Canada reportedly foils Iranian plot to kill former justice minister Irwin Cotler

Canadian authorities foiled an alleged Iranian plot to assassinate a former justice minister and rights activist who has been a strong critic of Tehran, the Globe and Mail newspaper has reported.

The 84-year-old was justice minister and attorney general from 2003 to 2006. He retired from politics in 2015 but has remained active with many associations that campaign for human rights around the world.

According to the Globe and Mail, he was informed last month that he faced an imminent threat – within 48 hours – of assassination from Iranian agents.

Authorities tracked two suspects in the plot, the paper said, citing unnamed sources.

In an email to AFP, the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights, where Cotler is international chair, confirmed the Globe and Mail report.

Cotler “has no knowledge or details regarding any arrests made”, said Brandon Golfman, an organization spokesman.

“We cannot comment on, nor confirm specific RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) operations due to security reasons,” a spokesperson for Dominic LeBlanc, the public safety minister, told AFP.

Jean-Yves Duclos, the government’s senior minister in Quebec province, where Cotler lives, commented that it was likely “very difficult for (Cotler), in particular, and his family and friends to hear” about the alleged plot.

Another senior government minister, Francois-Philippe Champagne, called the plot “very concerning.”

Cotler had already been receiving police protection for more than a year after the 7 October 2023 attack in Israel by Hamas.

He is Jewish and has advocated globally to have Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps listed as a terrorist entity.

Cotler’s name reportedly also came up in an FBI investigation of a 2022 Iranian murder-for-hire operation in New York that targeted the American human rights activist Masih Alinejad.

Ottawa, which severed diplomatic ties with Iran more than a decade ago, listed the Revolutionary Guard as a banned terror group in June.

As a lawyer, Cotler also represented Iranian political prisoners and dissidents. He is also international chair of the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights and a strong backer of Israel.

His daughter, Michal Cotler-Wunsh, is an Israeli politician and diplomat who previously served as a member of Israel’s parliament.