People’s University UBC rejects RCMP C-IRG/CRU-BC at student Palestine solidarity encampment
The People’s University UBC [University of British Columbia] has posted on Instagram: “The administration would rather bring paramilitary police to surveillance and intimidate students- putting Indigenous and marginalized students, faculty, staff, and community members at risk- rather than meeting our demands.”
Their post adds: “WE CALL ON THE PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT OF BRITISH COLUMBIA TO DISBAND CRU-BC AND WE CALL ON UBC TO GET COPS OFF OUR CAMPUS.”
The People’s University for Gaza at UBC is “a student-led movement for Palestinian liberation & ending UBC’s complicity in Israeli occupation and apartheid.”
UBC investments
The UBC Social Justice Centre has noted: “This May 2024, seven months into Israel’s genocidal bombardment of Gaza, UBC finally disclosed its 2023 endowment investments, thanks to pressure from students across UBC campuses.”
Among the 88 companies “complicit in Israeli apartheid” with investments totalling $113.8 million are “16 military companies directly profiting from and enabling the ongoing genocide of Palestinians (around $16 million).”
Those companies include BAE Systems, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics, Safran, RTX (formerly Raytheon) and Elbit Systems.
RCMP has spun protests as “pro-Hamas”
After the student encampment was set up in late-April, Matthew Ramsey, acting senior director for media relations at the University of British Columbia, told City News we “will liaise with RCMP on this matter.”
Back in February, Tyee reporter Amanda Follett Hosgood quoted RCMP senior media relations officer Staff Sgt. Kris Clark saying: “More recently, C-IRG has deployed to pro-Hamas demonstrations to support the police of jurisdiction with public safety and enforcement at these politically and emotionally charged events.”
Countering Clark, Follett Hosgood quotes Michael Bueckert of Canadians for Peace and Justice in the Middle East (CPJME) saying: “The RCMP is making an outrageous, racist and inflammatory conflation by labelling pro-Palestinian demonstrations as ‘pro-Hamas’. This is classic anti-Palestinian racism.”
Rebranding C-IRG
This is also in the context of the C-IRG rebranding as Critical Response Unit in British Columbia (CRU-BC) and expanding its scope and mandate.
On April 5, 2024, CBC journalist Brett Forester reported: “Dogged for years by complaints, lawsuits, alleged civil and Indigenous rights violations and now an ongoing federal investigation, the RCMP’s Community-Industry Response Group (C-IRG) officially has a new name and mandate.”
Systemic investigation
On March 9, 2023, the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission (CRCC) launched a systemic investigation into the C-IRG.
Just prior to that, the CBC had reported: “The RCMP’s federal watchdog agency is weighing its options after receiving nearly 500 formal complaints about a unit tasked with policing resistance to major resource extraction projects in British Columbia. More than 100 grievances accepted for investigation contain allegations of excessive force, illegal tactics, unprofessional behaviour, racism, discrimination and charter violations by the force’s Community-Industry Response Group (C-IRG).”
Now, 15 months after the launch of the systemic investigation, there is no word as to when their investigation will be concluded and released.
An abuse of process hearing is also about to resume this coming June 17-21 in Smithers focused on C-IRG actions on Wet’suwet’en territory. This follows the revelations about the C-IRG – including officers laughing about police brutality – that surfaced in the first hearings that took place in mid-January
We continue to follow this.
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