Some conflict resolution going on in Ottawa
More on the Ottawa raids from CP:
An Ottawa man was charged Tuesday with two terrorism-related offences after police raids at his home and office, while shocked family members insisted upon his innocence.
Sounds like they’re reading the playbook.
Mohammad Momim Khawaja, 29, was arrested Monday at his workplace and charged with participating in or contributing to the activities of a terrorist group and facilitating terrorist activity, the RCMP said in a release. The charges fall under Canada’s anti-terrorism law.
Television reports said the Canadian-born Khawaja, a software developer, worked on contract for the Department of Foreign Affairs.
Qasim Khawaja, Mohammad Momim Khawaja’s 26-year-old brother, said there was no evidence of terrorist activities in the home for police to find.
“I guess it’s part of someone’s sick imagination,” he said Tuesday.
“They are looking for something that doesn’t exist. They want to fabricate or create it somehow,” he said.
“I’m just shocked they would authorize something like this. I would say it’s a sad, sad day for Canadian democracy.” …
The Ottawa home is owned by Dr. Mahboob A. Khawaja, the author of Muslims and the West, a book about Islamic fundamentalism that analyses global conflicts within the framework of Muslim civilization.
Mahboob Khawaja has also authored several other essays critical of American foreign policy, “corrupt Arab leadership,” “American-Zionist political encroachment in the Middle East,” and the West’s response to terrorism and the war on terror.
He was once listed as a policy adviser and faculty member of International Affairs, Politics and Religions at Syracuse University but is currently in Saudi Arabia where he is the administrator of a polytechnical institute.
Mohammad Momim Khawaja’s mother, Azra, was also detained Monday at a grocery store while his 18-year-old brother Mohsin was escorted away from the University of Ottawa where he is a student. Another brother, Tanzeel, 20, was detained when he arrived at the house later in the day.
The family was later released and put up in a hotel Monday night.