ottawa –
Former Foreign Secretary Lawrence Cannon said in 2009 he refused to issue an emergency passport to Absoufian Abdelrazik because he deemed him a potential threat to national security.
Cannon said at a federal court hearing on Tuesday that he did not want Abdelrazik to return to Canada from Sudan and “put Canadians at risk.”
Born in Sudan, Abdelrazik settled in Montreal as a refugee and became a Canadian citizen in 1995.
In 2003, while visiting his home country to visit his sick mother, he was arrested, imprisoned, and interrogated on suspicion of links to extremists.
Abdelrazik denies any involvement in terrorism, but says he was tortured by Sudanese authorities during his two detentions.
He is suing the Canadian government, alleging that authorities arranged his arbitrary imprisonment, encouraged his detention by Sudanese authorities, and blocked his repatriation to Canada over several years.
The lawsuit also names Cannon, who was Conservative foreign secretary from October 2008 to May 2011.
Federal lawyers argue that Mr. Abdelrazik is the author of his own problems, and that Canada could not have asked Sudan to continue to detain him, mistreat him, or create the risk that something like that would happen. He said it was not.
Mr. Abdelrazik was released from Sudanese detention for the second time in July 2006. However, efforts to return to Canada were complicated by his inclusion on a United Nations security watch list. At various times, he was also on the US and Canadian no-fly lists.
In response to inquiries from the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and the RCMP stated in November 2007 that neither agency had current and substantive information to support Mr. Abdelrazik’s continued inclusion on the UN list. said.
However, Abdelrazik remained in Sudan.
In April 2008, he sought safe haven at the Canadian Embassy in Khartoum. He lived there in makeshift conditions for more than a year.
Canadian officials have said several times that the federal government would issue him with an emergency passport if he could arrange air travel to Canada.
In March 2009, Abdelrazik secured a ticket to Canada for the following month.
Email messages from March 12, 2009, submitted to the court, show that Mr. Cannon’s office questioned his authority to issue Mr. Abdelrazik with an emergency passport while he was on the United Nations list. It shows.
Mr. Cannon appeared to know little about the investigation and suggested that one of his staff members was seeking more information “as much as we were all looking for information.”
In early April 2009, Mr. Cannon ordered that Mr. Abdelrazik be arrested under a provision of the Canadian Passport Order that allows a passport to be refused or revoked “if the national security of Canada or another country requires such action.” refused to submit emergency travel documents.
Mr Cannon told the court on Tuesday that responsibility for national security was one of the key roles played by ministers.
“I took that responsibility very seriously,” Cannon said. “I didn’t want to put Canadians at risk, and I didn’t want Mr. Abdelrazik to come back to Canada and threaten the safety and livelihoods of many Canadians.”
Mr. Abdelrazik’s lawyer, Paul Champ, said in cross-examination of Mr. Cannon that Canadian Passport was well prepared to issue the document before the minister’s decision.
“Someone in your office pumped the brakes and said, ‘Wait, please don’t publish it because Mr. Cannon wants to review it. I’m suggesting to you that’s what happened.’
“I cannot confirm what you are suggesting,” Cannon replied. “I don’t know.”
Mr Abdelrazik told the court that the refusal of his passport was “like a mountain falling on my head and caused me great pain”.
He returned to Canada in late June 2009 after a judge ruled that Ottawa had violated his Charter right to enter Canada by refusing to provide him with temporary travel documents.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 10, 2024.
