Three years after a secretive federal inquiry concluded that mistakes made by Canadian officials contributed to Abdullah Almalki’s torture and imprisonment in Syria, recently-released RCMP documents now reveal that the entire case against him was fabricated.

At a press conference on Parliament Hill on Oct. 25, Mr. Almalki released shocking documents that prove that the RCMP’s allegations against him were baseless and founded on racism.

Mr. Almalki, who was detained, interrogated, and tortured for 22 months in a Syrian dungeon, has sought answers to many questions since his return to Canada. Why was he targeted? How could agencies of his own government fabricate a case against him and then send questions to his Syrian torturers? And why won’t the government accept responsibility for the mistakes made by its agencies?

He had hoped to find these answers in the Iacobucci Inquiry held to investigate his case and those of Ahmad El Maati and Muayyed Nureddin -- also tortured with Canadian complicity -- but all three men were completely shut out of the process, along with their lawyers, the public, and the media.

The Iacobucci report, released in October 2008, found, among other conclusions, that “several of the Canadian officials involved in the decision to send questions for Mr. Almalki were aware that doing so created a serious risk that Mr. Almalki would be tortured.”

It also found that “some of the RCMP members involved in the decision to send questions for Mr. Almalki displayed a dismissive attitude towards the issue of human rights and the possibility of torture.”

The report cleared the three men of the serious allegations made by CSIS and the RCMP, noting that in the case of Mr. Almalki, a description of him as an “imminent threat: to national security was not only “inflammatory, inaccurate, and lacking investigative foundation,” it was in fact meant to describe someone else.

But the damning findings of the Iacobucci inquiry did not provide a sufficient enough explanation both for what happened and why it occurred, and certainly failed to lay proper blame and seek accountability.

Since that time, Mr. Almalki has sifted through many pages of documents he received under freedom of access to information, and was shocked to discover what he found.

“Ten years ago, I never thought that one day I would be standing and speaking publicly about racism,” Mr. Almalki says.  “I think I had the grace of not experiencing racism in my life before.”

The occasion for his comments was the release of RCMP internal documents from 2001. About three weeks after the attacks of September 11, 2001, the RCMP sent a dangerous, inflammatory memo to Syria and the intelligence agencies of numerous other countries suggesting Mr. Almalki was an “imminent threat” to the public safety and security of Canada. Yet that same day, the RCMP’s own assessment showed he was not a threat at all.

“O Div. taskforce are presently finding it difficult to establish anything on him other than the fact that he is an Arab running around,” the shocking document reads referring to the RCMP’s Ontario Division.

“It is not only heartbreaking and extremely disappointing to see that the biggest police force in Canada is racist,” says Mr. Almalki.  “It is rather disgusting and outrageous when you see that this would lead to making up and fabricating accusations about a person that resulted in torture and illegal detention.

“Racism blinds people, impairs their judgment, shrinks their cognitive abilities, and diminishes moral values.  Racism stinks and stings.”

A few weeks prior to 9/11, another RCMP assessment of Mr. Almalki concluded: “It does not appear to me that there is any offense being committed at this time that would warrant an investigation.”

This confirmed earlier reports that read “Almalki does not seem to have committed any criminal offence…yet”, upon which it appeared that their investigation was closed. Two months before 9/11, the RCMP assessment of Mr. Almalki was “he has not been found to be committing any criminal activities in Canada.”

Subsequent to these memos being written, Mr. Almalki was picked up in Syria when he flew there to visit an ailing relative. The RCMP’s inflammatory description of him as an “imminent threat” doomed him to torture in Syria.  Questions drafted in Canada were then sent to the Syrians, despite the knowledge that doing so would expose Mr. Almalki to the substantial likelihood of being tortured. He was never visited by Canadian consular officials and, upon his release, was kicked out of the Canadian embassy in Damascus when he sought assistance getting home.

This shocking treatment of Messrs. Almalki, El Maati and Nureddin was put before the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security of the House of Commons, which in June, 2009, called for an immediate apology from the government to all three men, along with compensation "for the suffering they endured and the difficulties they encountered."

The Committee also called on the federal government to "do everything necessary to correct misinformation that may exist in records administered by national security agencies in Canada or abroad with respect to" the three men and their family members.

It also demanded "the Government of Canada issue a clear ministerial directive against torture and the use of information obtained from torture for all departments and agencies responsible for national security. The ministerial directive must clearly state that the exchange of information with countries is prohibited when there is a credible risk that it could lead, or contribute, to the use of torture."

On December 3, 2009, that report and its recommendations were endorsed by the majority of the House of Commons, but the Harper government still refuses to act on that majority vote.

To remind the public and government of these unresolved cases, from October 24 - 26, Almalki joined members of the group Stop Canadian Involvement in Torture as they traveled throughout Ottawa to mark sites of complicity in torture. Agencies such as the RCMP and CSIS, the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, and the Justice Department, all mentioned in the torture inquiries, saw crime scene tape go up around their premises, along with evidence tags and hooded, orange-jumpsuit-wearing detainees. Corporate targets included Starbucks, which refuses to take a position on the illegality of the Guantanamo Bay torture centre while it brews thousands of coffee cups for the soldiers and interrogators who work behind the wire.

Speaking in front of the Prime Minister’s Office on October 26, Mr. Almalki again shared the damning RCMP memos as he joined dozens of people in a public reading of key sections from the Iacobucci report. While no one from inside the office was willing to talk, Mr. Almalki and his supporters continue seeking answers, as well as the changes needed to ensure what happened to him never happens to anyone else.

The RCMP memos, along with other key documents, are available at www.abdullahalmalki.com

See also “Almalki case a wake-up call for Arabs, Muslims”