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I just have to ask, since in the past year since I checked it, this article seems now much more obsessively focued on Arar's lawsuits against the US and Canadian involvement in his extradition. It seems like Syria has been almost forgotten in the process. They are the actual torturers, therefore the primary proponents here, yet out of hundreds of lines of text, the article currently only has one small paragraph (of seven lines) actually devoted to Syria. He was only held by the US for two weeks (compared to a year in Syria), yet that paragraph is almost as long as the Syria one. Heck, there is almost as much space just devoted to US embassy statements on the case. I suspect this is because there are mostly Americans editing the article, so the US angle is what they naturally focus on. But is that truly encyclopedic? I just feel like this article looks too much like a US/Canadian political football field. Thoughts? BuboTitan ( talk) 23:27, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
The Prime Minister of Canada just conducted a press release regarding the Arar case (12:30 p.m. on the 26th of January, 2007). He officially apologized on behalf of the Canadian federal government. He also is awarding him $12.5 million ($10.5 million for him and $2 million for his legal fees) for his damages. 205.194.74.10 18:02, 26 January 2007 (UTC)Jsers
How could such a large settlement be justified? I could accept that $10.5 million could be appropriate for the imprisonment and torture, but all Canada did (allegedly) was provide misleading information to the USA, which proceeded to deport him to Syria, which proceeded to torture him. So, if $10.5 million was an appropriate measure of his damages, surely the USA should be responsible for, maybe $3 million, Syria for, maybe, $6 million, and Canada for, maybe $1.5 million? Why is the Canadian taxpayer picking up the tab for the full measure of his damages? Why isn't his other country of citizenship (Syria) being held to account? I appreciate that the settlement resulted from a mediation (with a very respected mediator), but I can't help but feel that Canada's willingness to pay such a huge sum in the circumstances was politically motivated, specifically to embarrass the previous Liberal government, on whose watch everything was alleged to have happened to Arar. Bq7720 ( talk) 13:53, 7 April 2009 (UTC)
The compensation to Arar was settled on the basis of Canada's complicity and has never been claimed to be "the entire bill." Part of the compensation is related to the libel and rumour-mongering that Arar and his family were subjected to as a result of leaks to the media that presented unfounded allegations to the public. The "end of the political spectrum that sides with Arar" is generally the side that's concerned with human rights and civil liberties; which would be entirely to contrary to the idea of being allied with Iran and Syria. Lyn ( talk) 20:16, 19 October 2010 (UTC)
The question we should ask ourselves should be......Would a black Middle Easterner or Black Muslim have gotten 10 million dollars? As a non black person, I really doubt it! Enjoy those tax payers dolars Mr. Arar. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.212.29.80 ( talk) 18:04, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
The Arar Commission having now officially accepted Arar's claims of torture as fact, they are considered a res judicata and need not be referred to as allegations.
Why has the "regularly" tortured now been changed to "allegedly" tortured, a year after this discussion? Is it just going to go back on forth on this one every few days? Unless you have a source more reliable than the Arar Commission showing that Arar was àlledgely tortued, it should revert back to "regularly". 17 March 2007
You know why - the US is still denying that Maher Arar was tortured and will continue to do so because he is suing them. Part of it is that they have changed their definition of torture to include practically only organ failure or death. Thus the horrible and damaging treatment Arar regularly received does not constitute torture in their opinion.
I am sure that I have read somewhere that Maher Arar is still feeling the physical effects of his torture (as well as the psychological effects). I am sure that these will be documented in Monia's book, though.
In finding facts concerning Mr. Arar’s experiences in Syria, I must conclude as to the credibility of his testimony, which was not taken under oath. Given the very nature of detention and interrogation, much of the detail concerning what happened to Mr. Arar in Syria cannot be verified by eyewitness observers. None of the jailers or interrogators was available for me to interview. To assess credibility, I have obviously had to judge the person sitting before me and telling me his story. (emphasis mine)
I have reworded this to reflect the apparent two sides that are reflected in the present dispute. Can you live with this? -- Fremte ( talk) 19:19, 7 February 2009 (UTC)
Since 23:35, 22 July 2011, the section titled "Activism for US Accountability" had included the phrase "presumed subsequent torture"! I have replaced it with "the torture verified by these organizations and the Canadian government". As I've noted in the Edit Summary, when an accused rapist (innocent or otherwise) denies rape, we do not use the phrase "presumed rape". Furthermore, to use even "alleged torture" would mean that the organizations "are directing activism efforts...for...involvement in...alleged...torture"; but, clearly, the human rights organizations do not hold the stance that his torture remains presumed or alleged.-- P00r ( talk) 04:30, 24 December 2011 (UTC)
This claim was made the government lawyer during the appeals process of Arar's case (with one source being "Alleged link between Arar and al-Qaida 'shocks' U.S. court" amongst others). Although this claim was never retracted it was never made again and various other subsequent statements hint at a different belief in Arar's affiliation and "threat" for lack of a better word. So I believe too that there should be an updated section describing the current US stance on Arar."Despite the Canadian court ruling, the United States government has not exonerated Arar and, on the contrary, has made public statements to state their belief that Arar is affiliated with members of organizations they describe as terrorist"
The first mention of Maher Arar I found in Question Period was on October 21 2002 and it wasn't until Thursday, December 12, 2002 in Question Period that we learned that Maher was shipped to Jordan for 12 days before being shipped to Syria. There should be a separate section on Maher Arar's 12 days in Jordan since it destroys the official American "deportation" theory and that was were the worst of the torture took place. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.77.37.48 ( talk) 21:03, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
This is the link to Question Period Transcripts for the period in question (click on date and edit/find Alexa)
http://www2.parl.gc.ca/housechamberbusiness/chambersittings.aspx?Key=2002&View=H&Language=E&Mode=1&Parl=37&Ses=2 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.77.37.48 ( talk) 21:09, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
“I think the U.S. would like to get Arar to Jordan where they can have their way with him.” Mr. Arar’s whereabouts were unknown at the time.” - Jack Hooper, October 10, 2002
[QUOTE] The newly uncensored passages also reveal the CSIS security liaison officer in Washington, in a memo to his superiors two days after Arar's deportation, "spoke of a trend they had noted lately when the CIA or FBI cannot legally hold a terrorist suspect, or wish a target questioned in a firm manner, they have them rendered to countries willing to fulfil that role." Arar, he said, was "a case in point." [/QUOTE] – Janice Tibbetts, Winnipeg Free Press [1] . 24.77.37.48 ( talk) 22:34, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
"is believed to be part of the unofficial US policy of extraordinary rendition whereby terrorism suspects are sent to countries where torture is practised." This is pretty biased. Unless you can find some evidence to support it, I'm deleting it along with all of the other racial profiling stuff. If you don't have a link to any of these, its inaccurate. Epsoul 05:38, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
I've also restored the phrasing which describes extraordinary rendition and the torture of Arar as established fact. The Canadian government has just spent millions of dollars in an exhaustive and wide-ranging enquiry into this case. There really is no justification for implying doubt. -- Lee Hunter 13:24, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
I can't believe anyone could seriously deny that the U.S. practises extraordinary rendition; look at Extraordinary_rendition#Examples_2 if nothing else. However, we don't even need indisputable proof to mention it in the article; it's enough that it be generally accepted as true by a significant group, and sourced. -- Saforrest 15:32, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
I removed the POV tag that RBPierce recently re-inserted, because that user seems to have ignored this discussion of the issues and contributed no new justification for the change. Jmacaulay 17:40, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
This section states that "Arar was held without access to consular services, without legal representation and without being allowed to contact his family." In fact, according to Arar's own website, he was permitted to call his mother-in-law on Oct. 2, was visited by a lawyer, Amal Oummih, on Oct. 5, and by Canadian consul Maureen Girvan on Oct. 4. I will rewrite this section when I have a moment; if anyone wants to do it in the meantime, please feel free. -- Rrburke 22:07, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
Epsoul, when making edits which significantly change the meaning of the article, like this one [4] , which changes the article to suggest the RCMP information was not false and misleading and that the certainty of Arar's torture is not established, please do not mark the edit as "minor".
I have reverted this edit, because the O'Connor report, an official report from the Canadian federal government, clearly states that Arar was tortured and that the RCMP information was false and misleading. -- Saforrest 15:40, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
There is enough blame to go around. The Americans threatened cross-border trade if Canada did not become tough on "terrorism." Papa Khadr was a nasty piece of work so they investigated anyone that Khadr had contact with. Almalki met Khadr and soon decided that he disliked the guy immensely and did not want anything to do with him. However, since the two had contact, Almalki because a person of interest and anyone Almalki talked to also became a person of interest - including Arar who just happened to work for the same company as Almalki's brother. Thus, the RCMP were following them around and taking notes on them to satisfy the Americans.
The RCMP later figured that Arar was not an interest to them but forgot to update his file to say that they no longer saw him as a terror threat. The Americans, using information from the RCMP database, picked up Arar, a Canadian citizen and shipped him to Jordan to be tortured before shipping him to Syria while his wife (who is not from Syria), his parents and kids were all back in Canada. The Syria thing is a loophole since Syria does not allow anyone born there to renounce their citizenship and jails people who have not served their two years military service. Any way, the RCMP did not really want Arar back because they did not want their role in his false imprisonment to be public knowledge and there are memos which say that the RCMP knew that they were going to send Arar away to be torture even when Arar was still in custody in the US. However, what happened to the whole American "innocent until proven guilty" and the right to regular access to a lawyer (not just one time before being shipped away). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.77.37.48 ( talk) 21:33, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
I don't have time to edit, but this BBC story covers Giulano Zaccardelli (RCMP Commissioner)'s public apology. Loganberry ( Talk) 02:23, 29 September 2006 (UTC)
The BBC article covered in that "US denial" section basically says that a lone embassador vigorously denied the allegations, only to be corrected by a US embassy spokesperson the very next day.
Rl 08:37, 29 September 2006 (UTC) Fixed.
Rl 06:46, 30 September 2006 (UTC)
I rewrote this section for accuracy: format diplomatic protests are not made when leaders call each other. During the phone call Harper notified Bush of Canada's intention to lodge a formal protest. The protest took the form of a Letter of Protest sent to Condoleezza Rice by Peter MacKay.
Additionally, Harper did not say he told Bush "Canada wants assurances that U.S. officials will deal honestly with their Canadian counterparts and incidents like the deportation of Canadian Maher Arar to Syria will not happen again." He told reporters that this is what Canada wants. Precisely what he said to Bush is not reported, as it's not customary to release such details. -- Rrburke 17:37, 8 October 2006 (UTC)
During this case, there was much use of the word "deported". This was and is incorrect. Most countries claim the right to expel foreigners. This is not what happened here. Arar was forcibly taken to a country that was known not to be his current country of residence, and that was known to practice torture by the very country which forced him there. -- Macchendra 21:36, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Here is the definition of the word deported: "To expel from a country."
It is not controversial that this is not what happened to Maher Arar. Furthermore, deportation is not a controversial act, but what happened here clearly is. -- Macchendra 01:39, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
According to the deportation article in WP, the word covers a broad range of government actions including what was done to Arar. I don't understand why you believe that deportation cannot be controversial. Any government action can be controversial if enough people disagree with it. -- Lee Hunter 02:16, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
'Extraordinary rendition'
Main article: Extraordinary rendition
"Extraordinary rendition" is an extra-judicial procedure and policy of the United States in which criminal suspects, generally suspected terrorists or supporters of terrorist organisations, are sent to countries for imprisonment and interrogation. The procedure differs from extradition as the purpose of the rendition is to extract information from suspects, while extradition is used to return fugitives so that they can stand trial or fulfill their sentence. Critics of the procedure have accused the CIA of rendering suspects to other countries in order to avoid US laws prescribing due process and prohibiting torture.
US and Canadian officials claim he was deported, but the Wiki article on deportation says that deportation involves a court or a "senior Minister". There's no record of a court trial for Ara, nor that a senior DHs official authorized his removal. So I've reworked the article to term this as Administrative Removal which I think you'll find is close and neutral description of what occured. Mre5765 05:54, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
In this recent edit a wikipedia contributor removed a reference to the USA's role, with the edit summary:
I don't see how this "distorts what happened", and I don't think the passage should be excised. I'd like the wikipedia contributor to explain their reasoning more fully.
Cheers! -- Geo Swan 22:34, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
Maher Arar (Arabic: ماهر عرار; born 1970 in Syria) is a Canadian software engineer who was falsely accused of being an Al-Qaeda operative and was subsequently tortured in Syria.
xxx
The truth is that we won't know how bad the American culpability in this is until it goes to court. Though what we know already is pretty damming. The Syrians considered Arar "more of a nuisance than anything else" and had to be talked into keeping him confined. Any way, this whole thing about citizenship is mute since Maher Arar was originally “deported” to Jordan! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.77.37.48 ( talk) 22:24, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
It is great job accounting for individual cases of the extraordinary rendition program. Be sure, however, to make a very short intro (currently, it is an article by itself) which manages, in a very few sentences, to give a quick overview of the cases and of the most important points of the article. Many, including me when I'm tired or low on time, never get past through the intro, and such a big intro can discourage the eventual reader. Cheers! Tazmaniacs
I was thinking much the same thing. The article, in general, is grossly unfinished and inadequate. Hence, a substantial part, if not the majority of all significant information, is located in the lead and it definitely needs to be redistributed or shortened. The difficulty is that this episode involving Arar is a significant case with a huge amount of information and implications. I'll see what I can do over the next week. I especially regret how we have yet to get a photo of Arar on this page or how it portrays Arar as coming back to Canada as though nothing happened in Canada. The role of his wife, the political process and news coverage must be included. Ben 04:45, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
__________ Someone should reconsider this sentence: "The Bush administration labelled him a member of Al Qaeda and rendered him, not to Canada, his home and country of citizenship, but to Syrian intelligence authorities, known by the U.S. government to practice torture." According to the Inquiry, the RCMP labelled Arar a "suspected" member of Al Qaeda in their request for an addition to a US watch-list. {CW} —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.6.91.17 ( talk) 01:59, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
Here are my reasons for the changes made to the article version 19:40, 9 November 2007 Ed M isnot edm 19:59, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
-- end of reasons -- Ed M isnot edm 19:59, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
RE: * Removed "due to his association with Al Qaeda suspects Abdullah Almalki and Ahmad El Maati".
There is nothing else there so put it back up! The trick is that, to be allowed to read this other information that the American government says it has on Arar, one has to promise not to reveal it's contents - which is the real "complication." Congressperson Jerrold Nadler has read the "information" the US government has on Arar and has said publicly that there is "nothing there" - [19] Some one else in Congress made a similar statement but I can't remember who. Think that Peter McKay read it and saw nothing there but not sure so someone check that out. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.77.37.48 ( talk) 21:52, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
This article could use a picture of Maher Arar. NorthernThunder 05:47, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
I agree with him or her that bias is a bad thing. But I disagree that this edit reduced it. Rather I think it introduced bias. For instance it calls Arar a "multi-millionaire". That is highly deceptive. Arar was just a computer consultant prior to his capture. He was just a middle-class guy, prior to his capture. Through no fault of his own he was captured and subjected to a devastating experience. The Canadian government eventually owned up to its share of responsibility for his capture, and acknowledged that the RCMP's handover of his dossier was an enormous mistake, and, in particular, whatever hints it might have contained that he knew a guy, who knew a guy, who knew a guy, who knew Bin Laden was a very tenuous link to terror. The Canadian government apologized to him, and they gave him a multi-million settlement.
Calling him a multi-millionaire leaves the possibility that intelligence analysts might have worried that he was able to donate a fortune to bin Laden. Deceptive.
Cheers! Geo Swan 17:52, 1 June 2007 (UTC)
The second paragraph contradicts itself: it says he was not sent to his country of citizenship -- but earlier it says that he was a citizen of Syria. ThreeE 02:28, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
The issue of Maher Arar's citizenship is a slightly complex one. This issue arises from the fact that Syria refuses to release citizenship to anyone born in Syria. This is briefly outlined in a United States Office of Personal Management report
LOSS OF CITIZENSHIP:
VOLUNTARY: Though voluntary renunciation of Syrian citizenship is permitted by law, the Syrian Information Office stated that it is so complicated that it is best not to attempt the process. In effect, according to that Office, the process is complicated in order to discourage renunciation of Syrian citizenship. Former citizens of Syria probably maintain an unofficial dual citizenship status and would be subject to Syrian law as citizens should they return to Syria.
Exception: Persons of military service age are not permitted to renounce citizenship.
In fact, I had recently heard Maher Arar describe that even his son who was born in Canada is considered Syrian by the government of Syria. In many places Maher Arar is described as "having dual-citizenship" or being "Canadian with Syrian birth". But the fact remains that Mr. Arar chose to become a citizen of Canada in 1991; thus one could say "he was not sent to his chosen country of citizenship". —Preceding unsigned comment added by . 64.222.63.209 ( talk) 23:14, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
As has been reiterated on this talk page many times before, the fact of Arar's torture is a res judicata in Canada, and beyond dispute. Given this, words like "alleged" and "claims" give a misleading impression about the degree of proof for the statements in question.
If you want to still say Arar was "allegedly" tortured, you'd have to stick "alleged" into every article on every criminal who ever pleaded innocent. -- Saforrest 21:36, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Randy2063 could you explain what exactly your problem is with Maher Arar? LamontCranston 7:14, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
I've asked for a second opinion on this GA nomination. Personally, I think the article should be passed, but this is my first GA review, so I'm reluctant to make any decisions.
Explanation:
This article is well written, is most verifiable, very comprehensive. However, there are problems (mostly with the lead). The lead is quite shaky. It repetitive (esp. about torture). The lead says "alleged" but does not say who is making the allegations. I propose that instead of the current lead:
Maher Arar (born 1970 in Syria), is a Canadian software engineer who was deported to Syria and tortured, in an alleged example of the United States policy of rendition.
we should have something like this:
Maher Arar (born 1970 in Syria), is a software engineer and Canadian citizen living in Montreal(?). He gained media attention after he was deported to Syria and tortured. His case is cited as an example of the United States policy of rendition.
Such neutralization should be done to the entire lead. Other than the lead, the entire article seems to comply with NPOV. Writing a more neutral lead will also make this article more stable.
Other than that there is some content that is unsourced. Though this content is not contentious, and probably not original research, nevertheless it should be sourced. Finally, images of Maher Arar do exist, and they need to be found. Hope this helps. Feel free to respond back on my talk. Bless sins 20:11, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
I have not fully read the article in detail, but I think that there are some considerations that are fairly obvious and too concerning to allow this article to be pass. The early sections have far too few citations and the citation needed tags are problematic and unsuitable for a GA pass, a concern made only more important given the fact that this is a biography of a living person. In addition, it fails several important MoS considerations such as WP:LEAD, a trivia section (or "Miscellenous facts" – there shouldn't be one and everything in that section should be either incorporated into the body of the article or removed) and there are far too many one-two sentence paragraphs. It is my opinion that this should be failed for these reasons, among others, although final decision rests in the hands of the initial reviewer. Cheers, CP 21:57, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
There is no definitive consensus that this article is a good one. I requested the nominator to address concerns, but that didn't happen. I hope that this article is improved an re-nominated. Bless sins ( talk) 20:30, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
To Canadians, Maher Arar is the most well-known example. Germans know about Khaled al-Masri and in Italy, it's Osama Mustfafa Hasan, also known as Abu Omar, who gets the headlines. What all three have in common, aside from being Muslims, is extraordinary rendition. Each has been taken forcibly to another country, allegedly by U.S. intelligence, to be interrogated or tortured about allegations of involvement in international terrorism. Arar and al-Masri have been released and declared innocent. Abu Omar remains in prison in his native Egypt.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/arar/renditions.html
Previously blacked-out portions of the Maher Arar report state that Canadian security officials believed the United States might send the Syrian-born Canadian to a foreign country to be questioned under torture.
"I think the U.S. would like to get Arar to Jordan where they can have their way with him," a Canadian Security Intelligence Service officer based in Washington wrote in a report dated Oct. 10, 2002, according to documents released Thursday.
The note was written days after the United States deported Arar, who was returning to Canada from a vacation in 2002 when he was detained during a flight stopover in New York, wrongly accused of links with al-Qaeda and sent to Syria, where he was jailed for months and tortured.
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/story/2007/08/09/arar-report.html
Arar was travelling on a Canadian passport and had expressly asked US authorities to be allowed to proceed or to be returned to Canada. Canada had expressly asked the US to return Arar to Canada for their own investigations and Arar was merely hours away from Canadian authorities.
Arar was not wanted in Canada, the United States or in Syria for any crimes and his "rendition" was not requested by Syria at any time. There was also no evidence, at least none that is reliable (let alone admissible in a court of law) that Arar had committed a crime.
The US was aware that Canada had no evidence no charge Arar with a crime. The US did not have sufficient evidence to convict Arar of a crime. The US has long been aware that Syria and its courts do not have an independent judiciary, that it is willing to convict its own citizens on scant evidence and that its authorities torture. The notion that the "rendition" to Syria was legal because Arar was also a Syrian citizen is preposterous and is merely a pretense. Syria does not recognize the disavowal of Syrian citizenship, let alone dual citizenship.
The question of why Syria and not Canada is easily answered, no? Ben ( talk) 21:33, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
I have changed this per above.
It is quite obvious that this is more than alleged but less than accepted everywhere. I think this is about as close to reality as possible. Fremte ( talk) 18:15, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
If we were talking the holocaust rather than the horrendous treatment of Maher Arar, changing "alleged" to (the even worse) "apparent" would not wash. "He said, She said" is not much better, but may be an easier way around the problem. "Apparent" sounds too much like a mirage.
Any way, as far as torture goes, I think it is the word "torture" that these torture-deniers are hung up on moreso than which of these "interrogation techniques" were and were not used on Arar. Maybe it is best to use both terms in the intro and let the details speak for themselves and the reader decide whether these "techniques" constitute torture or not. If the torture deniers won't accept that, they won't accept anything short of the article openly stating that Arar is making this all up and was just pulling a Dar Heatherington. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.77.37.48 ( talk) 22:19, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
Who put up the "neutrality is disputed" banner? Please add your discussion so we can either repair the article. Thanks! Fremte ( talk) 14:22, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
I see no need for any theory as to why the United States sent Maher Arar to Syria. No one disputes the fact that the US did in fact send him to Syria. As for the issue of US/Syrian cooperation with the War on Terror there is a well documented history of cooperation. The following references are just a sampling of such documentation [32] [33] [34] [35] [36] [37] [38] [39] [40]. In addition here is a video of the Syrian Ambassador to the US talking about its assistance in fighting terror [1]. And then there was a recent article by Jeff Stein, CQ National Security Advisor, concerning the backchannel communication between the US and Syria "Syria’s Backchannel to Washington Survives the Pelosi Firestorm" By Jeff Stein, April 6, 2007. Again there is a well documented cooperation between the two nations despites several strong political differences.
The wording of this sentence seems to imply that this a conspiracy theory. A better wording might be "The United States government has not given a satisfactory explanation as to why Maher Arar was sent to Syria and not Canada" although I don't think this captures your added statement very well either. Bq7722 can you elaborate a little more on what you are trying to convey? Ed M isnot edm ( talk) 01:15, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
References
I have changed the wording describing Secretary Rice's testimony in an effort to clarify her intended meaning. The previous wording suggests that the Secretary Rice was saying that the deportation of Maher Arar was not handled properly ("...admitted for the first time that the 2002 deportation of Arar to a Syrian jail was not handled properly, but she did not offer an apology."). I would argue that in fact what she was said and implied was that the communication between the US and Canadian governments was not handle properly not the handling of Arar's deportation. One can review the video of the exchange between Represenative Delahunt and Secretary Rice here. In addition one can read from the hearing transcript (pgs 30-33), see the State Department response to Rep. Delahunt question about assurances (ibid. pg 32) or view the full hearing video. Ed M isnot edm ( talk) 17:42, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
There appears to be a growing number of books which refer to the Arar case that for reference purposes should be listed in this article. I also find it helpful to summarize what each book has to say about the Arar case providing context. But the amount of pertinent content ranges from a mere passing reference to the primary focus of the entire work. As such due to the increasing number of books I felt some need merely to be listed and some listed and summarized. The guidelines I was going to use for which books to be summarized and listed were these
Otherwise if the book just simply references the Arar case in passing it should only be listed. Also it was my prefernece to link listed books to the publishers page for that book. I am not sure of wikipedia's guidelines on this so this might change. Feel free to adopt this guideline or not for listing and/or summarizing books under this article. Ed M isnot edm ( talk) 00:44, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
Related to the use "deport" is the article's use of the word "rendition" in the heading of the section that talks about his being transported out of the US (where the word deport is used to describe this act). "Rendition", when used with the meaning implied by this article is doublespeak and should not appear in this article; except in reference to this term as a euphamism for illegal acts by a government.
Rather than simply edit the heading myself and begin an edit-war, I'm opening this discussion here to attempt to gain concensus on a more accurate word for use in the heading.
Christopher Rath ( talk) 16:06, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, Christopher, for this helpful gesture. Hopefully we will be able to reach some sort of "concensus", as you say.
P.S. wait, a "concensus" is where they count up how many people live in a country and then afterwards try to make all of them agree on one single point of view, right? (I guess that's what you mean? Just checking.) Mardiste ( talk) 00:01, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
The Globe and Mail Web site is reporting that "a teenaged Omar Khadr identified Canadian Maher Arar, who was tortured in Syria after he was sent there by American authorities, as someone he had seen at al-Qaida safe houses and training camps in Afghanistan, an FBI special agent testified Monday.... Mr. Khadr made the identification from photographs the agent, Robert Fuller, showed him during interrogations several months after the Toronto-born Mr. Khadr was captured following a firefight in Afghanistan in July 2002." -- 99.240.224.103 ( talk) 23:31, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
Ok, it's clear that Arar is innocent and never had anything to do with terrorism. That obviously goes without saying. The only question this brings up is why the CIA would go to such expense (and we're talking an enormous amount of time and effort and resources here, I mean, we're literally talking millions of dollars here) to torture Omar Khadr (who is also innocent) to such a degree that he would agree to swear (falsely) that he recognized Arar as a person he had met at terrorist safe houses in Afghanistan. Why on earth would the CIA want Khadr to say that? Arar was just an innocent software designer from Canada. What were they attempting to do? I honestly don't understand their motivation here. It just doesn't seem to make any sense. Mardiste ( talk) 03:34, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
You're right, Eleland. The question of why the CIA and FBI would torture Omar Khadr (in clear violation of the United States Constitution and the Geneva Convention) in order to elicit a false accusation from a Guantanamo Bay prisoner to the effect that a Canadian software designer might in any way be involved in Al Qaida is absolutely irrelevant to a Wikipedia article on the subject of Maher Arar.
There are no "premises" here that anyone is asking you to "accept". I'm simply posing a completely reasonable question. Mardiste ( talk) 01:41, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
I'll say it again, Eleland. I am asking a perfectly reasonable and (considering the circumstances since the recent Omar Khadr revelations) pretty damn compelling question, with no preconceived assumptions or premises whatsoever. If the most intelligent response to that question that you can possibly formulate is that I am an internet "troll", then I guess I'll have to give you a pass on that and leave it at that. (I am logged in as a Wikipedia member with my personal information and identity absolutely open to the public. I will e-mail you or anyone else my full name, address, home phone number, and e-mail address at a second's notice if you like.) Your name-calling, by the way, is every bit as objective and classy as your contributions to this page. Props, man. On top of the standard outrage, the accusations were a really nice touch. Mardiste ( talk) 03:31, 23 January 2009 (UTC)
This is fabulous. I just got called a "troll" by someone who believes that a "special relationship" between Israel and something called "the Anglosphere" is "in operation" on Wikipedia. Mardiste ( talk) 02:12, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
Canadian newspapers reported today that Maher Arar is "shocked" and "depressed" to learn that Guantanamo Bay prisoner and son of Osama Bin Laden's chief financier Omar Khadr has stated under oath that he has seen Mr. Arar in Al-Qaeda safe houses in Afghanistan. Mardiste ( talk) 23:59, 30 January 2009 (UTC)
I disagree with you, "Sherurcig Speaker for the Dead" (best Wikipedia username EVER, by the way). If you're arguing that the extent of the connection between the Khadr family and Osama bin Laden is in fact a one-time indirect third-person car loan of $300, then there are at least two parties who have made multiple public statements that fundamentally contradict the factuality of your position. The first is the Khadr family. The second is Osama bin Laden. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mardiste ( talk • contribs) 01:49, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
And I don't think that Maha and Zaynab Khadr would approve of your representation of their husband and father Ahmed Khadr. That story paints him and everyone he was ever associated with as the sneakiest, most dishonest cowards imaginable. Seriously, what kind of person perpetuates such gratuitous (and so easily disproven) stories like that? Listen, I'm a Jew, and although I strongly disagree with his political views, I do recognise that Ahmed Khadr was a brave, courageous, decent man who lived and died for his principles. That's a lot more than I can say for the people defiling his memory with the third-person $300 car loan story. You should be ashamed of yourselves. Mardiste ( talk) 03:27, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
If I were Monia Mazigh, I would be suing the Khadr family into the ground right about now. Why isn't she? Mardiste ( talk) 01:29, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
The only bright point in this entire story is that Guantanamo Bay will soon be closed and (in all likelihood) Omar Khadr will soon be back with his family in Toronto. The best thing that will come out of this is that Omar will finally be able to speak freely to the press, confirming that he has indeed never laid eyes on Maher Arar in his entire life and that US authorities were willing to breach the US Constitution and multiple statutes under the Geneva Convention by torturing him into saying that he saw an innocent Syrian-born Canadian immigrant with no relationship to Al Qaeda whatsoever in an Al Qaeda training camp.
(I know, it doesn't make sense to me either.) Mardiste ( talk) 01:56, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
As this Wikipedia article currently stands, the author is claiming that Omar Khadr stated that "he felt" [quotation marks NOT mine] that he saw Maher Arar in Afghanistan sometime during September or October 2001. If this is actually a "quotation" (which I am herewith disputing in THE STRONGEST POSSIBLE TERMS) wouldn't Omar Khadr have said "I felt" instead of "he felt"?? I mean seriously, he was talking about himself, right? Why would he use the third person pronoun "he" when referring to himself? It seems kind of unusual, doesn't it? I would like to request that the author explain his use of quotation marks and give us a link to the source where he's getting these alleged quotations. Aren't most people who falsify quotations on Wikipedia at least intelligent enough to change the personal pronoun BEFORE they post it and THEN claim that someone else said it? Seriously. Mardiste ( talk) 22:52, 6 March 2009 (UTC)
To put this in the simplest possible terms for the person who wrote this section of the article on Maher Arar: If you change the quotation to "I felt", I will withdraw (and apologise for) my implication that the quotation was unbelievably and mind-bogglingly stupid. However, I firmly stand by my statement that that "quotation" was false, inaccurate, intentionally misleading, and completely made up. Mardiste ( talk) 23:06, 6 March 2009 (UTC)
First my apologies, I actually removed this unintentionally for a previous of the introductory paragraph. But I did intend to remove eventually. The reason being is that this information is already discussed in sections 1.2 and 4.7 and this information does not rise to the level of importance for the introductory and summary paragraph. Ed M isnot edm ( talk) 22:01, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
Mardiste, again my apologies. I see I unintentionally undid a few other edits. Apparently wikipedia does not have a three way edit functionality. Concerning your change within the sentence "He is famous for the outcry in the Canadian media regarding his deportation to Syria." (italics indicating Mardiste modification) although most news concerning Mr. Arar has been Canadian I will revert that sentence as previously written.
As for the paragraph about US current statement of Mr. Arar affiliations I believe you are correct that the latest US government statements say he "is" still affiliated and not "has been"; thus I will correct my unintended three way diff. But I believe those statement, made in court in the Arar case against the US government, state al-Qaeda and not some generic " terrorist organisation deemed illegal in both Canada and the United States". If you have more detail and source listing such organizations I will leave that part as it was. Ed M isnot edm ( talk) 22:25, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
Yes, as a matter of fact, I do know (precisely and word for word) what Mr. Arar has claimed in his case. If I didn't, I obviously wouldn't be qualified to contribute to this page. What I'm asking you now (having already asked you privately and without having received any answer as of yet) is the following:
On what grounds are you removing my Wikipedia edits, "Ed M isnot edm"? Please clarify immediately or reverse your edits. Thanks Mardiste ( talk) 01:48, 5 March 2009 (UTC)
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I just have to ask, since in the past year since I checked it, this article seems now much more obsessively focued on Arar's lawsuits against the US and Canadian involvement in his extradition. It seems like Syria has been almost forgotten in the process. They are the actual torturers, therefore the primary proponents here, yet out of hundreds of lines of text, the article currently only has one small paragraph (of seven lines) actually devoted to Syria. He was only held by the US for two weeks (compared to a year in Syria), yet that paragraph is almost as long as the Syria one. Heck, there is almost as much space just devoted to US embassy statements on the case. I suspect this is because there are mostly Americans editing the article, so the US angle is what they naturally focus on. But is that truly encyclopedic? I just feel like this article looks too much like a US/Canadian political football field. Thoughts? BuboTitan ( talk) 23:27, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
The Prime Minister of Canada just conducted a press release regarding the Arar case (12:30 p.m. on the 26th of January, 2007). He officially apologized on behalf of the Canadian federal government. He also is awarding him $12.5 million ($10.5 million for him and $2 million for his legal fees) for his damages. 205.194.74.10 18:02, 26 January 2007 (UTC)Jsers
How could such a large settlement be justified? I could accept that $10.5 million could be appropriate for the imprisonment and torture, but all Canada did (allegedly) was provide misleading information to the USA, which proceeded to deport him to Syria, which proceeded to torture him. So, if $10.5 million was an appropriate measure of his damages, surely the USA should be responsible for, maybe $3 million, Syria for, maybe, $6 million, and Canada for, maybe $1.5 million? Why is the Canadian taxpayer picking up the tab for the full measure of his damages? Why isn't his other country of citizenship (Syria) being held to account? I appreciate that the settlement resulted from a mediation (with a very respected mediator), but I can't help but feel that Canada's willingness to pay such a huge sum in the circumstances was politically motivated, specifically to embarrass the previous Liberal government, on whose watch everything was alleged to have happened to Arar. Bq7720 ( talk) 13:53, 7 April 2009 (UTC)
The compensation to Arar was settled on the basis of Canada's complicity and has never been claimed to be "the entire bill." Part of the compensation is related to the libel and rumour-mongering that Arar and his family were subjected to as a result of leaks to the media that presented unfounded allegations to the public. The "end of the political spectrum that sides with Arar" is generally the side that's concerned with human rights and civil liberties; which would be entirely to contrary to the idea of being allied with Iran and Syria. Lyn ( talk) 20:16, 19 October 2010 (UTC)
The question we should ask ourselves should be......Would a black Middle Easterner or Black Muslim have gotten 10 million dollars? As a non black person, I really doubt it! Enjoy those tax payers dolars Mr. Arar. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.212.29.80 ( talk) 18:04, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
The Arar Commission having now officially accepted Arar's claims of torture as fact, they are considered a res judicata and need not be referred to as allegations.
Why has the "regularly" tortured now been changed to "allegedly" tortured, a year after this discussion? Is it just going to go back on forth on this one every few days? Unless you have a source more reliable than the Arar Commission showing that Arar was àlledgely tortued, it should revert back to "regularly". 17 March 2007
You know why - the US is still denying that Maher Arar was tortured and will continue to do so because he is suing them. Part of it is that they have changed their definition of torture to include practically only organ failure or death. Thus the horrible and damaging treatment Arar regularly received does not constitute torture in their opinion.
I am sure that I have read somewhere that Maher Arar is still feeling the physical effects of his torture (as well as the psychological effects). I am sure that these will be documented in Monia's book, though.
In finding facts concerning Mr. Arar’s experiences in Syria, I must conclude as to the credibility of his testimony, which was not taken under oath. Given the very nature of detention and interrogation, much of the detail concerning what happened to Mr. Arar in Syria cannot be verified by eyewitness observers. None of the jailers or interrogators was available for me to interview. To assess credibility, I have obviously had to judge the person sitting before me and telling me his story. (emphasis mine)
I have reworded this to reflect the apparent two sides that are reflected in the present dispute. Can you live with this? -- Fremte ( talk) 19:19, 7 February 2009 (UTC)
Since 23:35, 22 July 2011, the section titled "Activism for US Accountability" had included the phrase "presumed subsequent torture"! I have replaced it with "the torture verified by these organizations and the Canadian government". As I've noted in the Edit Summary, when an accused rapist (innocent or otherwise) denies rape, we do not use the phrase "presumed rape". Furthermore, to use even "alleged torture" would mean that the organizations "are directing activism efforts...for...involvement in...alleged...torture"; but, clearly, the human rights organizations do not hold the stance that his torture remains presumed or alleged.-- P00r ( talk) 04:30, 24 December 2011 (UTC)
This claim was made the government lawyer during the appeals process of Arar's case (with one source being "Alleged link between Arar and al-Qaida 'shocks' U.S. court" amongst others). Although this claim was never retracted it was never made again and various other subsequent statements hint at a different belief in Arar's affiliation and "threat" for lack of a better word. So I believe too that there should be an updated section describing the current US stance on Arar."Despite the Canadian court ruling, the United States government has not exonerated Arar and, on the contrary, has made public statements to state their belief that Arar is affiliated with members of organizations they describe as terrorist"
The first mention of Maher Arar I found in Question Period was on October 21 2002 and it wasn't until Thursday, December 12, 2002 in Question Period that we learned that Maher was shipped to Jordan for 12 days before being shipped to Syria. There should be a separate section on Maher Arar's 12 days in Jordan since it destroys the official American "deportation" theory and that was were the worst of the torture took place. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.77.37.48 ( talk) 21:03, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
This is the link to Question Period Transcripts for the period in question (click on date and edit/find Alexa)
http://www2.parl.gc.ca/housechamberbusiness/chambersittings.aspx?Key=2002&View=H&Language=E&Mode=1&Parl=37&Ses=2 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.77.37.48 ( talk) 21:09, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
“I think the U.S. would like to get Arar to Jordan where they can have their way with him.” Mr. Arar’s whereabouts were unknown at the time.” - Jack Hooper, October 10, 2002
[QUOTE] The newly uncensored passages also reveal the CSIS security liaison officer in Washington, in a memo to his superiors two days after Arar's deportation, "spoke of a trend they had noted lately when the CIA or FBI cannot legally hold a terrorist suspect, or wish a target questioned in a firm manner, they have them rendered to countries willing to fulfil that role." Arar, he said, was "a case in point." [/QUOTE] – Janice Tibbetts, Winnipeg Free Press [1] . 24.77.37.48 ( talk) 22:34, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
"is believed to be part of the unofficial US policy of extraordinary rendition whereby terrorism suspects are sent to countries where torture is practised." This is pretty biased. Unless you can find some evidence to support it, I'm deleting it along with all of the other racial profiling stuff. If you don't have a link to any of these, its inaccurate. Epsoul 05:38, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
I've also restored the phrasing which describes extraordinary rendition and the torture of Arar as established fact. The Canadian government has just spent millions of dollars in an exhaustive and wide-ranging enquiry into this case. There really is no justification for implying doubt. -- Lee Hunter 13:24, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
I can't believe anyone could seriously deny that the U.S. practises extraordinary rendition; look at Extraordinary_rendition#Examples_2 if nothing else. However, we don't even need indisputable proof to mention it in the article; it's enough that it be generally accepted as true by a significant group, and sourced. -- Saforrest 15:32, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
I removed the POV tag that RBPierce recently re-inserted, because that user seems to have ignored this discussion of the issues and contributed no new justification for the change. Jmacaulay 17:40, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
This section states that "Arar was held without access to consular services, without legal representation and without being allowed to contact his family." In fact, according to Arar's own website, he was permitted to call his mother-in-law on Oct. 2, was visited by a lawyer, Amal Oummih, on Oct. 5, and by Canadian consul Maureen Girvan on Oct. 4. I will rewrite this section when I have a moment; if anyone wants to do it in the meantime, please feel free. -- Rrburke 22:07, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
Epsoul, when making edits which significantly change the meaning of the article, like this one [4] , which changes the article to suggest the RCMP information was not false and misleading and that the certainty of Arar's torture is not established, please do not mark the edit as "minor".
I have reverted this edit, because the O'Connor report, an official report from the Canadian federal government, clearly states that Arar was tortured and that the RCMP information was false and misleading. -- Saforrest 15:40, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
There is enough blame to go around. The Americans threatened cross-border trade if Canada did not become tough on "terrorism." Papa Khadr was a nasty piece of work so they investigated anyone that Khadr had contact with. Almalki met Khadr and soon decided that he disliked the guy immensely and did not want anything to do with him. However, since the two had contact, Almalki because a person of interest and anyone Almalki talked to also became a person of interest - including Arar who just happened to work for the same company as Almalki's brother. Thus, the RCMP were following them around and taking notes on them to satisfy the Americans.
The RCMP later figured that Arar was not an interest to them but forgot to update his file to say that they no longer saw him as a terror threat. The Americans, using information from the RCMP database, picked up Arar, a Canadian citizen and shipped him to Jordan to be tortured before shipping him to Syria while his wife (who is not from Syria), his parents and kids were all back in Canada. The Syria thing is a loophole since Syria does not allow anyone born there to renounce their citizenship and jails people who have not served their two years military service. Any way, the RCMP did not really want Arar back because they did not want their role in his false imprisonment to be public knowledge and there are memos which say that the RCMP knew that they were going to send Arar away to be torture even when Arar was still in custody in the US. However, what happened to the whole American "innocent until proven guilty" and the right to regular access to a lawyer (not just one time before being shipped away). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.77.37.48 ( talk) 21:33, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
I don't have time to edit, but this BBC story covers Giulano Zaccardelli (RCMP Commissioner)'s public apology. Loganberry ( Talk) 02:23, 29 September 2006 (UTC)
The BBC article covered in that "US denial" section basically says that a lone embassador vigorously denied the allegations, only to be corrected by a US embassy spokesperson the very next day.
Rl 08:37, 29 September 2006 (UTC) Fixed.
Rl 06:46, 30 September 2006 (UTC)
I rewrote this section for accuracy: format diplomatic protests are not made when leaders call each other. During the phone call Harper notified Bush of Canada's intention to lodge a formal protest. The protest took the form of a Letter of Protest sent to Condoleezza Rice by Peter MacKay.
Additionally, Harper did not say he told Bush "Canada wants assurances that U.S. officials will deal honestly with their Canadian counterparts and incidents like the deportation of Canadian Maher Arar to Syria will not happen again." He told reporters that this is what Canada wants. Precisely what he said to Bush is not reported, as it's not customary to release such details. -- Rrburke 17:37, 8 October 2006 (UTC)
During this case, there was much use of the word "deported". This was and is incorrect. Most countries claim the right to expel foreigners. This is not what happened here. Arar was forcibly taken to a country that was known not to be his current country of residence, and that was known to practice torture by the very country which forced him there. -- Macchendra 21:36, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Here is the definition of the word deported: "To expel from a country."
It is not controversial that this is not what happened to Maher Arar. Furthermore, deportation is not a controversial act, but what happened here clearly is. -- Macchendra 01:39, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
According to the deportation article in WP, the word covers a broad range of government actions including what was done to Arar. I don't understand why you believe that deportation cannot be controversial. Any government action can be controversial if enough people disagree with it. -- Lee Hunter 02:16, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
'Extraordinary rendition'
Main article: Extraordinary rendition
"Extraordinary rendition" is an extra-judicial procedure and policy of the United States in which criminal suspects, generally suspected terrorists or supporters of terrorist organisations, are sent to countries for imprisonment and interrogation. The procedure differs from extradition as the purpose of the rendition is to extract information from suspects, while extradition is used to return fugitives so that they can stand trial or fulfill their sentence. Critics of the procedure have accused the CIA of rendering suspects to other countries in order to avoid US laws prescribing due process and prohibiting torture.
US and Canadian officials claim he was deported, but the Wiki article on deportation says that deportation involves a court or a "senior Minister". There's no record of a court trial for Ara, nor that a senior DHs official authorized his removal. So I've reworked the article to term this as Administrative Removal which I think you'll find is close and neutral description of what occured. Mre5765 05:54, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
In this recent edit a wikipedia contributor removed a reference to the USA's role, with the edit summary:
I don't see how this "distorts what happened", and I don't think the passage should be excised. I'd like the wikipedia contributor to explain their reasoning more fully.
Cheers! -- Geo Swan 22:34, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
Maher Arar (Arabic: ماهر عرار; born 1970 in Syria) is a Canadian software engineer who was falsely accused of being an Al-Qaeda operative and was subsequently tortured in Syria.
xxx
The truth is that we won't know how bad the American culpability in this is until it goes to court. Though what we know already is pretty damming. The Syrians considered Arar "more of a nuisance than anything else" and had to be talked into keeping him confined. Any way, this whole thing about citizenship is mute since Maher Arar was originally “deported” to Jordan! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.77.37.48 ( talk) 22:24, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
It is great job accounting for individual cases of the extraordinary rendition program. Be sure, however, to make a very short intro (currently, it is an article by itself) which manages, in a very few sentences, to give a quick overview of the cases and of the most important points of the article. Many, including me when I'm tired or low on time, never get past through the intro, and such a big intro can discourage the eventual reader. Cheers! Tazmaniacs
I was thinking much the same thing. The article, in general, is grossly unfinished and inadequate. Hence, a substantial part, if not the majority of all significant information, is located in the lead and it definitely needs to be redistributed or shortened. The difficulty is that this episode involving Arar is a significant case with a huge amount of information and implications. I'll see what I can do over the next week. I especially regret how we have yet to get a photo of Arar on this page or how it portrays Arar as coming back to Canada as though nothing happened in Canada. The role of his wife, the political process and news coverage must be included. Ben 04:45, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
__________ Someone should reconsider this sentence: "The Bush administration labelled him a member of Al Qaeda and rendered him, not to Canada, his home and country of citizenship, but to Syrian intelligence authorities, known by the U.S. government to practice torture." According to the Inquiry, the RCMP labelled Arar a "suspected" member of Al Qaeda in their request for an addition to a US watch-list. {CW} —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.6.91.17 ( talk) 01:59, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
Here are my reasons for the changes made to the article version 19:40, 9 November 2007 Ed M isnot edm 19:59, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
-- end of reasons -- Ed M isnot edm 19:59, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
RE: * Removed "due to his association with Al Qaeda suspects Abdullah Almalki and Ahmad El Maati".
There is nothing else there so put it back up! The trick is that, to be allowed to read this other information that the American government says it has on Arar, one has to promise not to reveal it's contents - which is the real "complication." Congressperson Jerrold Nadler has read the "information" the US government has on Arar and has said publicly that there is "nothing there" - [19] Some one else in Congress made a similar statement but I can't remember who. Think that Peter McKay read it and saw nothing there but not sure so someone check that out. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.77.37.48 ( talk) 21:52, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
This article could use a picture of Maher Arar. NorthernThunder 05:47, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
I agree with him or her that bias is a bad thing. But I disagree that this edit reduced it. Rather I think it introduced bias. For instance it calls Arar a "multi-millionaire". That is highly deceptive. Arar was just a computer consultant prior to his capture. He was just a middle-class guy, prior to his capture. Through no fault of his own he was captured and subjected to a devastating experience. The Canadian government eventually owned up to its share of responsibility for his capture, and acknowledged that the RCMP's handover of his dossier was an enormous mistake, and, in particular, whatever hints it might have contained that he knew a guy, who knew a guy, who knew a guy, who knew Bin Laden was a very tenuous link to terror. The Canadian government apologized to him, and they gave him a multi-million settlement.
Calling him a multi-millionaire leaves the possibility that intelligence analysts might have worried that he was able to donate a fortune to bin Laden. Deceptive.
Cheers! Geo Swan 17:52, 1 June 2007 (UTC)
The second paragraph contradicts itself: it says he was not sent to his country of citizenship -- but earlier it says that he was a citizen of Syria. ThreeE 02:28, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
The issue of Maher Arar's citizenship is a slightly complex one. This issue arises from the fact that Syria refuses to release citizenship to anyone born in Syria. This is briefly outlined in a United States Office of Personal Management report
LOSS OF CITIZENSHIP:
VOLUNTARY: Though voluntary renunciation of Syrian citizenship is permitted by law, the Syrian Information Office stated that it is so complicated that it is best not to attempt the process. In effect, according to that Office, the process is complicated in order to discourage renunciation of Syrian citizenship. Former citizens of Syria probably maintain an unofficial dual citizenship status and would be subject to Syrian law as citizens should they return to Syria.
Exception: Persons of military service age are not permitted to renounce citizenship.
In fact, I had recently heard Maher Arar describe that even his son who was born in Canada is considered Syrian by the government of Syria. In many places Maher Arar is described as "having dual-citizenship" or being "Canadian with Syrian birth". But the fact remains that Mr. Arar chose to become a citizen of Canada in 1991; thus one could say "he was not sent to his chosen country of citizenship". —Preceding unsigned comment added by . 64.222.63.209 ( talk) 23:14, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
As has been reiterated on this talk page many times before, the fact of Arar's torture is a res judicata in Canada, and beyond dispute. Given this, words like "alleged" and "claims" give a misleading impression about the degree of proof for the statements in question.
If you want to still say Arar was "allegedly" tortured, you'd have to stick "alleged" into every article on every criminal who ever pleaded innocent. -- Saforrest 21:36, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Randy2063 could you explain what exactly your problem is with Maher Arar? LamontCranston 7:14, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
I've asked for a second opinion on this GA nomination. Personally, I think the article should be passed, but this is my first GA review, so I'm reluctant to make any decisions.
Explanation:
This article is well written, is most verifiable, very comprehensive. However, there are problems (mostly with the lead). The lead is quite shaky. It repetitive (esp. about torture). The lead says "alleged" but does not say who is making the allegations. I propose that instead of the current lead:
Maher Arar (born 1970 in Syria), is a Canadian software engineer who was deported to Syria and tortured, in an alleged example of the United States policy of rendition.
we should have something like this:
Maher Arar (born 1970 in Syria), is a software engineer and Canadian citizen living in Montreal(?). He gained media attention after he was deported to Syria and tortured. His case is cited as an example of the United States policy of rendition.
Such neutralization should be done to the entire lead. Other than the lead, the entire article seems to comply with NPOV. Writing a more neutral lead will also make this article more stable.
Other than that there is some content that is unsourced. Though this content is not contentious, and probably not original research, nevertheless it should be sourced. Finally, images of Maher Arar do exist, and they need to be found. Hope this helps. Feel free to respond back on my talk. Bless sins 20:11, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
I have not fully read the article in detail, but I think that there are some considerations that are fairly obvious and too concerning to allow this article to be pass. The early sections have far too few citations and the citation needed tags are problematic and unsuitable for a GA pass, a concern made only more important given the fact that this is a biography of a living person. In addition, it fails several important MoS considerations such as WP:LEAD, a trivia section (or "Miscellenous facts" – there shouldn't be one and everything in that section should be either incorporated into the body of the article or removed) and there are far too many one-two sentence paragraphs. It is my opinion that this should be failed for these reasons, among others, although final decision rests in the hands of the initial reviewer. Cheers, CP 21:57, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
There is no definitive consensus that this article is a good one. I requested the nominator to address concerns, but that didn't happen. I hope that this article is improved an re-nominated. Bless sins ( talk) 20:30, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
To Canadians, Maher Arar is the most well-known example. Germans know about Khaled al-Masri and in Italy, it's Osama Mustfafa Hasan, also known as Abu Omar, who gets the headlines. What all three have in common, aside from being Muslims, is extraordinary rendition. Each has been taken forcibly to another country, allegedly by U.S. intelligence, to be interrogated or tortured about allegations of involvement in international terrorism. Arar and al-Masri have been released and declared innocent. Abu Omar remains in prison in his native Egypt.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/arar/renditions.html
Previously blacked-out portions of the Maher Arar report state that Canadian security officials believed the United States might send the Syrian-born Canadian to a foreign country to be questioned under torture.
"I think the U.S. would like to get Arar to Jordan where they can have their way with him," a Canadian Security Intelligence Service officer based in Washington wrote in a report dated Oct. 10, 2002, according to documents released Thursday.
The note was written days after the United States deported Arar, who was returning to Canada from a vacation in 2002 when he was detained during a flight stopover in New York, wrongly accused of links with al-Qaeda and sent to Syria, where he was jailed for months and tortured.
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/story/2007/08/09/arar-report.html
Arar was travelling on a Canadian passport and had expressly asked US authorities to be allowed to proceed or to be returned to Canada. Canada had expressly asked the US to return Arar to Canada for their own investigations and Arar was merely hours away from Canadian authorities.
Arar was not wanted in Canada, the United States or in Syria for any crimes and his "rendition" was not requested by Syria at any time. There was also no evidence, at least none that is reliable (let alone admissible in a court of law) that Arar had committed a crime.
The US was aware that Canada had no evidence no charge Arar with a crime. The US did not have sufficient evidence to convict Arar of a crime. The US has long been aware that Syria and its courts do not have an independent judiciary, that it is willing to convict its own citizens on scant evidence and that its authorities torture. The notion that the "rendition" to Syria was legal because Arar was also a Syrian citizen is preposterous and is merely a pretense. Syria does not recognize the disavowal of Syrian citizenship, let alone dual citizenship.
The question of why Syria and not Canada is easily answered, no? Ben ( talk) 21:33, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
I have changed this per above.
It is quite obvious that this is more than alleged but less than accepted everywhere. I think this is about as close to reality as possible. Fremte ( talk) 18:15, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
If we were talking the holocaust rather than the horrendous treatment of Maher Arar, changing "alleged" to (the even worse) "apparent" would not wash. "He said, She said" is not much better, but may be an easier way around the problem. "Apparent" sounds too much like a mirage.
Any way, as far as torture goes, I think it is the word "torture" that these torture-deniers are hung up on moreso than which of these "interrogation techniques" were and were not used on Arar. Maybe it is best to use both terms in the intro and let the details speak for themselves and the reader decide whether these "techniques" constitute torture or not. If the torture deniers won't accept that, they won't accept anything short of the article openly stating that Arar is making this all up and was just pulling a Dar Heatherington. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.77.37.48 ( talk) 22:19, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
Who put up the "neutrality is disputed" banner? Please add your discussion so we can either repair the article. Thanks! Fremte ( talk) 14:22, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
I see no need for any theory as to why the United States sent Maher Arar to Syria. No one disputes the fact that the US did in fact send him to Syria. As for the issue of US/Syrian cooperation with the War on Terror there is a well documented history of cooperation. The following references are just a sampling of such documentation [32] [33] [34] [35] [36] [37] [38] [39] [40]. In addition here is a video of the Syrian Ambassador to the US talking about its assistance in fighting terror [1]. And then there was a recent article by Jeff Stein, CQ National Security Advisor, concerning the backchannel communication between the US and Syria "Syria’s Backchannel to Washington Survives the Pelosi Firestorm" By Jeff Stein, April 6, 2007. Again there is a well documented cooperation between the two nations despites several strong political differences.
The wording of this sentence seems to imply that this a conspiracy theory. A better wording might be "The United States government has not given a satisfactory explanation as to why Maher Arar was sent to Syria and not Canada" although I don't think this captures your added statement very well either. Bq7722 can you elaborate a little more on what you are trying to convey? Ed M isnot edm ( talk) 01:15, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
References
I have changed the wording describing Secretary Rice's testimony in an effort to clarify her intended meaning. The previous wording suggests that the Secretary Rice was saying that the deportation of Maher Arar was not handled properly ("...admitted for the first time that the 2002 deportation of Arar to a Syrian jail was not handled properly, but she did not offer an apology."). I would argue that in fact what she was said and implied was that the communication between the US and Canadian governments was not handle properly not the handling of Arar's deportation. One can review the video of the exchange between Represenative Delahunt and Secretary Rice here. In addition one can read from the hearing transcript (pgs 30-33), see the State Department response to Rep. Delahunt question about assurances (ibid. pg 32) or view the full hearing video. Ed M isnot edm ( talk) 17:42, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
There appears to be a growing number of books which refer to the Arar case that for reference purposes should be listed in this article. I also find it helpful to summarize what each book has to say about the Arar case providing context. But the amount of pertinent content ranges from a mere passing reference to the primary focus of the entire work. As such due to the increasing number of books I felt some need merely to be listed and some listed and summarized. The guidelines I was going to use for which books to be summarized and listed were these
Otherwise if the book just simply references the Arar case in passing it should only be listed. Also it was my prefernece to link listed books to the publishers page for that book. I am not sure of wikipedia's guidelines on this so this might change. Feel free to adopt this guideline or not for listing and/or summarizing books under this article. Ed M isnot edm ( talk) 00:44, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
Related to the use "deport" is the article's use of the word "rendition" in the heading of the section that talks about his being transported out of the US (where the word deport is used to describe this act). "Rendition", when used with the meaning implied by this article is doublespeak and should not appear in this article; except in reference to this term as a euphamism for illegal acts by a government.
Rather than simply edit the heading myself and begin an edit-war, I'm opening this discussion here to attempt to gain concensus on a more accurate word for use in the heading.
Christopher Rath ( talk) 16:06, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, Christopher, for this helpful gesture. Hopefully we will be able to reach some sort of "concensus", as you say.
P.S. wait, a "concensus" is where they count up how many people live in a country and then afterwards try to make all of them agree on one single point of view, right? (I guess that's what you mean? Just checking.) Mardiste ( talk) 00:01, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
The Globe and Mail Web site is reporting that "a teenaged Omar Khadr identified Canadian Maher Arar, who was tortured in Syria after he was sent there by American authorities, as someone he had seen at al-Qaida safe houses and training camps in Afghanistan, an FBI special agent testified Monday.... Mr. Khadr made the identification from photographs the agent, Robert Fuller, showed him during interrogations several months after the Toronto-born Mr. Khadr was captured following a firefight in Afghanistan in July 2002." -- 99.240.224.103 ( talk) 23:31, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
Ok, it's clear that Arar is innocent and never had anything to do with terrorism. That obviously goes without saying. The only question this brings up is why the CIA would go to such expense (and we're talking an enormous amount of time and effort and resources here, I mean, we're literally talking millions of dollars here) to torture Omar Khadr (who is also innocent) to such a degree that he would agree to swear (falsely) that he recognized Arar as a person he had met at terrorist safe houses in Afghanistan. Why on earth would the CIA want Khadr to say that? Arar was just an innocent software designer from Canada. What were they attempting to do? I honestly don't understand their motivation here. It just doesn't seem to make any sense. Mardiste ( talk) 03:34, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
You're right, Eleland. The question of why the CIA and FBI would torture Omar Khadr (in clear violation of the United States Constitution and the Geneva Convention) in order to elicit a false accusation from a Guantanamo Bay prisoner to the effect that a Canadian software designer might in any way be involved in Al Qaida is absolutely irrelevant to a Wikipedia article on the subject of Maher Arar.
There are no "premises" here that anyone is asking you to "accept". I'm simply posing a completely reasonable question. Mardiste ( talk) 01:41, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
I'll say it again, Eleland. I am asking a perfectly reasonable and (considering the circumstances since the recent Omar Khadr revelations) pretty damn compelling question, with no preconceived assumptions or premises whatsoever. If the most intelligent response to that question that you can possibly formulate is that I am an internet "troll", then I guess I'll have to give you a pass on that and leave it at that. (I am logged in as a Wikipedia member with my personal information and identity absolutely open to the public. I will e-mail you or anyone else my full name, address, home phone number, and e-mail address at a second's notice if you like.) Your name-calling, by the way, is every bit as objective and classy as your contributions to this page. Props, man. On top of the standard outrage, the accusations were a really nice touch. Mardiste ( talk) 03:31, 23 January 2009 (UTC)
This is fabulous. I just got called a "troll" by someone who believes that a "special relationship" between Israel and something called "the Anglosphere" is "in operation" on Wikipedia. Mardiste ( talk) 02:12, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
Canadian newspapers reported today that Maher Arar is "shocked" and "depressed" to learn that Guantanamo Bay prisoner and son of Osama Bin Laden's chief financier Omar Khadr has stated under oath that he has seen Mr. Arar in Al-Qaeda safe houses in Afghanistan. Mardiste ( talk) 23:59, 30 January 2009 (UTC)
I disagree with you, "Sherurcig Speaker for the Dead" (best Wikipedia username EVER, by the way). If you're arguing that the extent of the connection between the Khadr family and Osama bin Laden is in fact a one-time indirect third-person car loan of $300, then there are at least two parties who have made multiple public statements that fundamentally contradict the factuality of your position. The first is the Khadr family. The second is Osama bin Laden. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mardiste ( talk • contribs) 01:49, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
And I don't think that Maha and Zaynab Khadr would approve of your representation of their husband and father Ahmed Khadr. That story paints him and everyone he was ever associated with as the sneakiest, most dishonest cowards imaginable. Seriously, what kind of person perpetuates such gratuitous (and so easily disproven) stories like that? Listen, I'm a Jew, and although I strongly disagree with his political views, I do recognise that Ahmed Khadr was a brave, courageous, decent man who lived and died for his principles. That's a lot more than I can say for the people defiling his memory with the third-person $300 car loan story. You should be ashamed of yourselves. Mardiste ( talk) 03:27, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
If I were Monia Mazigh, I would be suing the Khadr family into the ground right about now. Why isn't she? Mardiste ( talk) 01:29, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
The only bright point in this entire story is that Guantanamo Bay will soon be closed and (in all likelihood) Omar Khadr will soon be back with his family in Toronto. The best thing that will come out of this is that Omar will finally be able to speak freely to the press, confirming that he has indeed never laid eyes on Maher Arar in his entire life and that US authorities were willing to breach the US Constitution and multiple statutes under the Geneva Convention by torturing him into saying that he saw an innocent Syrian-born Canadian immigrant with no relationship to Al Qaeda whatsoever in an Al Qaeda training camp.
(I know, it doesn't make sense to me either.) Mardiste ( talk) 01:56, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
As this Wikipedia article currently stands, the author is claiming that Omar Khadr stated that "he felt" [quotation marks NOT mine] that he saw Maher Arar in Afghanistan sometime during September or October 2001. If this is actually a "quotation" (which I am herewith disputing in THE STRONGEST POSSIBLE TERMS) wouldn't Omar Khadr have said "I felt" instead of "he felt"?? I mean seriously, he was talking about himself, right? Why would he use the third person pronoun "he" when referring to himself? It seems kind of unusual, doesn't it? I would like to request that the author explain his use of quotation marks and give us a link to the source where he's getting these alleged quotations. Aren't most people who falsify quotations on Wikipedia at least intelligent enough to change the personal pronoun BEFORE they post it and THEN claim that someone else said it? Seriously. Mardiste ( talk) 22:52, 6 March 2009 (UTC)
To put this in the simplest possible terms for the person who wrote this section of the article on Maher Arar: If you change the quotation to "I felt", I will withdraw (and apologise for) my implication that the quotation was unbelievably and mind-bogglingly stupid. However, I firmly stand by my statement that that "quotation" was false, inaccurate, intentionally misleading, and completely made up. Mardiste ( talk) 23:06, 6 March 2009 (UTC)
First my apologies, I actually removed this unintentionally for a previous of the introductory paragraph. But I did intend to remove eventually. The reason being is that this information is already discussed in sections 1.2 and 4.7 and this information does not rise to the level of importance for the introductory and summary paragraph. Ed M isnot edm ( talk) 22:01, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
Mardiste, again my apologies. I see I unintentionally undid a few other edits. Apparently wikipedia does not have a three way edit functionality. Concerning your change within the sentence "He is famous for the outcry in the Canadian media regarding his deportation to Syria." (italics indicating Mardiste modification) although most news concerning Mr. Arar has been Canadian I will revert that sentence as previously written.
As for the paragraph about US current statement of Mr. Arar affiliations I believe you are correct that the latest US government statements say he "is" still affiliated and not "has been"; thus I will correct my unintended three way diff. But I believe those statement, made in court in the Arar case against the US government, state al-Qaeda and not some generic " terrorist organisation deemed illegal in both Canada and the United States". If you have more detail and source listing such organizations I will leave that part as it was. Ed M isnot edm ( talk) 22:25, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
Yes, as a matter of fact, I do know (precisely and word for word) what Mr. Arar has claimed in his case. If I didn't, I obviously wouldn't be qualified to contribute to this page. What I'm asking you now (having already asked you privately and without having received any answer as of yet) is the following:
On what grounds are you removing my Wikipedia edits, "Ed M isnot edm"? Please clarify immediately or reverse your edits. Thanks Mardiste ( talk) 01:48, 5 March 2009 (UTC)
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