canada
Mounties make arrests for "terrorism" offenses Fri Jun 2, 11:46 PM ET
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said on Friday that it arrested a number of individuals in the Toronto area for "terrorism-related offenses."
"The operation is on-going," said Corporal Michele Paradis, spokeswoman for the Mounties.
Paradis declined to offer details on the nature of charges or provide a specific number of those detained in the police operation, which was conducted with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), Canada's main intelligence agency.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation said at least 8 people were taken into custody and more than 100 police officers were involved in the sweep.
Those individuals arrested on Friday were being held by authorities in the city of Pickering, a Toronto suburb.
The mounted police said it planned to hold a news conference on Saturday morning in Toronto to provide details, but would not comment further until then, Paradis said.
Earlier this week, Canada's spy service admitted it couldn't track down many domestic terror suspects, and warned that the country faced an increasing threat from "home-grown terrorists" who are assimilated into society.
Jack Hooper, deputy director of operations at CSIS, said the service was trying to keep track of "350 high-level targets" as well as 50 to 60 organizations thought to be linked to groups such as al-Qaeda.
"We know who and where some of them are," he told the Senate's national defense committee on Monday in Ottawa.
Both the current and previous directors of the CSIS have said over the last two years that an attack by militants inside Canada is inevitable.