about this in the future?

¸ (1420)

Hon. Anne McLellan (Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, let me be absolutely clear, as I was yesterday. CSIS and the RCMP are engaged in an ongoing basis in ensuring that the collective security and economic interests of our country are protected.

I have said before that I will not discuss operational detail. I can reassure the hon. member that CSIS and the RCMP do everything that is necessary and required, based on the circumstances of any given situation, to protect the collective security of Canadians.

Also click here and scroll to Cpl. Robert Read's testimony