posted
These are the only snippet of the U.S. Attorney General's comments that I've been able to find.
quote:"Mr. Arar was deported under our immigration laws. He was initially detained because his name appeared on terrorist lists, and he was deported according to our laws," Gonzales told reporters.
...
Gonzales said Arar's removal was a deportation and not rendition.
"Even if it were a rendition, we understand as a government what our obligations are with respect to anyone who is rendered by this government to another country, and that is that we seek to satisfy ourselves that they will not be tortured," he said. "And we do that in every case. And if in fact he had been rendered to Syria, we would have sought those same kind of assurances, as we do in every case."
I found another little piece of comment from Gonzalez in the NYT:
quote:In Washington, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said he had not read the report, but said, "We were not responsible for his removal to Syria," adding, "I’m not aware that he was tortured."
I can only assume that by "we" he means that the U.S. DoJ was not responsible for his removal to Syria; U.S. officials in some capacity most certainly were responsible. Unfortunately, given the U.S. government's refusal to participate in our Arar Commission inquiry, we may never know why he was sent to Syria (his country of birth) rather than Canada (his country of residence). He was a dual Syrian-Canadian citizen, but was sent to Syria without having had access to legal counsel [added: this is not accurate -- after asking for nine days he got a short meeting with a lawyer] and without communication between U.S. officials and Canadian officials [added: Arar did have one meeting with the Canadian consul; however, the Commission found that Canadian officials were not involved in or aware of the decision to deport him to Syria until he had already been deported].
The LA times piece doesn't summarize the Arar Commission's report very well, though; a lot of blame lies on this side of the border with Canadian authorities, in particular the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Here is a much better summary of the report. U.S. officials would likely not have detained Arar at all were it not for the false information that they had previously been supplied with by criminally incompetent RCMP officials.
Regardless of whether the deportation was indeed "lawful," an apology is in order at a bare minimum given that this "lawful" deportation resulted in the horrific torture of a man who has been completely exonerated of any terrorist activity or links to terrorism.
Domestically, it would be an extreme understatement to say that I'm unimpressed with the new Conservative government's comments on the report. Prime Minister Harper, formerly leader of the Canadian Alliance, was in opposition when the story broke nearly four years ago and his party's line was that Arar was indeed a terrorist and they accused the then-governing Liberal Party of being "soft" on terrorism. His new party's line appears to be acknowledgement that Arar was treated poorly (the understatement of the millenium), but he didn't apologize for falsely accusing Arar when he was in opposition, nor did he apologize on behalf of the government.
Syrian officials also had nothing to say. They owe Arar at least an apology as well.
posted
So the treatment of Mr. Arar was legal, if not right. Meanwhile Mr. Gonzales is asking for the legalization of broader powers of coercion, so that we can do even more things, legaly, whether or not they are right.
And they wonder why people are against it?
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quote:In Washington, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said he had not read the report, but said, "We were not responsible for his removal to Syria," adding, "I’m not aware that he was tortured."
I can only assume that by "we" he means that the U.S. DoJ was not responsible for his removal to Syria; U.S. officials in some capacity most certainly were responsible. Unfortunately, given the U.S. government's refusal to participate in our Arar Commission inquiry, we may never know why he was sent to Syria (his country of birth) rather than Canada (his country of residence). He was a dual Syrian-Canadian citizen, but was sent to Syria without having had access to legal counsel and without communication between U.S. officials and Canadian officials.
Oooops! But we should just trust them...they don't need any oversight. Really.
quote: WASHINGTON, Sept. 20 — In an embarrassing turnabout, the Department of Justice backed away Wednesday from a denial by Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales of responsibility for the treatment of a Canadian who was seized by American authorities in 2002. The man was deported to Syria, where he was imprisoned and beaten.
Stefan Zalkin/European Pressphoto Agency Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales disputed Canadian findings that the United States was responsible for deporting an innocent man. Asked at a news conference on Tuesday about a Canadian commission’s finding that the man, Maher Arar, was wrongly sent to Syria and tortured there, Mr. Gonzales replied, “Well, we were not responsible for his removal to Syria.” He added, “I’m not aware that he was tortured.”
On Wednesday, a Justice Department spokesman said Mr. Gonzales had intended to make only a narrow point: that deportations are now handled by the Department of Homeland Security, not the Department of Justice. (snip)
The spokesman, Charles Miller, said the attorney general forgot that at the time of Mr. Arar’s deportation, such matters were still handled by the Immigration and Naturalization Service, which was part of the Department of Justice.
posted
Interesting. I'd like to see a proper statement.
Arar received an apology from the House of Commons yesterday, but no formal apology from the Canadian government yet.
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I need to clarify that I got something wrong in my intial post:
quote:He was a dual Syrian-Canadian citizen, but was sent to Syria without having had access to legal counsel and without communication between U.S. officials and Canadian officials.
This is inaccurate. Arar was denied access to a lawyer from September 26th, 2002, to October 5th, 2002. He was then permitted one meeting with his lawyer. He also had one meeting with the Canadian consul. He was then denied access to his lawyer and the consul again, and ultimately deported on October 8th.
Added: To clarify, the Arar Commission did find that Arar was deported to Syria without the knowledge of Canadian officials. He wouldn't have been picked up if not for the RCMP's prior false information, but they weren't complicit in the decision to send him to Syria rather than Canada.
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"We arranged it so my department would not dirty our hands with this. Ooop, we have arranged it for my department to not have to dirty our hands with in the future. We were involved with this but I didn't know about it. It was before his time. Should we ask Ashkroft?
Yet you should trust us with torturing only real terrorists in the future."
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posted
Here's why I invariably feel at least somewhat uncomfortable when I travel in the U.S.:
quote:Mr. Arar was deported to Syria without being given a chance to plead his case before a judge. In a crucial hearing before an adjudicator, he went unrepresented by counsel. Given the risks to Mr. Arar -- the United States has acknowledged that Syria tortures prisoners -- how could this be legal?
The U.S. government offered a startling answer to this question in court, before Mr. Arar's lawsuit was thrown out: Foreigners at its airports -- even those just changing planes -- can be seized, detained and deprived of lawyers or access to courts if they are not ruled admissible to the country. That sounds more like Syria than one of the world's great democracies.
posted
Yes, it is. Unfortunately, things aren't much better on this side of the border.
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Here is the official summary of the Arar Commission report. It enumerates the major conclusions very concisely (the whole thing is just three pages).
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posted
Gonzales has proclaimed so many dubious acts to be "lawful behavior" which have since be ruled unlawful by the courts that it is amazing that anyone continues to listen to his legal opinions.
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posted
Yeah, he seems to beg the question: Is, "I thought it was legal" a legal defense?
If a Lawyer kidnaps a man, while claiming he is upholding the law, and has some legal theories to support him, does he still go to jail for kidnapping after the court show his legal theories are wrong?
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quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit: Gonzales has proclaimed so many dubious acts to be "lawful behavior" which have since be ruled unlawful by the courts that it is amazing that anyone continues to listen to his legal opinions.
SO a lawyer who loses cases shouldn't be listened to any more?
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posted
On another forum, I read a summary of what the procedure is supposed to be in these situations:
quote:INA:ACT 241.1 (Federal Law) Summary (b)(1)(A) Generally - removed to the country in which the alien boarded the vessel - Tunisa / Switzerland (b)(1)(B) IF he entered from Canada, Mexico or the Carribian but was just passing through THEN he should be sent to the original destiation - Tunisa / Switzerland (b)(1)(C) IF none of those countires want the person THEN (b)(1)(C)(i) Send him to the country of which he is a citizen, subject, or national. (Canada, Syria) OR (b)(1)(C)(ii) Send him to the country of which the alien was born. (Syria) OR (b)(1)(C)(iii) Send him to a country where the he has a residence (Canada) OR (B)(1)(C)(iv) IF none of those countries want him - send him to any county willing to take him.
So if Tunisa or Switzerland had been willing to take him back, that should have been the end of the matter. I haven't found facts on this question one way or the other.
After that step it was basically up to the Attorney General's office to decide whether to try for Syria or Canada next. However if a CAT hearing had barred Syria from consideration (as it should have) than Canada was a no-brainer. Even if the CAT hearing hadn't taken place it would be highly irregular to not first try the country connected to the passport he was traveling on.
At very least we have some serious procedural flaws here. He should have had a CAT hearing. I'm not sure at the moment what if any relief is available. I'll try to find out though.
posted
One should never confuse laws with ethics. Anyone so tempted should watch actual laws being made.
In this case it's not actually clear that it WAS lawful. To my knowledge it is not (or at least, WAS not) our policy to willy-nilly deport people transiting through the country on their way to somewhere else.
Lately, though, if I wasn't a U.S. citizen, I would pay a lot of money to avoid coming here on my way to somewhere else. And a lot of people do for just that reason.
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posted
Well, according to customary international law, it is in fact illegal to deport someone when you know that they will likely get tortured as a result. Problem with CIL is that it is pretty hard to enforce and usually just means a stern sounding, "you're a bad boy" from the UN.
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posted
"SO a lawyer who loses cases shouldn't be listened to any more?"
A lawyer who advises "Go ahead, kill your wife. I can get you outta the murder rap if ya get caught." is engaging in criminal activity long before the case ever reaches trial.
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quote:SO a lawyer who loses cases shouldn't be listened to any more?
I'm not sure how that fits what Rabbit said.
As I see it, working from her statement, we have two options (three if you combine them). First, she could be talking about his role as White House counsel. In this role, he was not merely (in Rabbit's argument unsucessfuly) defending the White House's actions, but advising them to commit those actions. He'd not only be the lawyer who lost many cases, but also the person who told his clients that the behavior they wanted to commit was legal and/or advised them on how to commit that behavior.
In the second case, it could be about his role as Attorney General. In this case, he'd be not just a lawyer (and counsel) but also the actor, who was committing or instructing others to commit these acts. Also, his "client" would be the American people, whose interests he swore to protect, and not specifically the Bush administration.
In either case, I don't see how your likening of him to a lawyer losing some cases fits.
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