To normal people, the case of Maher Arar, a dual Canadian-Syrian citizen detained in transit at JFK and "rendered" to Syria for interrogation is a case study in what's wrong with the war on terror: Arar was completely innocent of any links to terrorism, received no due process before being moved to Syria, and was tortured when he got there. But the Wall Street Journal editorial page (subs. req'd) sees a different lesson:
the temptation to get vital information by "rendering" such suspects for interrogation by governments that have little respect for human rights will only increase if the CIA's own al Qaeda interrogation program is shut down. This may make some in Congress feel better about themselves, but it won't do much for the "rights" of those interrogated.
That is, by their chosen analogy, if the CIA isn't allowed torture innocent people, other countries will have to be found to do the job.
UPDATE 22 SEP: Since we're on the topic of Arar, one of the insidious aspects of the case is the eagerness with which Canadian authorities sent him to his fate. Consider then the seemingly unrelated case of Gavin Tollman, who has been carefully staying out of US jurisdiction since being indicted on tax evasion charges. However, US prosecutors got word, it's not clear how, that he was doing a stopover in Toronto en route to Bermuda and had him arrested there and detained in a high security prison. The idea was to pressure him into waiving a formal extradition hearing so that he could "consent" to a handover at Niagara Falls.
However Tollman got a lawyer, who got a judge to throw out the extradition request owing to the subterfuge. The judge therefore joins Governor George Pataki of New York in rebelling at the overreach of these extradition requests -- although it's still fine with Tony Blair. One little detail from the Times (UK) story is that the setup was arranged by US Department of Homeland Security Officials in Ottawa; presumably alleged white collar criminals are now seen as a security threat. The story is also consistent with US Attorney General Al Gonzales' hasty backtracking on his denials about the Arar case by claiming that such cases would now be handled by DHS.
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