A government commission on Monday exonerated a Canadian computer engineer of any ties to terrorism and issued a scathing report that faulted Canada and the United States for his deportation four years ago to Syria, where he was imprisoned and tortured.
The report on the engineer, Maher Arar, said American officials had apparently acted on inaccurate information from Canadian investigators and then misled Canadian authorities about their plans for Mr. Arar before transporting him to Syria.
“I am able to say categorically that there is no evidence to indicate that Mr. Arar has committed any offense or that his activities constituted a threat to the security of Canada,” Justice Dennis R. O’Connor, head of the commission, said at a news conference.
The report’s findings could reverberate heavily through the leadership of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, which handled the initial intelligence on Mr. Arar that led security officials in both Canada and the United States to assume he was a suspected Al Qaeda terrorist.
The report’s criticisms and recommendations are aimed primarily at Canada’s own government and activities, rather than the United States government, which refused to cooperate in the inquiry.
If I had to choose where to lay the blame I would have to say that the US bears the majority of the burden here. Canada may have suspected the guy but America stomped on his civil rights and broke the law to get information that he did not have.
And of course this just further erodes the trust between Canada and America. George Bush has set fire to yet another bridge.
And Canada will remember this when global warming turns the lower 48 into hell on earth and swarms of Americans are trying to go northward!
ReplyDeleteYes, those in my state have considered that possibility as well.
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