Urge Minister Lametti to launch a public inquiry into Hassan Diab’s wrongful extradition

On Friday July 26, after a two-month delay, the Department of Justice Canada released the report of Murray Segal, former Deputy Attorney General of Ontario, who was tasked with reviewing the wrongful extradition of Hassan Diab to France. Mr. Segal concluded that government lawyers acted ethically and followed proper procedures in extraditing Hassan. Mr. Segal reached this conclusion despite the fact that government lawyers withheld exculpatory evidence, were not truthful with the court, and intervened to direct French authorities on how to patch up the case to ensure Hassan’s extradition.

At a press conference in Ottawa after the report was released, Hassan stated: “To say that the Segal report is a disappointment is a gross understatement. It is a one-sided report. Its purpose is not to provide transparency or accountability or to prevent future miscarriages of justice. Rather, its purpose is to absolve the Department of Justice from any accountability and to shield senior officials at the Department from further scrutiny. From the outset, we asked for an independent and transparent public inquiry into my wrongful extradition… I trusted the government’s promise that what happened to me should never happen to anyone else. However, the report promises a continuation of the old way where every Canadian is at risk.”

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It is urgent that we voice our dissatisfaction with the Segal report and demand an independent and transparent public inquiry into Hassan’s wrongful extradition, as well as serious reform of the extradition law, so no one in Canada would be subjected to the deeply flawed and unfair extradition process.

Please call Justice Minister David Lametti and urge him to launch an independent public inquiry into Hassan’s extradition and reform Canada’s extradition law.

Minister David Lametti’s Office: (613) 992-4621

When you call, please give your name and where you are calling from. You may be talking to an answering machine. You can leave a message to this effect:

“Minister Lametti, I am profoundly disappointed with Murray Segal’s report on the wrongful extradition of Hassan Diab. Due to the limited nature of Mr. Segal’s mandate, there are many questions about Dr. Diab’s extradition that remain unanswered. We need full transparency and accountability to ensure that the injustice that happened to Hassan never happens again. I urge you to launch an independent public inquiry into Dr. Diab’s extradition and to reform Canada’s extradition law.”

You can also write to Mr. Lametti at:
The Honourable David Lametti
Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada
284 Wellington Street
Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0H8
Canada

Email: mcu@justice.gc.ca

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Donald Bayne, Hassan Diab’s lawyer, reacted to the Segal report saying: “This is basically a report that says nothing wrong was done by anybody. If Canadian prosecutors and the justice system all got it so right, why then did Hassan Diab languish in solitary confinement over three years, an innocent Canadian in a French jail? The standards we are using are clearly wrong. Anything goes in an extradition, and you can’t defend yourself. This will happen again.”

Josh Paterson, Executive Director of the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association, wrote: “If Canada’s horrendous treatment of Dr. Hassan Diab was legal, then Canada’s extradition law is severely broken and must be changed. This [Segal] report makes clear that our extradition laws are deeply unfair… Dr. Diab was shipped off for lengthy imprisonment in a foreign country on a flimsy case, without even having the right to see and to respond to the evidence against him. Canada’s laws must be changed to prevent anything like this from happening again in the future.”

Alex Neve, Secretary General of Amnesty International Canada, remarked: “That this review effectively concludes ‘no problem here’ is the strongest possible reason why this cannot end here and there absolutely must now be a proper judicial inquiry into what happened to Hassan Diab… Nowhere does the [Segal] report ask the absolutely vital, central and obvious two questions in this case (not surprisingly, because the government did not include them in Murray’s Segal’s Terms of Reference): (1) how did those ‘laws, practices and policies’ fail to protect Hassan Diab from years of agonizing human rights violations; and (2) what needs to be strengthened or entirely reformed, urgently, to ensure no one else goes through such a cruel and anguished experience. Those are the questions Hassan Diab, his family and all Canadians deserve and need to have answered.”

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