On April 29, 2014 IRFAN-Canada, a formerly registered Canadian charity, was listed by the Canadian Government as a terrorist entity, effective immediately.

IRFAN-Canada had its charity registration revoked by the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) on April 9, 2011 based in part on CRA's findings that IRFAN-Canada provided support to Hamas, a listed terrorist organization. CRA findings indicate that IRFAN-Canada provided over $14.6 million in resources to operating partners that were run by officials of Hamas, openly supported and provided funding to Hamas, or have been listed by various jurisdictions because of their support for Hamas or other terrorist entities.

Revocation summary

The CRA works with other Canadian government departments and agencies to assist in the fight against terrorism and to protect the charitable sector from abuse, including the exploitation of charitable resources to support terrorism.

Where there are concerns that a registered charity or an organization seeking registration is engaged in providing support to terrorism, section 241 of the Income Tax Act allows the CRA to disclose designated taxpayer information to CSIS, the RCMP and FINTRAC. The CRA regularly exercises this legislative authority.

The CRA's Charities Directorate mandate includes:

• preventing organizations with ties to terrorism from obtaining charitable registration;

• detecting and revoking registered organizations with ties to terrorism; and

• ensuring that it makes the fullest contribution it can to the Government of Canada's overall efforts to combat terrorist financing, through appropriate sharing of information obtained in the course of discharging its regulatory responsibilities in relation to national security.

For further information on how you as a charity can protect yourself refer to our Checklist for charities on avoiding terrorist abuse .

For further information on the listing, please refer to the Public Safety Canada News Release .