Vol. 75/No. 2      January 17, 2011

Harkat was given refugee status in 1997 on grounds that he faced political persecution if he returned home. Harkat was arrested in 2002 after being labeled an al-Qaeda sleeper agent by the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service. Before his arrest he worked in Ottawa as a pizza delivery man and a gas station attendant. Since then Harkat and his wife Sophie Harkat-Lamarche have been waging a broad campaign both to clear his name, lift the security certificate against him, and abolish the entire security certificate process.

The certificates are used to detain and deport refugees and immigrants the Canadian government deems a threat to “national security.” The system is based on secret evidence that the accused can neither see nor challenge in court.

In 2007, under pressure from Harkat’s campaign and others victimized by such certificates, the federal Supreme Court ruled the security certificate process “invalid” under Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms. In response, Ottawa made a number of cosmetic changes to the process a year later. The ruling against Harkat is the first time a court has validated the “new” security certificate system.

Harkat’s defense campaign, which has won wide support among civil libertarians, unionists, and others, led to his release from house arrest in 2006. When a “new” security certificate was issued against him in 2008 under the revised law, he appealed the decision. In the meantime courts have since invalidated and lifted security certificates of two other victims of this anti-working-class judicial procedure, Adil Charkaoui in Montreal and Hassan Almrei in Toronto.

In a message issued December 22, the Justice for Mohamad Harkat Committee stated, “We are still standing, and stronger and more determined to fight this injustice than ever.”

In a widely reported Ottawa press conference December 10, Harkat announced that he will appeal the constitutionality of the new security certificate law to the Federal Court of Appeal and, if necessary, to the Supreme Court of Canada.

Information about the Justice for Mohamed Harkat Committee is available at www.justiceforharkat.com.

John Steele contributed to this article.
 
 
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