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LILLEY: CBC's 9/11 retreat doesn't fix its terrorism problem

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29.08.2026

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In the face of worldwide public outcry and a dressing down by the Carney government, CBC has announced that its journalists can, in fact, call the 9/11 attacks terrorism. The issue, and the outcry, arose after a CBC executive issued a memo earlier this week warning journalists not to call the attacks terrorism.

LILLEY: CBC's 9/11 retreat doesn't fix its terrorism problem Back to video

The entire email, reminding journalists of CBC’s longstanding and misguided policy, was obtained by Toronto Sun columnist Warren Kinsella.

“Do not refer to the Sept. 11 attacks as terrorist attacks,” read the memo from Basem Boshra, CBC’s Senior Director of Journalistic Standards and Public Trust.

“The hijackings led to passenger jet crashes in Washington, D.C., Pennsylvania and Manhattan,” the memo states.

Kinsella confirmed the email and its content with CBC, which defended the policy.

“CBC’s longstanding language guidance regarding the terms ‘terrorist’ and ‘terrorism’ is a preference for the use of these words with attribution, a practice shared by many of the world’s top journalistic organizations,” wrote spokesperson Kerry Kelly in an email to Kinsella.

Kelly pointed to a blog post by CBC Editor-in-Chief Brodie Fenlon from October 2023, just after the Hamas terror attacks on Israel, which, of course, CBC refused to call terrorist attacks.

“CBC News does not itself designate specific groups as terrorists, or specific acts as terrorism, regardless of the region or the events, because these words are so loaded with meaning, politics and emotion that they can end up........

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