National Security Minister Gary Griffith has condemned yesterday’s brazen attack on the Canadian Parliament and reminded T&T citizens that the cost of real freedom is eternal vigilance and those who fail to prepare are dooming themselves to failure. He made the comment yesterday after the attack by a lone gunman left a soldier and the gunman dead. Asked if any T&T nationals living in Canada had been injured in the incident, Griffith said up to late yesterday he had received no such information, but his ministry would continue to monitor the situation.
In a press release earlier, Griffith said: “This latest incident that reverberates throughout the Commonwealth, of which both T&T and Canada are integral parts, sends a strong message that no country is safe from the violent and the depraved. “As such, security experts and law enforcement personnel remain vigilant and must to be armed and ready to deal with any attack against our country’s freedom and democracy.”
Describing yesterday’s incident as reprehensible, Griffith said it highlighted that his ministry had been proven accurate in its predictive planning and preparation for threats to national security.
He said initiatives and policies implemented in the last few months were being done in the best interest of T&T and there was a need for intense training, increased manpower strengthening and the acquisition of assets to defend T&T against all manner of security threats. “Highly trained officers and the provision of resources are all part of the ministry’s strategy to ensure that all members of the protective services are equipped and outfitted to securely stand in the first line of defence for this country and its citizenry,” Griffith said.
He said he intended to make every effort to ensure the units and key agencies of the ministry were well prepared for a similar situation. “The risk and the clear and present danger were real and evident in today’s (yesterday’s) occurrence and the response of the Canadian authorities was appropriate and in accordance with their threat assessment,” Griffith said. The first assets and response team on site during the shooting, Griffith said, were the armoured personnel carriers and the special operations group, He said his ministry was exploring similar initiatives. “These are the same armoured personnel carriers that some had taken to calling expensive toys. Today these APCs have proven their worth, pressed into service in a hostile civilian environment, and the message could not be clearer for us here at home, especially as we have had experience with attacks on our very own seat of democracy,” Griffith said.
He said as recently as two months ago a comprehensive risk threat and vulnerability assessment was done at T&T’s Parliament building by the National Operations Centre, Defence Force, Police Service, Parliament security and the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Management (ODPM). On the basis of the findings the ministry has implemented proactive security planning, he said.
