Gonzales Lies About Torture Victim

Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales is a deceitful piece of shit. There is no other way to put it. To cast doubt that this person, Canadian citizen Mr. Arar, was not tortured in Syria is absurd. This case is about a Canadian citizen wrongly accused of terrorist ties. He was apprehended at JFK and sent to Syria. This happened in September 2002. In October 2003, Mr. Arar was released by Syria, where officials found no evidence that he had any connection to terrorism, and returned to Canada. The Bush Administration cannot be trusted with anything. This is just one case of deceit and total lack of responsibility, lack of accountability and an abundance of incompetence. Justice Dept. Amends Remark on Torture Case By SCOTT SHANE Published: September 21, 2006 WASHINGTON, Sept. 20 — In an embarrassing turnabout, the Department of Justice backed away Wednesday from a denial by Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales of responsibility for the treatment of a Canadian who was seized by American authorities in 2002. The man was deported to Syria, where he was imprisoned and beaten. Asked at a news conference on Tuesday about a Canadian commission’s finding that the man, Maher Arar, was wrongly sent to Syria and tortured there, Mr. Gonzales replied, “Well, we were not responsible for his removal to Syria.” He added, “I’m not aware that he was tortured.” The attorney general’s comments caused puzzlement because they followed front-page news articles of the findings of the Canadian commission. It reported that based on inaccurate information from Canada about Mr. Arar’s supposed terrorist ties, American officials ordered him taken to Syria, an action documented in public records. On Wednesday, a Justice Department spokesman said Mr. Gonzales had intended to make only a narrow point: that deportations are now handled by the Department of Homeland Security, not the Department of Justice. Read at NYT