ZGram - 5/29/2004 - "Security Certificates: Is this Canada?"

[zgrams at zgrams.zundelsite.org]

Zgram - Where Truth is Destiny:  Now more than ever!

May 29, 2004

Good Morning from the Zundelsite:

A few weeks ago I wrote a letter to Minister Anne McLellan, asking 
that I be granted an interview with her about my kidnapped husband. 
Her reply was the standard balderdash you can expect out of 
government:  She cannot get involved because Ernst's case is before 
the Federal Courts of Canada - if I have complaints about CSIS, I 
might consider writing to SIRC, the alleged "watch dog" of CSIS, but 
in fact, a rubber stamp outfit for CSIS, as we already learned in 
1996.

It's called the Royal Runaround.  Besides, Ernst wrote to SIRC 
already - which triggered a punishing transfer the very next day from 
the fairly humane, albeit raggedy prison in Thorold to the abominable 
hellhole where he is now! 

Ernst's case will now be submitted to the Supreme Court of Canada, 
asking that leave be granted.  If leave is granted, and if a miracle 
occurs and he actually wins against CSIS, it means that five 
Canadian-based Arabs, held under practically identical brutality, and 
who are probably as innocent as Ernst, will benefit. 

These men insist that they are innocent and certainly no threat to 
Canada.  Yet they are stuck in Guantanamo North.  To my knowledge, 
not one of them has the means, or the know-how, or the tenacity and 
will, as Ernst does, to challenge the satanic power that is trying to 
force a dictatorship by judicial decree and subsequent administrative 
punishment on all of Canada.

One might assume that these five Arabs would be grateful for the 
supreme sacrifice the Zundel case entails.  The irony and sad reality 
is that the Arab community is as prejudiced and biased against Ernst 
as the Canadian system is against Arabs. 

In their releases and communiqués, the Arabs always talk of "five 
men" as victims of CSIS, as if they didn't know - how can they not 
know? - that there are six, one in a cell right next to one of their 
own, without official permission to talk to each other.  (Let's say 
that I dreamed that sometimes they do!)

At any rate, if you want to get a glimpse of Marxist Canada, here is 
as good a summary as any:

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Coalition Justice for Adil Charkaoui

tel. 514 859 9023, justiceforadil at riseup.net, www.adilinfo.org

Security Certificates: Is this Canada?

3 May 2004

On 21 May 2003, Montreal resident Adil Charkaoui brought his pregnant 
wife to her gynaecologist, dropped her at a cousin's and began to 
head towards the University of Montreal, where he was taking a 
Masters degree in teaching. In the middle of the highway, he suddenly 
found himself surrounded by police and summarily arrested. With great 
media fanfare, but no evidence, he was declared a threat to national 
security. He has been imprisoned without charges, on allegations that 
neither he nor his lawyer are allowed to see, ever since. For almost 
a year, he and his family have been living under the constant fear of 
his deportation to Morocco, the country where he was born. There, 
because of the case that has been made against him in Canada, he is 
likely to suffer further attacks on his dignity and rights; such as 
imprisonment without charges, torture, cruel and unusual punishment - 
and even death.

Mr. Charkaoui describes years of intimidation and harassment by CSIS 
agents leading up to his arrest. He vehemently denies that he is a 
"terrorist" and that he represents any danger to the public or to 
national security. He says his arrest is directly related to his 
refusal to use his connections to Muslims in Montreal to become an 
informer for CSIS. He also recognises that the Canadian government is 
under political pressure to produce high profile cases like his to 
show the White House that they are doing their part in the "war on 
terror", a campaign that, all too often, uses terrorist techniques 
itself.

Charkaoui is one of Canada's Secret Trial Five, five Muslim men whose 
lives have been torn apart by accusations they are not allowed to 
fight in a fair and independent trial. Three men are imprisoned in 
Toronto: Mohammad Mahjoub, a refugee from Eygpt who has been in 
prison since June 2000 (almost four years in prison without charge); 
Mahmoud Jaballah, a refugee from Egypt who was arrested in August 
2001 (three years this summer), and Hassan Almrei, a refugee who has 
been facing deportation to Syrian torture, just like Maher Arar, 
since October 2001 (two and a half years in solitary). The fourth 
man, Algerian refugee Mohamed Harkat, was arrested in Ottawa in 
December 2002, ironically on Human Rights Day.

All five men were arrested under "security certificates," a measure 
of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA) which has been 
described by Amnesty International as "fundamentally flawed and 
unfair". They are imprisoned without charges on secret evidence and 
face deportation to their countries of origin, even if there is a 
substantial risk of torture or death.



Talking Points

The court is not given the power to decide on the truth of the 
allegations. A Security Certificate is issued by the Minister of 
Public Safety, Anne McLellan. Although a judicial review of her 
decision is allowed, the court is not given the power to judge the 
truth of the allegations. The judge can only decide on whether it is 
possible that the allegations are true; on whether the Minister had 
"reasonable grounds" to sign the certificate. In the end, this is a 
political decision, which is fought in the arena of media 
sensationalism, public opinion, party politics, pressure from the 
United States administration, and behind-the-scene games in the 
shadowy spy world of CSIS and the RCMP. It is the end result of this 
political struggle, not facts weighed up in a fair and independent 
trial, which will determine the fate of the"Secret Trial Five".

Secret trials are fundamentally unfair. Neither the detainee nor his 
lawyer are informed of the precise allegations or provided with the 
full information against him &endash; they are only given a summary. 
Evidence, which is not included in the summary, can be presented at 
any time to the judge in the absence of the detainee and his lawyer. 
Normal standards of evidence are explicitly waived. As lawyer Edward 
Greenspan wrote, "The evidence can be hearsay, double hearsay, triple 
hearsay". Information based on confessions under torture and 
plea-bargains, which would generally be inadmissable, or at least 
highly questionable on grounds of ethics and credibility, is 
apparently used. There is no right to cross-examine witnesses who 
have made allegations. The result is that both the original approval 
of the certificate (by the Minister), and then the judgement on 
whether it is "reasonable" (by a Federal Court judge), are based on 
one-sided arguments, without access to counter-evidence and context 
that a defense would normally bring forward. This violates a fairly 
fundamental playground rule: that both sides of the story are heard.

There is no appeal. Once the Federal Court judge decides that there 
are "reasonable grounds" to issue the security certificate, there is 
no appeal. Similarly, once the judge reviews the decision on whether 
to grant protection there is no appeal. Lawyer Greenspan calls this 
"a glaring violation of a basic tenet of the rule of law." 
Constitutional lawyer Julius Gray argues that it is in fact 
unconstitutional, along with other elements of the secret trial 
process.

The detainee can be imprisoned indefinitely. Refugees are not given 
any chance of release on bail during the proceedings. They can be 
held indefinitely: years of prison without charge. In the case of 
Mohammad Mahjoub, this has meant jail for almost four years! For 
permanent residents like Adil Charkaoui, the court is required to 
conduct a detention review every six months. In Charkaoui's case, the 
judge has already refused release on bail twice, on the basis that 
the secret evidence he has seen makes him think that it is possible 
that a threat exists &endash; before the case has even been heard! In 
effect, his decision reverses the fundamental rule of innocent until 
proven guilty.

The men can be deported, even if their lives are threatened. A 
substantial risk of torture and even death exists for all five men 
&endash; in some cases, because of the case that has been made 
against them in Canada. For example, under Immigration Canada's own 
assessment, Adil Charkaoui faces a "risk of torture," and a "threat 
to his life or risk of cruel and unusual punishment" if he is 
deported to Morrocco (ERAR, 21 August 2003). Both Human Rights Watch 
(25 March 2004) and Amnesty International (28 July 2003) agree with 
this assessment and it is further substantiated by a detailed report 
on Morocco's "anti-"terror measures, released in February 2004 by the 
Fédération Internationale des Ligues des Droits de l'Homme (FIDH). 
But this is not enough! Deportation may still go ahead, even though 
torture is a crime against humanity. The UN Committee against Torture 
actually had to remind Canada in 2000 that it is a violation of the 
UN Convention against Torture to deport someone to a substantial risk 
of torture, including when there are security concerns. Where 
security concerns actually do exist, other solutions can and must be 
sought. Nothing justifies knowingly sending someone to torture, cruel 
and unusual punishment, and death.

The security certificate process undermines the Charter of Rights and 
violates Canada's international obligations. Amnesty International 
"is of the view that the security certificate process may very well 
result in arbitrary detention and thus violate the fundamental right 
to liberty."  Amnesty also believes that the Secret Trial Five are 
"effectively denied their right to prepare a defense and mount a 
meaningful challenge to the lawfulness of their detention." According 
to Amnesty, this puts Canada on the wrong side of articles 9 and 14 
of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (Amnesty 
International, 31 March 2004).

This is a discriminatory measure. Security certificates only apply to 
Permanent Residents and Refugees. They thus deny certain classes of 
people in Canada their fundamental rights &endash; a completely 
unacceptable discrimination. Human rights are inalienable and do not 
depend on legal status.

Secret trials for refugees and immigrants are just the beginning. 
Muslim and Arab communities and civil liberties more generally are 
being threatened by hysteria around national security. The Security 
Certificate, which dates back to 1991 and was reintroduced in the 
Immigration and Refugee Protection Act in 2002, is one of the roots 
of the attack that has been mounted, with frightening rapidity, on 
civil liberties and international norms since 11 September 2001. Now, 
"national security" is endangering all of us. It is being used to 
justify Bill C-18, which would amend the Citizenship of Canada Act to 
subject naturalized citizens to indefinite detention, secret trials, 
and deportation. With C-36, the Anti-Terrorism Act, similar 
violations of rights are extended to all citizens. The historical 
parallels are clear: Japanese interned in Canada during World War II; 
the "red scare" of the McCarthy era; even the rise of fascism in 
Germany in the 40s. These should stand as warnings to us. If national 
security is not about safeguarding our fundamental freedoms and 
values, then what is it about?

We must not let fears about terrorist attacks blind us to some very 
obvious questions:

*	Why are these men not permitted to argue against precise 
charges in a free and fair trial?

*	Why don't ordinary standards of evidence apply?

*	Why is there no appeal?

*	Why can't the Minister's security concerns be satisfied by 
less abusive measures than a secret trial, indefinite imprisonment 
and deportation to torture or death?

We are asking Anne McLellan to:

1) immediately release all five men;

2) if any case against them actually exists, let them fight it in a 
fair and independent trial;

3) guarantee that they will not be deported;

4) cease using Security Certificates and re-write the security 
provisions of IRPA in compliance with the constitution and the 
Charter, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, 
the UN Convention against Torture and principles of justice; and

5) stop the racist scape-goating of Arab and Muslim communities and 
the attack on civil liberties in Canada.

FOR MORE INFORMATION: www.adilinfo.org or www.homesnotbombs.org or 
www.zerra.net/freemohamed.

Please also feel free to contact the Coalition for Justice for Adil 
Charkaoui for further background material, including all of the 
reports and articles cited in this document:

tel 514 859 9023 or justiceforadil at riseup.net.

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