OTTAWA — Amnesty International has added its voice to a chorus of critics who fear a new federal protocol on Canadian detainees could leave the door open to abuses like those seen in the cases of Maher Arar and Omar Khadr.
The newly disclosed agreement gives the Canadian Security Intelligence Service the go-ahead to meet with a Canadian imprisoned abroad before consular officials do when there are "urgent national security or terrorism-related considerations."
The protocol, obtained by The Canadian Press under the Access to Information Act, also suggests CSIS approach foreign authorities when a government denies Ottawa diplomatic access to a prisoner.
That raises the possibility of a Canadian’s well-being taking a back seat to intelligence gathering needs, said Hilary Homes, security and human rights campaigner with Amnesty International’s Canadian division
"We do know that when it’s the intelligence service that is the first or the only person visiting someone in detention, that can certainly colour that situation in a way that can have other implications," Homes said.
"So it does kind of beg the question, what will really happen to that person if only one agency goes in and it is CSIS?"
The three-page memorandum of understanding between CSIS and Foreign Affairs, signed last November, is intended to address recommendations of a federal inquiry into the ordeal of Maher Arar, an Ottawa engineer tortured in a Syrian prison over false allegations of terrorist ties.
The agreement’s release comes amid simmering debate about CSIS’s interrogation of frightened Canadian Omar Khadr, while still a teenager, in custody of U.S. officials at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Lorne Waldman, one of Arar’s lawyers, and University of Toronto intelligence expert Wesley Wark have also raised questions about whether the new protocol will prevent future rights violations.
The Arar inquiry called for better co-ordination across government in detainee cases involving allegations of terrorism, including political accountability for federal actions.
Homes lauded the effort to ensure a more coherent approach with the new protocol, but added: "It’s not enough to address some of (Amnesty’s) concerns about the rest of the document, though."
