(Ottawa) The Supreme Court will not hear the case of four Canadians detained in Syria who argue that Ottawa has a legal obligation to help them return home.
The mother of one of the men said after the ruling that she was not ready to give up, but added that it was difficult to remain hopeful.
The Canadians are among many foreign nationals held in dilapidated prisons run in northern Syria by Kurdish forces, who recaptured the civil war-ravaged region from the Islamic State armed group.
The four men asked the Supreme Court to hear their challenge to a decision by the Federal Court of Appeal, rendered in May, which concluded that Ottawa was not obliged, under the law, to repatriate them.
Among them: Jack Letts, who became a devout Muslim as a teenager, went on vacation to Jordan, then studied in Kuwait before ending up in Syria. The identities of the other three Canadians are not made public.
As usual, the court gave no reason Thursday for refusing to hear the case.
In a motion filed with the country’s highest court, lawyers for the four men argued that Ottawa was “choosing” Canadians to help get out of a hellish situation.
They argued that the four men’s foreign jailers would release them if Canada requested it and facilitated their repatriation, as it had done for some Canadian women and children who returned to the country.
The four men have been arbitrarily detained for several years without charge or trial, the lawyers said in their brief submitted to the country’s highest court.
“They are imprisoned in extremely crowded and unsanitary conditions, and at least one Canadian is held with 30 other men in a cell built for six people. They lack adequate food and medical care, and one of the applicants reported to Canadian government officials that he had been tortured. »
Last January, the four men won a first instance battle in their long fight. Federal Court Justice Henry Brown ordered Ottawa to request their repatriation as soon as reasonably possible and to urgently provide them with passports or travel documents.
Justice Brown also ruled that the men had the right to have a representative of the federal government travel to Syria to assist in their release once the captors agreed to hand them over to Canadian authorities.
The Canadian government then argued that Justice Brown wrongly confused the right recognized for citizens by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms to enter Canada with the right to return to the country, thus creating a new right for citizens to be brought home by the government.
The Federal Court of Appeal agreed with this argument, saying that Justice Brown’s interpretation “requires the Government of Canada to take positive, even risky, steps, including steps abroad,” to facilitate the right of men to enter Canada.
The appeal judges concluded that even if the government was not obligated by the Constitution or the law to repatriate these men, their decision “should not deter the Government of Canada from making efforts on its own to obtain this result “.
“Not the same rights as everyone else”
Sally Lane, Mr Letts’ mother, said in August that her son was “barely holding on”. She then argued that “he and other Canadian nationals had to endure what no human being should ever have to endure.”
On Thursday, she expressed her frustration.
“Global Affairs Canada will not meet with me. My own MP will not listen to me. And now the Supreme Court has told me and other families that we don’t have the same rights as everyone else,” Ms.me Lane in a statement, released by the group Ending Canada’s Participation in Torture.
By refusing to hear this case, the Court essentially declared that it was acceptable for Canada to engage in illegal practices of exile, indefinite arbitrary detention and torture, added Ms.me Lane.
“We are not giving up, but today it is difficult to maintain hope when my son and other men and other women and children who remain detained are told that their lives have no meaning. importance. »
Lawyers for the four men submitted to the Supreme Court that it had the opportunity to decide whether Canada had a duty under the Charter to help Canadians abroad when they face clear violations. flagrant violations of human rights.
In its own filing with the Supreme Court, the Canadian government asserted that no one disputed that the men faced deplorable conditions. But if they cannot enter Canada, it is because they are imprisoned abroad by foreign kidnappers, argued the government.
“The Federal Court of Appeal applied established principles of law and interpretation of the Charter to undisputed findings of fact,” the government says.
“Particularly where Canada does not participate in the detention of a Canadian citizen in a foreign country, there can be no obligation on Canada, under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, to secure his or her release and to proceed with its repatriation. »
The court’s decision sends a dangerous message that the Canadian government can simply abandon citizens indefinitely, without due process, in prisons rife with disease and death, said Farida Deif, director of the Canadian portion of Human Rights Watch.
“But the Trudeau government does not need a court decision to bring these Canadians home, it simply must muster the courage and political will to save their lives before it is too late,” he said. -she said Thursday, in a press release.
“It is high time that Canada takes the urgent steps necessary to repatriate all Canadian citizens still detained in northeastern Syria, in inhumane and degrading conditions, regardless of gender or age. Once home, adults may be monitored or prosecuted, if appropriate. »