Canadian Heritage committee  True.

Canadian Heritage committee  I believe this is what Islamic organizations and the mosques are there for. There is leadership there. They should take the responsibility. Unfortunately, some of the wrong organizations are taking the leadership. We have been approached by the legal department and by the police department who ask, who should we go to?

Canadian Heritage committee  Absolutely not. I'm fighting tooth and nail for freedom of speech. There should be no restrictions on freedom of speech. Every Canadian citizen should have a right to ask any question and to criticize those practices that are against human rights.

Canadian Heritage committee  I've had my share of threats and hate mail. It's terrible to have a hate mail folder on your computer, but I do. However, it has worked well because now there are five mosques across the world that are run by women. The culture of the mosques here has been so misogynist and patriarchal that women decided that they were going to open their own mosques.

Canadian Heritage committee  Very well.

Canadian Heritage committee  Thank you. Yes, I do believe it's important to have a dialogue between communities, not just faith communities but between all communities and to learn from each other. I want to pick up very quickly on what you said that's extremely important in this discussion, which is that hate is a learned behaviour.

Canadian Heritage committee  Thank you.

Canadian Heritage committee  Thank you for that very important question. I work closely with Baroness Cox, and in fact, I have travelled across the Atlantic to give testimony to the House of Lords in England on the exact same issue. As you may be aware, there are over 85 sharia courts operating in the United Kingdom, and these were established with the blessing of the British government until the problems started arising.

Canadian Heritage committee  My recommendation is that the communities themselves should be empowered to bring about change. This is work that should be taken over by the thriving Muslim communities here. We have a large Muslim population. I don't see this happening. I don't see round-table conferences in mosques or in Islamic organizations in which this issue is being discussed, regarding the concerns or the way that we can deal with it.

Canadian Heritage committee  Thank you so much for the clarification. I believe it's important to focus on the word “all”, and I would appreciate it if, included in all the recommendations, we had “all ethnic communities,” “all minorities,” and “all sorts of racism”. It is the focus on the word “Islamophobia” that has me concerned, because many of you may not be aware that Islamophobia is a word that was created after 9/11 to stem any kind of critique, discussion, or debate about Islam and Muslims.

Canadian Heritage committee  Thank you.

Canadian Heritage committee  Madam Chair, members of the committee, ladies and gentlemen, thank you for this opportunity to address this committee. My name, as you know, is Raheel Raza. I am president of the Council for Muslims Facing Tomorrow. My family and I will have been in Canada for 30 years next year.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  It happens both ways. Typically they will take them out of the country, but it is also happening right here. As I said in my opening remarks, these have not been tracked. So some work needs to be done on getting statistics, and that once the awareness is there, that these girls are able to speak out, or the support systems, the social workers or educational systems that know about this to speak out.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  A law that would prosecute parents or anybody involved in forcing a young girl into marriage would be a definite deterrent. Just knowing that they can be criminalized for doing this, which is the law in England now.... It was brought into place about a year after Honor Diaries came out.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Once they are aware of the triggers of honour-based violence, which means workshops, training, and education, I believe that yes, they will be better equipped to deal with it. They will be even better equipped to deal with issues of forced marriage. A quick example is that if a young girl calls a police officer or calls 911 and says that she's afraid her parents are going to force her into a marriage, they can't do anything because a crime has not been committed.