OTTAWA - Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is promising to look into reports that the RCMP proposed shadowing an Ottawa journalist to learn who leaked secret information on a suspected terrorist.
Trudeau says he believes a free and independent press is an essential part of a strong democracy.
The case involves Joel-Denis Bellavance, a journalist for Montreal La Presse, and the leak to the newspaper of a sensitive spy agency document about Adil Charkaoui.
Information about the proposed surveillance comes in classified RCMP documents which a Federal Court ordered disclosed as part of a lawsuit filed by Abfousian Abdelrazik, another man the government once branded a terrorist and who was also subject of a damaging leak.
The Canadian Security Intelligence Service asked the RCMP for help tracing the Charkaoui leak; in a 2008 document, the police suggested shadowing Bellavance as one potential tactic.
Bellavance says he is shocked that the Mounties would consider following him.
