Monday, August 04, 2003



SIS "evidence" doesn't stack up

Great, not only are we still holding Ahmed Zaoui when we've determined he's a genuine refugee, but it turns out that the evidence provided by the SIS to the Refugee Status Appeals Authority is highly questionable, to say the least:

The authority decision says the unclassified material was often unsourced but was apparently drawn from news reports and internet material.

"Many of the entries consist solely of unsourced extracts from various news reports with no attempt to excise opinion from fact."

[...]

"That the SIS was content to rely on such a self-evidently dubious source to construct its biography of the appellant is most surprising," said the decision. "The consequence was not only to reinforce the chronology's portrayal of the appellant as connected to the GIA but also to import into the biography a suggested al-Qaeda link."

This is the worst sort of heresay evidence, and a perfect example of why the government needs to make its case in court, before an independent judge. But then, given the quality of the evidence they've publicized, it's no wonder the government wants to hide behind secrecy - because they clearly wouldn't be able to make their case to any independent review body.

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