Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree insists the federal government’s approach to people associated with the Iranian regime in Canada is “aggressive,” despite having only deported one person in the last three years.
Late last month, the United States and Israel began strikes on Iran, targeting the country’s leadership, with retaliatory strikes since widening the conflict in the region.
Against the backdrop of the now-two-week war, there are growing concerns about the threat posed by individuals aligned with the Iranian regime who live in Canada.
“What I can say is, and Canadians can be reassured of this, we have a process in place,” Anandasangaree told CTV Question Period host Vassy Kapelos in an interview airing Sunday, when pressed on the recent threats and violence faced by Iranian Canadians, such as the gunshots fired earlier this month at the boxing gym owned by an Iranian Canadian activist and outspoken critic of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in Toronto.
“We have investigations that are credible, that are not ad hoc, that we spend an enormous amount of resources into investigating,” Anandasangaree added. “And once the finding of inadmissibility is met — and that is the threshold internally to the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) — then they’re referred for removal, and we’re going through the process of removing those individuals.”
Last June, the CBSA confirmed to CTV News it was investigating how dozens of suspected Iranian officials had been allowed to enter Canada, while three individuals had been issued deportation orders and another removed from the country.
In addition to Canada’s designation of the Iranian regime under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, it has also listed the IRGC as a terrorist entity under the Criminal Code.
According to Anandasangaree, of the thousands of visa and other document applications, Canada has either rejected or cancelled 239 because of membership in the IRGC.
He said there are about 270 reviews currently underway, with 32 individuals who “fit the definition and who are deemed to be inadmissible.” Of those, he continued, 28 are still in Canada, four have left voluntarily, and one has been removed.
The public safety minister said “it is not every member of the IRGC” that is denied access to Canada, but rather only senior officials of the military branch. And, he said, there is “a number of different measures that people need to go through before the removal.”
“What I will say is that we will aggressively pursue every single individual who is deemed to be inadmissible based on their membership in the IRGC, and we will ensure that their removal is enforced,” Anandasangaree said.
The opposition Conservatives spent much of the week’s debates in the House of Commons focused on the issue, accusing the government of being anything but aggressive in tackling it, and of making Canada a “safe haven” for activists of the IRGC.
“Those long arms of the regime are in our own communities,” deputy Conservative leader Melissa Lantsman told Kapelos in an interview on CTV Power Play this week. “I’m an MP with a sizeable Iranian population.”
“I have people call my office, I have calls with them,” Lantsman added. “They’re in a car with a blurred-out background far away from their house because they are terrified of the activists we have living on our soil.”
In 2022, the then government enacted a policy barring any senior Iranian government official from entering Canada. According to CBSA, those include senior officials from the Iranian government, security and intelligence agencies, as well as members of the IRGC.
When pressed by Kapelos on a lack of deportations, Anandasangaree said he was “defending the process, because it is robust,” adding there is “adequate due process in place, as per the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.”
“I want Canadians to be assured, I want Iranian Canadians to be assured that, that every member who we deem to be inadmissible, based on the listing, based on the information that we have … we will take decisive steps, and that’s exactly what we’re doing now,” Anandasangaree said.
The Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), meanwhile, says the threat level in Canada from Iran or its proxies has not changed since the war began two weeks ago, but adding that threat-related activities are “likely to continue.”
“The level remains at ‘Medium,’ meaning that a violent extremist attack remains a realistic possibility,” a CSIS spokesperson said in a statement to CTV News on Tuesday night.
The statement also pointed to potential Iranian threats thwarted in recent months.
You can watch Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree’s full interview on CTV Question Period Sunday at 11 a.m. ET.
With files from CTV News’ Brennan MacDonald and Stephanie Ha
