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| Jun. 9, 2005. 01:00 AM |
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Syria's ruthless secret service misread a signal that Canada, despite diplomatic pressure for Arar's release, was really in no hurry to get him back. JAMES TRAVERS Truth is often stranger than fiction. In the Maher Arar case it is also more twisted and disturbing.Here's the truth: Canada's spy agency not only told Syria it had "no interest" in Arar during a November 2002 trip to Damascus, that shadowy visit was unrelated to the plight of the Ottawa engineer deported by the United States and imprisoned in the Mideast country.Now here's the twist: Misunderstanding about the meaning of the phrase and the purpose of the CSIS mission to the Syrian capital apparently contributed to Arar's suffering and is now complicating understanding of a case that could shift the delicate balance between personal privacy and public security.As much as it will discourage conspiracy theorists, CSIS was not in the Middle East to extract information from Arar or even sift through the results of the interrogation. Instead, it was striking a secret deal to exchange information made vital by Sept. 11, the impending threat of an Iraq war and the ebb and flow of guerrillas trained in Afghanistan Al Qaeda camps.During that meeting, CSIS told the Syrians exactly what it had been quietly and consistently saying since Arar's New York arrest in September 2002: The agency had no interest in someone whose only crime was knowing other Muslims under surveillance. According to testimony heard before Justice Dennis O'Connor's inquiry, Syria's notoriously ruthless secret service read that as a signal that Canada, despite formal diplomatic pressure for Arar's release, was really in no hurry to get him back.Even that scenario has other layers. Arar was a victim of the now notorious U.S. clandestine practice of whisking suspects by Gulfstream jet to countries where torture is a common interrogation tool. In those cases, Washington has the loudest voice so it's far from certain Canada could have told the Syrians anything that would have set Arar free.What this country — or, more specifically the RCMP — told the United States about him is more significant as well as increasingly clear. Thrust back into anti-terrorism operations after Osama bin Laden's attacks on New York and Washington, the iconic federal police force was privy to CSIS surveillance that identified Arar and forwarded it to American agents either verbally or in a document.That was enough to add Arar's name to the ever-lengthening airport watch list. And that, perhaps combined with an airport incident, was enough to lead to an arrest, deportation and imprisonment with far-reaching consequences. In the United States, the obvious injustice of a case based on such flimsy evidence is making Arar the poster-boy for civil rights groups resisting the roughest tactics used by President George W. Bush in the war on terrorism. The case is also focussing public attention on tough questions about the use of undemocratic methods to protect a democracy.If the issue in Canada is less dramatic, it's equally important. In responding to political pressure for an inquiry into Arar's treatment, Prime Minister Paul Martin also indirectly forced a review of practices safeguarding national security information CSIS and its allies share.In trying to restore public trust in personal privacy by ordering wide disclosure in the controversial Arar case, O'Connor could effectively change those practices as well as Canada's relationship with countries that are this country's primary intelligence sources. Behind closed doors, O'Connor, who now knows all that is ever likely to be known about Arar's case, is being warned those sources will evaporate if Canada signals that information sent here in confidence may not remain confidential.Since its creation in 1984, CSIS successfully defended those conduits, often in federal court. Now there is fear that the Arar leak to the U.S. and outrage over his treatment could shift the balance between privacy and security enough to put Canada in an intelligence bubble.If that happens, the federal government will be a victim of its own precipitous policies. In attempting to satisfy U.S. concerns over border security after 9/11, Ottawa ended the RCMP's two-decade exclusion from security intelligence work.There are two simple truths in that complex decision: It was a disaster for Maher Arar and may yet prove to be a disaster for national security. James Travers writes on national affairs. His column appears Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. jtraver@thestar.ca. Additional articles by James Travers › Get great home delivery subscription deals here! |
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