CIAs terror blunders
BY N. American Press
Since 9/11, Canadian and American intelligence services have been busy swapping information on terror suspects. Just ask Maher Arar, the Ottawa computer engineer who was arrested by the Americans and deported to his native Syria after being wrongly characterised as an Islamic radical with ties to Al Qaeda.
When the embarrassing truth came out in Justice Dennis OConnors probe, Arar was vindicated and Ottawa paid him $10.5 million in compensation. Even so, Canadian officials scrambled to shield the US Central Intelligence Agency by blacking out sections of OConnors report that identified the CIA as an actor in the sordid drama.
Bad instinct, that. As a damning report on the CIA that was released last week makes clear, Ottawa was covering up for an ineptly managed agency that bungled its own surveillance of Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden before the Sept 11, 2001 attacks. The report confirms that Canadian officials had reason to be cautious, even sceptical, rather than complicit, in passing the CIA information about Arar or anyone else.
CIA Inspector General John Helgerson oversaw the report, prepared two years ago, but a summary was released only last week. The CIA wanted it kept under wraps. In the same way, Ottawa had to be forced to reveal bits of the OConnor report that Ottawa tried to black out to protect the CIA and other actors.
Canadian officials should err on the side of prudence when weighing intelligence from the CIA or other foreign agencies, or passing it to them. They dont always get it right. Sometimes they dont get it at all. (Aug 27)
DAWN - Editorial; August 29, 2007
