Arar

This sort of thing really pisses me off. The excuses for not holding an inquiry are so piddling and lame, while the reasons for holding an inquiry seem so large. It doesn’t matter to me whether or not Arar was a Canadian Resident at the time of his arrest — he’s a Canadian citizen and deserves the full support of the Canadian government in these instances. That he didn’t receive it is deplorable. I don’t care if you do suspect him of being a terrorist. If you suspect of him of such, detain him here in Canada. Don’t let Syria do the dirty work.

As For Canadian-American relations, this should have been a much bigger deal. That the US would send a Canadian passport holder to a third country is unconscionable (sp?). While maybe we can’t expect John Ashcroft to show up at a Canadian inquiry into the matter (though why we shouldn’t, I don’t know), but we should be demanding a full and public apology from the US on this matter. We should be making a big stink on it. The actions taken by the US here are not just an offense to Arar but to our entire nation — it’s the US showing complete disregard for the Canadian government — in some sense, it’s as if the US doesn’t recognize the country as legitimate, otherwise they’d respect the passport.

(story pointed out to me by _Brishen)

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