Historical Dictionary of Terrorism Third Edition

QUEBEC LIBERATION FRONT • 569QIBLA. See PEOPLE AGAINST GANGSTERISM AND DRUGS.QUEBEC LIBERATION FRONT (FLQ). The Front de Libération duQuébec was a French Canadian group seeking independence for theprovince of Quebec from the rest of Canada along with creation of a socialistregime there. From 1962 to 1980 the FLQ was the single largestsource of political violence in Canada, accounting for over 50 percentof all domestic terrorist incidents in Canada, most of which occurredbefore 1972. Most incidents involved bombings of Canadian federalbuildings and arsons of Canadian police stations, businesses in Quebecowned by American and Canadian Anglophones, and military installations,but eventually progressing to kidnapping and murder. The groupenjoyed moral and limited material support from Cuba and Algeria.The FLQ was founded in February 1963 by three Quebec separatistsdisgruntled with existing separatist organizations. On 21 June1970 the group botched an attempt to kidnap the U.S. consul generalin Montreal. On 5 October 1970 they kidnapped James RichardCross, the British trade commissioner in Canada, whom they releasedon 3 December 1970. On 10 October 1970 they kidnapped Pierre La-Porte, Quebec’s minister of labor, who was also the acting provincialpremier while the actual premier was away from Quebec on officialbusiness. In response to these FLQ actions, the Canadian governmentimposed the War Measures Act on 16 October 1970, suspending ordinarycivil liberties and allowing police and military forces extraordinarypowers to conduct searches without warrants and to apprehendsuspects without formal charges. It should be noted that the WarMeasures Act was originally legislated to allow for the internment ofenemy civilians during World War I and was later used during WorldWar II to intern Japanese Canadians. The kidnappers murdered La-Porte on 17 October 1970, and his body was found the following dayin the trunk of a car. The five kidnappers eventually negotiated safepassage to Cuba in exchange for the life of James Cross.The murder of LaPorte greatly shocked English-speaking Canadianand Québécois public opinion and created a backlash against theFLQ even in Quebec. The outrage against the FLQ was heightenedby the separatist Parti Québécois’s impressive gains in recent elections,it having secured 23 percent of the provincial election votesin 1970, which made the recourse to terrorism seem pointless andcounterproductive. Although Canadian public opinion was incensed