The U.S. pastor behind “International Burn a Koran Day” said he would “possibly” try again to enter Canada after border officers turned him back Thursday as he was on his way to speak in Toronto.
“We will see,” Terry Jones said in an interview. “We were looking forward to coming there and we were looking forward to speaking. … We were definitely disappointed and we were surprised.”
At the Windsor border crossing, Canada Border Services Agency officers questioned Mr. Jones and searched his car and luggage for more than four hours before denying him entry on the grounds of criminality.
The CBSA also confiscated signs found in his car that read “Islam is the New Nazism” and “Koran Burning Site.” But he said they were from a rally in Michigan and he did not plan on burning any Korans in Canada.
National Post, 11 October 2012
The Examiner reports that the “debate” went ahead without Jones. The speakers were Allan Einstoss, who was arrested earlier this year after trying to intimidate participants at a Quds Day rally with a 165-pound mastiff that had an Israeli flag tied round its neck, along with Hindutva extremist Ron Banerjee who organised the “Walk Your Dog in Front of a Mosque” protest in support of Einstoss, and Masud Ansair, author of the book Psychology of Mohammedwhich asserts that “Islam is founded on the bases of terrorism and bloodshed”.