Canada’s spy chief warns of rise in lone-wolf terror attacks

Daily Brew
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
By Steve Mertl

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The head of Canada's spy agency is warning that al-Qaeda appears to be changing tactics and as many as 60 Canadians have journeyed abroad to train with the Islamic terrorist group.

Richard Fadden, director of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, told a Senate committee al-Qaeda's shift to so-called lone-wolf attacks, which are harder to detect, is presenting a problem for anti-terrorism units.

"This really makes things very complicated for us," Fadden said, according to the Globe and Mail.
Al-Qaeda began encouraging lone-wolf attacks after increased pressure on its networks in the wake of the 9/11 attacks made it harder to carry out complex operations, Reuters reported.

Fadden told the committee western intelligence agencies, including Canada, are devoting more resources to better understand what motivates individual attackers.

"It's not easy … because these individuals seem to be a mix of (ideologically driven) terrorists and people who simply have very big personal problems," he told the committee, according to Reuters.

"So it becomes very difficult to try to develop a doctrine, a series of operational capabilities, to deal with them. So to be honest, yes, it worries us."

Fadden was testifying in support of Conservative government legislation that would make it a crime to leave, or try to leave Canada for the purpose of committing terrorism.

"There has … been an alarming number of Canadians who have travelled, are planning, or have expressed a desire to engage in terrorist activities," Fadden said.

A branch of al-Qaeda last fall published an online magazine that called for "open source jihad" that included instructions for readers on how to carry out their own attacks, the Globe noted.

Fadden told the committee Canada's intelligence allies are all seeing an increase in the number of people acting alone, which makes it harder for counter-terror experts to track.

"When there are a certain number of people involved, there is a possibility of intercepting communications; the chances of errors are far greater," Fadden said.

"But when there's one person who's not talking to anybody, (counter-terrorism agencies) have to be really lucky."

One of the most recent examples, he said, was French-born Mohammed Merah, who mounted a series of attacks that killed three French soldiers and four children and teachers at a Jewish school in Toulouse before dying in a shoot-out with police.

Fadden said CSIS knows of at least 45 Canadians, and perhaps as many as 60, who've left the country to seek terror training in countries such as Somalia, the tribal area along the Afghan-Pakistan border and Yemen.

"These individuals represent a threat both to the international community and to Canada, as some have returned, or may, eventually, return to Canada after having acquired terrorist training, or even having engaged directly in acts of terrorism," Fadden told the committee, according to the Globe.

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