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Lifting the cover on Canada’s spy files
Michelle Shephard writes for the Toronto Star:
But beyond answering questions that have lingered for years about Khadr’s case, John’s testimony was a remarkable example of how the Canadian Security Intelligence Service is being forced into public.
“There really has been a paradigm shift in what is being disclosed and what’s not,” noted Toronto lawyer Lorne Waldman, who represented Maher Arar during a multi-million dollar federal inquiry.
Another evidence flop in a security certificate case
Judge orders CSIS to hand over file
Bill Curry writes for the Globe:
The Federal Court is ordering Canada’s spy agency to disclose a second human source in the Mohamed Harket case, an exceptional decision taken after finding the Canadian Security Intelligence Service “filtered” evidence and failed to tell the court that a first key source had failed a polygraph test.
Ottawa abandons case against Charkaoui
Divisive terror law losing traction
Can we trust secret evidence, often borrowed from foreign countries, to throw people out of Canada?
Colin Freeze explains the security certificates:
… federal ministers sign off on a certificate after viewing secret CSIS information, which allows officials to immediately jail, and eventually deport, a non-citizen.
The “intelligence” used to do this is disclosed to judges but never fully revealed to the accused, drawn as it usually is from secret agents and wiretaps, sometimes placed within Canada but also frequently “loaned” from foreign governments on condition that the provenance be kept secret.
Charkaoui: the name every Canadian law student knows
Charkaoui, however, is the legal star of the five. He’s won two Supreme Court challenges and, as he gradually demolished Ottawa’s case against him, managed to make the government look like an idiot.
