Former Carleton professor Hassan Diab won’t face a fair trial in France if he’s extradited on allegations of terrorism, his lawyer said at an Oct. 18 panel discussion at Carleton.
A group of more than 50 students, faculty and Diab supporters attended the panel discussion on Canadian extradition law.
Diab is fighting extradition to France on allegations that he was involved in a 1980 synagogue bombing in Paris.
Ontario Superior Court Justice Robert Maranger signed the committal for Diab’s extradition to France June 6, despite acknowledging “there couldn’t possibly be a conviction assuming a fair trial,” said Donald Bayne, Diab’s lawyer.
The final decision for extradition now rests with Justice Minister Rob Nicholson.
Bayne, an Ottawa criminal defense lawyer, and Nathalie Des Rosiers, general counsel of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, led the discussion on how a French court would allow the use of information gathered by intelligence agencies.
“There’s a twist,” Bayne said. “It’s intelligence that has been manipulated as well.”
Unsourced French intelligence states that Diab was in France at the time of the bombing, and that it could be proved because he used his own passport to enter the country.
Diab’s passport didn’t have a French stamp confirming this, which would have been the norm in 1980, the defence stated. But Diab used a fake passport to enter the country, the prosecution responded.
The evidence in the case wouldn’t be admissible in Canadian courts, Bayne said, because “the case against [Diab] is based on intelligence.”
French authorities have changed the way they’re using the gathered intelligence to suit their arguments and move the case against Diab forward, Bayne said.
There’s additional cause for concern in using intelligence information because there’s no guarantee it wasn’t gathered through the use of torture, Des Rosiers said.
During the question and answer period, attendee Maher Arar questioned whether Diab was committed for extradition because he’s going to another Western country.
Arar said he was deported to Syria by the United States and tortured based on intelligence information supplied by the RCMP.
Diab likely wouldn’t be sent to a country like Syria with similar evidence being presented because of Canada’s policy not to extradite individuals when there’s a risk of cruel or inhuman punishment, Bayne said.
The French authorities won’t disclose what the intelligence information reveals about Diab, Des Rosiers said.
Diab’s defense has also discredited the handwriting analyses being used by experts in the case. The French case rests on the assertion that the handwriting of the bomber on a hotel registration card matches that of Diab.
But half of the handwriting French officials took to compare to the writing of the person believed to be the bomber was that of Diab’s wife, Bayne said.
“This was glaring unreliability. An embarrassment,” he said.
Carleton human rights professor Bill Skidmore moderated the discussion.
