Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland speaks during a news conference before delivering the Federal budget, Tuesday, March 28, 2023 in Ottawa. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld

By Dylan Robertson in Ottawa

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government plans to launch a National Counter-Foreign Interference Office, amid ongoing scrutiny of allegations that Beijing interfered in recent federal elections.

Tuesday’s federal budget earmarked $56 million over five years for measures to combat foreign interference, threats and covert activities.

The Mounties are slated to receive most of that money before April 2026 in support of efforts to investigate threats and proactively work with diaspora communities at risk of being targeted by foreign interference.

The budget document says the new office will be created within the Department of Public Safety, but it does not include a timeline for its launch.

The measures come as former governor general David Johnston takes up his role as a special rapporteur, with a mandate to sort out whether Trudeau should call the public inquiry demanded by the three main opposition parties.

The Liberals are also proposing legislative amendments that would task a federal banking watchdog with determining whether large financial institutions “have adequate policies and procedures to protect themselves against threats to their integrity and security, including protection against foreign interference.”

The Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions would also be given the powers to take control of a bank “where there are national security risks.”

Ottawa also plans to beef up its money-laundering regime and policies tackling terrorism funding through a series of proposed amendments.

The changes would follow an internal assessment that found weaknesses in how departments share information, few prosecutions being pursued and gaps how the rules apply to lawyers.

The proposed legislative changes would enact whistleblower protections and crack down on people who avoid reporting requirements by using a series of small transactions.

Ottawa would also compel banks to report on assets held by people who are subject to sanctions, beefing up existing rules that generally only compel such reporting on clients suspected of terrorist financing and money laundering.

The budget says the Liberals plan to implement a Federal Beneficial Ownership Registry by the end of this year, after recently introducing legislation to that effect, with a mandate to be publicly shared by this fall.

The Liberal government also says it aims to update the public this fall on whether Fintrac should be tasked with countering sanctions evasion.

In another measure related to terrorist financing, the budget allocates $16 million over the coming two years to implement proposed legislation aimed at allowing humanitarian groups to work in Afghanistan.

Currently, aid workers cannot operate in that country without paying taxes to the government and therefore running the risk of being prosecuted for financially supporting the Taliban.

The bill proposes a regulatory program to issue exemption permits. Officials said the funding would be needed to assess applications for permits and probe the risk of the exemptions benefiting terror groups.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 28, 2023.

Deputy Regional Director for the Middle East & North Africa Aya Majzoub, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press in Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, March 28, 2023. Leading international rights group Amnesty International on Tuesday decried what it said were double standards by Western countries, which rallied behind a “robust response” to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine but remain “lukewarm” on issues of human rights violations in the Middle East. The Arabic Words in the background read “Woman, life, freedom.” (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)

By Kareem Chehayeb in Beirut

BEIRUT (AP) — A leading international rights group on Tuesday decried what it said were double standards by Western countries that have rallied behind a “robust response” to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine but remain “lukewarm” on issues of human rights violations in the Middle East.

According to Amnesty International, such double standards only fuel further repression for millions in the region.

The sharp rebuke came as the London-based watchdog launched its annual report at a news conference at its office in Beirut, Lebanon’s capital. Every year, the report documents and analyzes patterns of human rights violations and abuses across the world.

In the report, Amnesty urged the international community to hold perpetrators of human rights abuses in the Middle East and North Africa to account, and to address the issue of migration without discrimination.

“They immediately opened their borders to receive refugees from Ukraine,” Aya Majzoub, Amnesty’s deputy chief for Mideast and North Africa, said of Western nations. She said that’s in stark contrast to how the same countries generally treat refugees and migrants trying to flee war-torn Syria, the chaos in Libya or Lebanon’s economic meltdown.

The number of attempts by migrants to enter the European Union without authorization reached around 330,000 in 2022, the highest in five years. In 2015, over 1 million people, mostly Syrian refugees fleeing the conflict, reached Europe.

Germany received accolades for welcoming large numbers of Syrian refugees at the time, and the U.S. and European countries frequently point out the billions of dollars they have given in aid to help refugees and internally displaced Syrians.

Today, many European governments are calling for reforms to the asylum-seeking system for better efficiency and to distinguish between refugees fleeing war and persecution and migrants searching for job opportunities, who they say are creating a strain on the asylum system and should be returned.

Majzoub spoke to The Associated Press in an interview after the news conference. She praised the international community for denouncing Russian President Vladimir Putin’s attacks against civilians in Ukraine, including systematic torture and killing in occupied regions — which a U.N.-backed inquiry earlier this month said amount to war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity.

But such a strong response was lacking during Syria’s 12-year-old brutal civil war. “That’s perpetuated the culture of impunity and empowered Putin to commit the crimes that he was committing in Ukraine,” she said.

Amnesty’s report said Middle Eastern governments took advantage of the situation over the past year and doubled down on repressing dissidents while neglecting obligations to respond to economic crises.

The group condemned Iranian authorities for detaining over 20,000 people who took part in monthslong anti-government protests that erupted last September, following the death of a young woman in the custody of the country’s morality police.

Amnesty’s report also did not spare oil-rich Saudi Arabia for “changing its image to win over foreign investment” in a public relations campaign while continuing to crack down on activists promoting women’s rights.

Amnesty also criticized Israel for its ongoing raids on Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, with the past months being among the deadliest in years.

In tiny Lebanon, Amnesty chastised the authorities for escalating rhetoric against Syrian refugees and the queer community — instead of undertaking badly needed economic reforms for an International Monetary Fund bailout package.