today’s ” AR-online” again AR-Online recent issues: July 1999 June 1999 May 1999 April 1999 March 1999 February 1999 January 1999 December 1998 November 1998 October 1998 September 1998 August 1998 July 1998 Alphabetical index (text) Toronto, http://www.globeandmail.ca/gam/National/19990830/UWEBBN.html Far Right using Web to whip up hostility to Chinese migrants Internet the latest tool to promote campaign against immigration JOHN
GRAY The Globe and Mail THE recent arrival of two boatloads of illegal Chinese migrants on the West Coast has provided fresh fuel for the long-standing anti-immigration campaign that inspires Canada’s small but noisy far right. Since the first boat arrived on Vancouver Island from China last month with a cargo of 123 illegal migrants, the far right has been agitating to send them back without delay.
The Canada First Immigration Reform Committee has harnessed the Internet to carry its campaign against immigration in general and the two recent boatloads of Chinese migrants in particular. The Internet campaign has involved a subtle combination of straightforward stories reprinted from news organizations, such as The Globe and Mail , and anonymous commentaries from those sympathetic to the anti-immigration campaign.
The committee is promoting lobbying devices ranging from an E-mail petition to postcards and faxes to Immigration Minister Elinor Caplan and members of Parliament. The petition has attracted the support of many of the traditional figures of the far right: Terry Long , former leader of the Aryan Nation; Wolfgang Droege , leader of the Heritage Front, and Gerry Lincoln , a founder of the Heritage Front.
The man leading the campaign is Paul Fromm (right), the director of the committee and a prominent fixture of just about every far-right cause in Canada since he was leader of the defunct Edmund Burke Society three decades ago. Mr. Fromm was particularly delighted with more than 100 E-mail messages of support he received in the 24 hours after conservative columnist Diane Francis allied herself with the campaign to send the migrants