G8/G20 summits have low terrorism risk: CSIS

The upcoming G8 and G20 summits in Huntsville, Ont., and Toronto do not appear to be the subject of terrorist chatter, the head of Canada's spy agency said Monday.

"I think [there is] surprisingly little on the terrorism front," Richard Fadden, the director of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, told the CBC's Peter Mansbridge in an exclusive interview. "We don't think there is anyone who is really interested in doing any harm from that perspective."

"Anarchist groups" and "multi-issue extremists" are a different matter, however, Fadden suggested.

"Nothing attracts the world media like the G8 and G20, so anyone who is interested in getting their issues in front of the public, I think, are interested in being in Toronto," Fadden said at his Ottawa office. He predicted turnouts of "a substantial amount of people."

While the RCMP is the lead agency in securing the summits, CSIS has spent the past 12 to 18 months gathering intelligence it hopes could help the RCMP with "any breaches of the law that might occur," he said.

The G8 summit begins Friday in Huntsville. The G20 runs Saturday and Sunday in downtown Toronto.