U.S. Ambassador David Wilkins on Wednesday criticized Ottawa's efforts to have Maher Arar removed from a United States security watch list, saying the U.S. alone will decide who to let into the country.
Speaking in Edmonton after meeting with new Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach, Wilkins warned Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day to back off, because a U.S. review determined Arar should remain on the watch list.
"It's a little presumptuous for him [Day] to say who the United States can and cannot allow into our country," Wilkins told reporters Wednesday.
Last week, U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was grilled relentlessly on Thursday by Senate judiciary committee chairman Patrick Leahy. Leahy said that when Arar — a citizen of both Canada and Syria travelling on a Canadian passport — was detained in 2002, American authorities knew he would be tortured if they deported him to Syria.
"We knew damn well if he went to Canada he wouldn't be tortured," said Leahy, a Democrat from Vermont. "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. Continued...
