Abousfian Abdelrazik makes his way to federal court in Ottawa, on Oct. 30.Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press
Canada faced an impossible situation helping a Montreal man return to this country from Sudan because the U.S. had placed him on a terrorist no-fly list, a former senior foreign-affairs official says.
In testimony in Federal Court on Wednesday, James Wright conceded that there were insurmountable challenges to bringing Abousfian Abdelrazik, a Canadian citizen, home after he was detained in 2003 while on his way to visit his ailing mother in the northeast African country.
Mr. Abdelrazik would end up spending 2003 to 2009 in Sudan, a period of time in which he was incarcerated twice. He was under a cloud of suspicion because the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) suspected that he was involved in Islamic extremism in Canada and was a threat to Canadian security.
Mr. Abdelrazik, 62, is suing the federal government for $27-million. He alleges that he was abandoned in Sudan, where he says he was tortured by authorities.
Mr. Wright, who served as an assistant deputy minister at the Foreign Affairs department, said that department efforts to get him home on a commercial flight were blocked.
“In a post-911 world, it was not realistic to think that airlines, commercial airlines were going to carry Mr. Abdelrazik,” said Mr. Wright.
“The reality that Mr. Abdelrazik lived for an extended period of time is that it was virtually impossible for us to facilitate his return to Canada.”
He said the issue in the case was not Canadian actions, but decisions taken by the U.S. government to impose a no-fly list in respect to Mr. Abdelrazik.
Mr. Wright noted that consular officials tried, but failed, to arrange flights home with Air Canada and Lufthansa.
He said he was well aware of Sudan’s human-rights record. “We knew that Sudan was a failed state that did not respect the norms we take for granted here in Canada.”
Born in Sudan, Mr. Abdelrazik became a Canadian citizen in 1995. While living in Montreal, he was subjected to investigation by CSIS and was interviewed, while in Sudanese custody, by its agents.
Mr. Wright said Foreign Affairs and the mission in the Sudanese capital of Khartoum kept trying to help Mr. Abdelrazik.
For example, while he was detained, Foreign Affairs kept asking Sudanese officials to release Mr. Abdelrazik if they were not going to charge him.
Mr. Wright, now retired, said he was involved in the file until 2006. He said he never recommended to the Foreign Affairs minister that they should try to assist Mr. Abdelrazik, although he said that notes were sent to the minister’s office to keep them up to date on the matter.
“I do not recall going to our foreign minister to say, ‘We need you to be involved on this particular file,’ ” he said.
Asked why he didn’t act, he said the department thought it was doing the best it could for Mr. Abdelrazik.
He said the Foreign Affairs department was open to getting Mr. Abdelrazik back to Canada, and looked at different options for accomplishing that goal. “My recollection is they were not successful,” he said.