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(Published in the The Vancouver Province Aug. 26, 1999)
'A breach of national security'
Files at Canada's diplomatic mission in Hong Kong were infiltrated
By Fabian Dawson
Chinese nationals linked to organized crime have broken into the immigration computer at Canada's diplomatic mission in Hong Kong, classified documents obtained by The Province allege.
At least 788 files from the Computer-Assisted Immigration Processing System (CAIPS) were deleted, and up to 2,000 blank visa forms have disappeared, according to the documents.
The core allegations are:
- That certain people paid locally engaged staff of the Canadian commission (now the consulate-general) to delete their backgrounds in the computer system to hide their links with triads -- the Chinese Mafia.
- That the visa forms have been used by possibly hundreds of people, including criminals, to enter Canada illegally.
For seven years, the RCMP, Immigration Canada and the department of external affairs are alleged to have kept a lid on the case, unwilling to reveal the extent of what several sources call a "breach of national security."
Two key figures in the investigation suspect the RCMP is covering up criminal acts and negligence at Canada's immigration office in Hong Kong.
Details of the case are contained in reports filed by Robert Read, an RCMP corporal in Ottawa, and Brian McAdam, a former immigration control officer at the Canadian commission in Hong Kong.
"I believe there has been a massive conspiracy to cover up the whole issue," Read said.
In a report marked Top Secret, he wrote: "The loss of control of CAIPS . . . loss of control over immigration from Hong Kong . . . from 1986 to 1992 is a most serious breach of national security."
Read, who has written orders from his boss, Insp. Jean Dube, not to talk to the media, told The Province: "I am going public because there needs to be a public inquiry into this whole thing."
Official spokesmen would not confirm or deny the existence of an investigation.
In fact, the investigation began in 1992, when the department of external affairs sent to Hong Kong an electronic data processing officer, David Balser, and RCMP Sgt. John Conohan.
Read and McAdam say the two men carried out a cursory investigation. Despite evidence indicating security breaches by locally employed staff and the discovery of fake Immigration Canada stamps in one of their desks, neither recommended further investigations.
Conohan was also told about local staff who had given themselves unauthorized, top-level security clearance to access the computer, according to one of Read's reports.
The sergeant reported that the suspect in whose desk the fake stamps were found had fled to Taiwan, despite having been given information that she was living in B.C., some of the reports allege.
Documents also show that a second suspect, a woman who operated the CAIPS computer, fled her job in September 1993 because of gambling debts owed to triads.
Balser's report, a copy of which The Province has obtained, is described by sources familiar with the allegations as "unintelligible bureaucratese."
He makes no express mention of the deleted files, fake stamps, missing blank visas or the disappearing local staff.
Balser does talk about the potential for security breaches and recommends that locally engaged staff not be given high security clearance.
And he hints that someone could misuse blank visas, which were left lying in open cardboard boxes, but does not report allegations that at least 2,000 blank immigrant visas were found to be missing.
Read, a Mountie for 24 years, alleged that Balser has told him on the record that he (Balser) was ordered to "obfuscate" his report. Balser is now retired.
Unable to get any answers to his concerns, McAdam continued with his complaints. A series of RCMP investigators were given the case and then abruptly transferred.
The Canadian Security and Intelligence Service, Canada's spy agency, was brought in to investigate Chinese espionage. Together with the RCMP, CSIS launched Operation Sidewinder in 1995. That operation, which was to look at the influence of Chinese officials and tycoons at the Hong Kong mission, was also abruptly halted.
The investigation into the penetration of CAIPS is now being conducted by Sgt. Sergio Pasin of the immigration and passport section of the RCMP in Ottawa.
"There is enough evidence in this case and in my other reports to initiate a public inquiry . . . but for some reason nobody wants to do anything," said McAdam.
"If the RCMP does not tell the government that a disaster has occurred," said Read, "the government cannot decide how to react to it, cannot decide when to tell the people of Canada what has occurred.
"They have Balser's report, McAdam's testimony, the missing files in Hong Kong . . . and my report.
"Why won't they do anything?"
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