Next They Will Extradite Blasphemers to Pakistan

Do you know the one reason I might doubt whether the Holocaust really happened? Because the authorities are so intent in prosecuting Holocaust-deniers. Truth doesn't need jail cells for its protection. As I wrote last year regarding the David Irving case, "Why bully the kooks and cranks with the threat of jail, unless they were on to something?"

Unfortunately, Canada doesn't feel the same way. They've had "hate speech" laws - which covered Holocaust denial - for over two decades now. But now they took the extraordinary step of deporting a resident to Germany to stand trial there, for actions committed on Canadian territory:

A German court on Thursday convicted far-right activist Ernst Zundel and sentenced him to five years in prison for Holocaust denial in a case that underlined Germany's determination to prosecute people who claim the Nazis didn't murder six million Jews.

The 67-year-old Zundel, who was deported from Canada in 2005, was convicted on 14 counts of inciting hatred for years of anti-Semitic activities, including contributing to a Web site devoted to denying the Holocaust - a crime in Germany.

[...]

Born in Germany in 1939, Zundel emigrated to Canada in 1958 and lived in Toronto and Montreal until 2001. Canadian officials twice rejected his attempts to obtain Canadian citizenship, and he moved to Pigeon Forge, Tenn., until he was deported to Canada in 2003 for alleged immigration violations.

Mannheim prosecutors were able to open a case against Zundel because his Holocaust-denying Web site is available in Germany.

In February 2005, a Canadian judge ruled that Zundel's activities were not only a threat to national security, but 'the international community of nations' as well.

A Canadian law, passed after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States, allows the government to hold terrorism suspects without charge, based on secret evidence that does not have to be disclosed to a suspect or his defense.

Zundel was deported a few days later

Would Canada have treated Salman Rushdie the same way, deporting him to Iran? How about the Danish Cartoonists? Would Canada have sent them back to Pakistan to stand trial? Okay, probably not - but what if a Pakistani immigrant living in Canada drew the offensive cartoons? After all, pissing off a billion Muslims is a tad greater threat to international security and stability than pissing off 20 million Jews, is it not?

Aside from the free speech problem, there's the sovereignty problem. If an American ex-pat buys drugs in the Netherlands, should he be sent back to the U.S. for violating American drug laws?

One final point. The article also says,

The German prosecution won praise from Bnai Brith Canada, a Jewish human rights group.

What B.S. A "human rights" group would protect freedom of speech, not attack it.