Sleeping with the Elephant
Make no mistake in thinking that the nation to the south of us is a colossal homogeneous monster so filled with chest-thumping nationalism that its citizens are blind to the the rest of the world beyond their borders. (Side note: a little extra nationalism on this side of the border wouldn’t hurt.) Far from it. You don’t have to look farther than the vote split of the last couple of presidential elections (granted that there’s certainly some doubt as to whether Georgie-boy was actually elected in the first place back in 2000, but let’s not go there right now).
In a Senate hearing this week, Senator Patrick Leahy grilled torture advocate and U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales over the Maher Arar “affair”. The Senator is a bit put out with the lack of interest or response that anyone has gotten and with the whole situation in the first place from an American perspective. A couple of quotes (courtesy of the CBC):
“We knew damn well if he went to Canada he wouldn’t be tortured. He’d be held and he’d be investigated. We also knew damn well if he went to Syria, he’d be tortured. And it’s beneath the dignity of this country — a country that has always been a beacon of human rights — to send somebody to another country to be tortured. You know and I know that has happened a number of times in the past five years by this country. It is a black mark on us.”
But Senator, assurances were given that no one deported to Syria would be tortured. “Assurances,” he snorted, “from a country that we also say now that we can’t talk to them because we can’t take their word for anything.”
Well, yes, but… “Before you get more upset,” Gozales said to Leahy, “perhaps you should wait to receive the briefing.” Which he is hopeful will be available sometime next week. Leahy promised another hearing when, I mean if he doesn’t get it.
Make no mistake that politics is being played here. Leahy is a Democrat, a party that finds itself with some teeth for the first time in some years, but you’ve got to believe that the Deomcrats are going after the big things first, the things they can draw the most blood on. It’s only been two months since the midterm elections that gave the Democrats those teeth. I find it promising that Arar’s deportation to Syria and the international fallout is coming up so early - although Leahy has been talking about Arar for nearly two years, now he can rub the adminstration’s face in it.
All is not one big happy family down south.
But let’s not forget that it was information provided by the RCMP and/or CSIS that led to Mr. Arar’s detention in the first place. Still waiting for an actual answer there, I think, not just an admitted, “Oops, we’re sorry.”
