The murder in Paris of 10 magazine employees, three police officers and four hostages has gripped the world. Last weekend, more than three million protesters took part in solidarity marches across France, the largest demonstrations in that country鈥檚 history.
They were joined by the leaders of 44 nations, who walked arm in arm through the streets of Paris, a scene unprecedented since the state funeral of President John F. Kennedy half a century ago.
Britain, the U.S. and Australia have also suffered attacks by terrorists claiming ties to Islamic extremist groups. And here at home, two soldiers were killed and Parliament Hill was fired upon, in separate incidents last October.
Inevitably, these grim events have prompted calls for tougher security measures.
But accepting that the level of threat has escalated, is a security crackdown the answer?
Successive Canadian governments have already tightened the noose. In 2001, after the 9/11 assaults on the U.S., Jean Chr茅tien鈥檚 administration broadened police powers. Aiding terrorists was made a crime and tougher penalties were imposed.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper has promised additional measures. There have been hints that some form of preventive detention will be introduced.
The idea might seem tempting. It鈥檚 almost inevitable, when intelligence is sifted from a haze of intercepted phone calls and email chatter, that an imperfect picture emerges.
Patterns become visible that could indicate a planned attack. But what to make of them? Wait for certainty, and you might wait too long.
It appears this dilemma preceded the Paris murders. Those responsible were already known to security personnel, both in France and the U.S. One had been jailed on a prior occasion for a terrorism-related offence.
And the RCMP now say they wanted to detain the man who ran down two soldiers in Quebec last fall, killing one of them. But prosecutors declined to act for want of definite proof.
Yet what options do we have? There is today no legal power in sa国际传媒 to detain suspected terrorists for more than 48 hours without charges being laid. Such an authority once existed, in the form of the War Measures Act, now revoked.
But we know where that led. During the First World War, 4,000 Canadians from Ukraine were detained on no better grounds than their former nationality. Throughout the Second World War, 27,000 Japanese-Canadians suffered internment, some for years, some with the loss of all their possessions. No one wants a replay of that ugly period in our history.
Yet the whole point of preventive detention is to imprison suspects before they have committed a crime. And to achieve a meaningful reduction in threat levels, the period of imprisonment would have to be prolonged, if not indefinite.
We don鈥檛 know what the government has in mind. Certainly any new scheme would require the blessing of our courts. It鈥檚 unlikely that would be forthcoming if something draconian were proposed.
But there is a fine line to walk here, between guarding our safety and undermining basic rights. On the one hand, the threat is real and living in our midst.
On the other hand, the outrage in Paris was a deliberate attack on free speech. It would be more than an irony if we respond by curtailing other freedoms.
The responsibility of balancing these competing interests falls on the prime minister and his colleagues. They will need the wisdom of Solomon to bring us through this intact.
