CSIS promises on torture baseless, watchdog says

posted on November 01, 2005 | in Category CSIS | PermaLink

Original author: Jeff Sallot Source: The Globe and Mail URL: [link] Date: November 1, 2005 CSIS

Ottawa - The Canadian Security Intelligence Service has been giving false assurances to the government that it can guarantee the intelligence it receives from foreign agencies is not obtained by torture, a review committee said. "CSIS was not in a position to provide such an absolute assurance" and should stop saying so, the Security Intelligence Review Committee said in its report to Parliament yesterday. The issue came to light because SIRC, an independent watchdog established by Parliament, wanted to know more about the hundreds of intelligence-sharing agreements CSIS has with foreign services after U.S. allies deported Canadian Maher Arar to Syria, where he was tortured. SIRC discovered that CSIS had been telling the Department of Foreign Affairs and ministers for years that it would scrutinize the information for other countries.

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