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TORONTO — The government used its new power to revoke the citizenship of convicted terrorists for the first time on Friday against the imprisoned ringleader of the 2006 al-Qaida-inspired plot to detonate truck bombs in downtown Toronto.

Zakaria Amara was notified in a letter sent to the Quebec penitentiary where is he serving a life sentence that he is no longer a Canadian. He still holds citizenship in Jordan and could be deported there following his release from prison.

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Defence Minister Jason Kenney confirmed in an interview Saturday that the government had revoked Amara’s citizenship. He called it a “fitting first application” of law that he played a key role in bringing to Parliament.

“I hope that this case makes people realize what we’re really trying to do here,” he said from Regina. “If you basically take up arms against your country or plan to do so, and you’re convicted in a Canadian court, or an equivalent foreign court, through your violent disloyalty you are forfeiting your own citizenship and we’ll just read it as it is.”