It's doubtful Munir Adam has ever heard of the Energy East pipeline. Likely he's never even heard of some far-off place called Alberta.
After all, these days he has more pressing concerns on his mind, sitting in a Saudi Arabian jail cell awaiting the time when he is led to the execution block where his head will be severed from his young body.
The fact he's disabled – Munir can barely see or hear - didn't stop the Saudi regime from imposing the death penalty after arresting the 23-year-old a few years ago for getting caught up in unwelcome protests in the Kingdom. Apparently he was spotted using a cell phone at the scene – given his physical limitations that seems a bit of a stretch in itself - so obviously, for the Saudis, that's cause enough to execute him.
Yet in a strange, sad way, poor Munir is a tragic but poignant example of the hypocrisy and blatant gamesmanship that is currently being played out by the rabid anti-pipeline lobby across our own country.
These are the folk that love nothing better than a good protest. Heck, the public hearings into TransCanada's $16-billion project to transport Alberta crude to New Brunswick refineries hadn't even got going in Montreal before the hooligan element turned it into a ludicrous circus.
So now the project sits in limbo as yet more terms of engagement are dreamed up in Ottawa.
Meanwhile every single day, sailing in from the wide Atlantic, arrive tankers brim full of oil that dock at our eastern Canadian refineries.
How much, you may ask. Quite a lot it turns out. We are actually importing about 700,000 barrels a day.
Astute readers will probably have already guessed what is coming next – yes, last year those very same Saudis dropped off an average of 84,017 barrels of oil a day at New Brunswick's Irving oil refinery – the country's largest. Ironically that's the very same refinery TransCanada is targeting to take Alberta's oil.
Of course it's not just the Saudi oil that Canada welcomes with open arms to our refineries. Oh no, we are also taking in crude from those lovely bastions of human rights Nigeria and Algeria.
No doubt the more naďve among us may wonder what sort of protests are being mounted on the St. John docks by all those fervent human rights and environmental stewards that have proven so steadfast in their determination to take TransCanada to task and stop its dirty Alberta crude pipeline plans. Surely they must be seething at such an outrage.
It was those very same Saudis who opened the taps and cratered the world oil price 18 months ago. Just ask the 10 per cent of Calgarians now desperately looking for any sort of work what that little ploy did to the Alberta oil patch and all those who once toiled in it.
But don't expect either sympathy or understanding from the environmental lobby lot. Not as long as they are still getting some grant or outside funding from somewhere so they can continue to enjoy the moral high ground in their self-appointed role as guardians of our Canadian conscience.
Meanwhile, thousands of miles away, a young man, accused of using a cellphone during a protest, waits for the sword.
