Regular contributors:
Alex Neve is a lawyer, with a Masters Degree in International Human Rights Law from the University of Essex in the United Kingdom. He has served as Secretary General of Amnesty International Canada’s English branch since 2000. In that role he has carried out numerous human rights research missions throughout Africa and Latin America as well as within Canada. He speaks to audiences across the country, appears regularly before parliamentary committees and is a frequent commentator in the media. Alex has held other positions with Amnesty International as well, both nationally and internationally. He has also served as a member of the Immigration and Refugee Board, taught at Osgoode Hall Law School, been affiliated with York University’s Centre for Refugee Studies, and worked as a refugee lawyer in private practice and in a community legal aid clinic. He is an Officer of the Order of Canada and has received an honorary Doctorate of Laws degree from the University of New Brunswick. Above all else Alex passionately believes in a world in which the human rights of all people are protected, equally.
Fred A. Reed is the author of many award-winning books. He is also a respected specialist on politics and religion in the Middle East. After several years as a librarian and trade union activist at the Montreal Gazette, Reed began reporting from Islamic Iran in 1984, visiting the Islamic Republic thirty times since then. He has also reported extensively on Middle Eastern affairs for La Presse, CBC Radio-Canada and Le Devoir. A three-time winner of the Governor General’s Award for translation, plus a nomination in 2009 for his translation of Thierry Hentsch’s Le temps aboli, Empire of Desire, Reed has translated works by many of Quebec’s leading authors, several in collaboration with novelist David Homel, as well as by Nikos Kazantzakis and other modern Greek writers.
Gar Pardy is a son of the Rock and his early education was in Norris Arm and Gander. He first worked for the Meteorological Service of Canada in Gander, Goose Bay and then Frobisher Bay. Following a honours degree from Acadia University and a Master’s from McMaster, he joined the Canadian Foreign Service in 1967. He served in India, Kenya, the United States and Central America where he was Ambassador to Costa Rica, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama. From 1992 to 2003 he was head of the Canadian Consular Service. He retired in 2003 and since has been a commentator and writer on issues of Canadian foreign and public policy. He appears regularly in the Ottawa Citizen, the Embassy and on CBC, CTV, Global, CBS, CPAC. He lives in Ottawa.
Jeff Sallot joined the faculty of the Carleton University School of Journalism and Communication 2007 after a long reporting career at The Globe and Mail. He’s been the Globe’s bureau chief in Moscow, Ottawa and Edmonton, the lead political correspondent for the Globe’s website during federal elections, and has reported from every corner of Canada, and from more than 30 foreign countries. A graduate of the Kent State University journalism school, he shared a Pulitzer Prize with colleagues at The Akron Beacon-Journal for his eyewitness coverage of the massacre of four Kent State students by the Ohio National Guard during an anti-war demonstration.His coverage of RCMP security service scandals in Quebec for the Globe resulted in the publication of his book on police corruption. Sallot was the Globe’s diplomatic and security correspondent, based in Ottawa, from 1992 until he joined the Carleton faculty.
Lisa Hajjar teaches sociology at the University of California – Santa Barbara. Her research and writing focus on law and legality, war and conflict, human rights, and torture. She is the author of Courting Conflict: The Israeli Military Court System in the West Bank and Gaza (University of California Press, 2005). In addition to being a Co-Editor at Jadaliyya, she serves on the editorial committees of Middle East Report and Journal of Palestine Studies. She is currently working on a book about anti-torture lawyering in the United States.
Maher Arar is an award-winning human rights activist and is a frequent speaker at national security related events. He recently founded Prism (www.prism-magazine.com), an online not-for-profit magazine that focuses on the in-depth coverage and analysis of national security related issues. Maher’s persistent and disciplined struggle has garnered him multiple recognitions and awards. TIME magazine chose Maher as the “Canadian Newsmaker of the Year” for 2004, and in 2007, the same magazine named him to the TIME 100, its annual listing of 100 most influential people in the world. He was also named “The Nation Builder” by the Globe and Mail for the year 2006. Maher is a frequent contributor to public discussion on matters related to national security. His commentary appears in publications such as The Globe and Mail, The Guardian, The Huffington Post, The Ottawa Citizen and others.
Martin Aquilina is an international business lawyer who has special interest in human rights, culture and international law. He is currently a partner with Gowlings LLP, one of Canada’s largest law firms. Martin is an alumnus of the University of Ottawa where he obtained a Bachelor in Commerce and a Bachelor in Law. He also holds a certificate in Italian language from the Università per Stranieri di Perugia and a Master’s degree in international and comparative law from the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen, Netherlands where he authored a thesis on international and European cultural rights. Before working in private practice, Martin held positions at the Supreme Court of Canada, Correctional Services Canada and with MD Management Limited, the financial services arm of the Canadian Medical Association, where he headed the legal department. Martin was called to the Bar in the provinces of Ontario (1999) and Québec (1993) and is well versed in both the civil law and common law legal systems of Canada. He is fluent in French, English and Italian and knowledgeable in three other languages. When he is not reading or writing, Martin enjoys the company of his beautiful wife and daughter who live with him in Ottawa.
Sarah Boyd obtained her Bachelor of Laws (LL.B) from Osgoode Hall Law School, and joined Jackman & Associates after articling under Lorne Waldman at Waldman & Associates. She practices in the areas of immigration and refugee law, with a particular focus on cases with security implications, as well as inadmissibility for reasons of criminality or national security. She is also experienced in the areas of international criminal and international humanitarian law.
Sherry Wasilow is a doctoral candidate in communication at Carleton University and a science writer for Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research. She has a Master of Arts in journalism from The University of Texas at Austin, a Graduate Diploma in journalism from Concordia University (Montreal), and a Bachelor of Arts in political science from the University of Calgary. Her current and future research interests include past and present conflict journalism – with a particular focus on the media’s role in the war in Afghanistan – as well as technology’s impact on the nature of journalism, religion and politics, women and children’s rights, and national-security versus right-to-know issues. Sherry’s work has appeared in academic, policy, and journalistic venues, including the Journal of the American Pharmacists Association, the Betty Ford Newsletter, Texas Department of Health policy briefs, The Austin Chronicle, and the Ottawa Citizen.
Reg Whitaker is Distinguished Research Professor Emeritus at York University, and Adjunct Professor of Political Science at the University of Victoria. He has published extensively about Canadian politics; security, intelligence, and politics of information issues. He is the author of a number of books, among them The End of Privacy: How Total Surveillance is Becoming a Reality, which has also appeared in French, Spanish, German, and Korean editions; Cold War Canada: the Making of a National Insecurity State; Double Standard: the Secret History of Canadian Immigration, and The Government Party: Organizing and Financing the Liberal Party of Canada, 1930-1958. He was an adviser to Justice Dennis O’Connor on the Maher Arar inquiry. He chaired an advisory panel on aviation security that reported to Parliament in 2006 and reported to the Air India inquiry on the aviation security aspects of the 1985 terrorist attack. He has recently co-authored a study on ‘Accountability in and for national security’ for the Institute for Research in Public Policy.
William Fisher has managed economic development programs for the U.S. State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development in the Middle East, North Africa, Latin America, Asia and elsewhere for the past 25 years. He has supervised major multi-year projects for AID in Egypt, where he lived and worked for three years. He returned later with his team to design Egypt’s agricultural strategy. Fisher served in the international affairs area in the administration of President John F. Kennedy. He began his working life as a reporter and bureau chief for the Daytona Beach News-Journal and the Associated Press in Florida. He now reports on a wide-range of issues for a number of online journals.
Yahya Abdul Rahman is a longtime human rights and social justice activist. He is an active blogger and over the years has successfully maintained several news websites and has written on a variety of topics related to human rights and the erosion of civil liberties. His op-eds have appeared in numerous publications. He has received numerous community awards for his writing contributions. He is also an active member of Muslims for Progressive Values — Canada. Yahya possesses a degree in Political Science from the University of New Brunswick and an English Literature degree from the University of Ottawa. Since 2005 he has lived in Ottawa, Canada.
Guest contributors:
David Cole is a professor at Georgetown University Law Center, a volunteer attorney for the Center for Constitutional Rights, the legal affairs correspondent for The Nation, and a regular contributor to the New York Review of Books. He is the author of six books, most recently, The Torture Memos: Rationalizing the Unthinkable (The New Press, 2009). He has litigated many constitutional cases, and, with the Center for Constitutional Rights, represents Maher Arar in his lawsuit against the federal officials responsible for sending him to Syria to be tortured.
Faisal Kutty is a Toronto-based lawyer, human rights activist and academic. He is currently an adjunct professor at Osgoode Hall Law School of York University and a visiting assistant professor at Valparaiso University School of Law in Indiana. He is general counsel for the Canadian Muslim Civil Liberties Association (CMCLA) and formerly served as the vice-chair and legal counsel to the Canadian Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR-CAN). He holds an LL.B. from the University of Ottawa, and an LL.M. from Osgoode, where he is currently a Ph.D. candidate. His dissertation explores the impact of anti-terror laws and policies on the rule of law. He has acted for a number of charities and individuals caught up in national security investigations. He also served as counsel to CAIR-CAN and the CMCLA at the Iacobucci and Air India Inquiries. In 2007, he filed submissions on the No-Fly List to Transport Canada on behalf of more than two-dozen organizations.
Gary Botting, a barrister, solicitor and appellate lawyer, has practiced law in British Columbia for more than 20 years, representing clients primarily in the legal areas of extradition,criminal defence, and criminal appeals. He has worked on many high-profile extradition cases over the years, including the Charles Ng case in Calgary, the Gerald Gervasoni and Ronald Stewart cases in Victoria, the Karlheinz Schreiber case in Ottawa and Toronto, and the Clifford Edwards case in Vancouver BC — all of which set legal precedents. As the author of several books on extradition and constitutional rights and freedoms, including Extradition Between Canada and the United States, Canadian Extradition Law Practice, and Wrongful Conviction in Canadian Law, he is considered one of Canada’s foremost authorities on extradition law.
Julia Hall is a human rights lawyer and Amnesty International’s expert on counter-terrorism and human rights in Europe in the organization’s international secretariat in London, England. She has conducted extensive research and advocacy in a number of areas, including: the prohibition against torture; unlawful (“extraordinary”) rendition; the nonrefoulement obligation; the use of diplomatic assurances; administrative and preventive detention; oversight of intelligence agencies; the use of control orders; and unfair trial procedures, including the use of special advocates and secret evidence. Hall was senior legal counsel in the Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism Program at Human Rights Watch from 1996-2009. She has authored numerous reports, articles, and amicus briefs on a range of counterterrorism topics; conducted sustained advocacy at UN, Council of Europe, European Union, and national levels; and served as an expert in individual cases before UN treaty-bodies, the European Court of Human Rights, the UK Special Immigration Appeals Commission, the Commission of Inquiry into the Actions of Canadian Officials in Relation to Maher Arar, and in US federal court. In July 2008, she monitored the military commission of Salim Hamdan, Osama bin Laden’s former driver, at Guantanamo Bay. Hall is a member of the International Bar Association’s Terrorism Task Force.
Margaret Satterthwaite co-directs the International Human Rights Clinic and is one of the Faculty Directors of the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice (CHRGJ) at New York University School of Law. Her research and advocacy focuses on the human rights impacts of terrorism and counter-terrorism, and on economic and social rights. Professor Satterthwaite has worked for a variety of human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, Human Rights First, and the Commission de Verité et de Justice (Haitian Truth and Justice Commission) and has authored or co-authored more than ten human rights reports. She has engaged in human rights work in countries such as Haiti, Nigeria, Northern Ireland, the United States, and Yemen. She serves on the Advisory Panel of Experts to the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Protecting Human Rights While Countering Terrorism (Prof. Martin Scheinin) and the National Security Task Force of the New York City Bar Association.
Maureen Webb is a human rights lawyer and author of the book, Illusions of Security: Global Surveillance and Democracy in the Post 9-11 World (San Francisco: City Lights, 2007). She was a litigator for some of Canada’s first Charter cases, including the landmark Lavigne case and a case challenging the powers of the newly instituted Canadian Security Intelligence Service. In 2001 she was a Fellow at Columbia University’s Human Rights Institute. She has served as Co Chair of the International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group and is currently a Director of Lawyers’ Rights Watch Canada. Maureen has spoken about security issues across Canada and the United States in the media, in policy forums, at universities and before Parliamentary committees. She was an advisor to Members of Parliament on the review of the Canadian Anti-terrorism Act and the revision of the security certificate regime. Her article on the Anti-terrorism Act was cited extensively in the judgment (R. v. Khawaja) striking down the definition of ‘terrorism’ on constitutional grounds.
Mike Larsen is an Instructor in the Department of Criminology at Kwantlen Polytechnic University, and Co-Managing Editor of the Journal of Prisoners on Prisons, a prisoner-authored peer-reviewed journal dedicated to experiential narratives and analysis related to spaces and practices of incarceration. His current research deals with Canadian national security practices, particularly as they involve the deprivation of liberty and contestations around government secrecy, public accountability, and the right to know. His current work focuses on the Canadian security certificate regime, with an emphasis on practices of detention and surveillance, and makes extensive use of access to information requests.
Monia Mazigh is an author and a human rights activist. She was catapulted onto the public stage in 2002 when her husband Maher Arar, was deported to Syria where he was tortured and held without charge for over a year. During that time, she campaigned vigorously for her husband’s release and later fought to re-establish his reputation. Monia Mazigh has since authored a new book called Hope and Despair which documents her ordeal after her husband was arrested and how she campaigned to clear his name. Monia is a frequent speaker at national security related events and has since become a passionate advocate for the rights of individuals who are detained under unfair laws such as the security certificate system that has been used by the Canadian government to detain five Muslim men without due process. She has authored various op-eds that appeared in various newspapers and web sites such as the Ottawa Citizen, Le Devoir, rabble.ca. Monia presently lives in Ottawa with her husband and two children and has recently published her second book “Mirroirs et mirages”.
Nathalie Des Rosiers has been General Counsel of Canadian Civil Liberties Association and Executive Director of the Canadian Civil Liberties Education Trust since July 1, 2009. She was previously Acting Vice President – Governance of the University of Ottawa. She was Dean of the Civil Law Section of the University of Ottawa’s Faculty of Law from 2004 to 2008. She obtained an LL.B. from Université de Montréal in 1981, an LL.M. from Harvard University in 1984, and an honorary doctorate from the Law Society of Upper Canada in 2004. She became a member of the Québec Bar in 1982 and of the Law Society of Upper Canada in 1987. Nathalie was president of the Law Commission of Canada from 2000 to 2004. From 1987 to 2000, she was a member of the University of Western Ontario’s Faculty of Law. She served as law clerk to Supreme Court of Canada Justice Julien Chouinard from 1982 to 1983 and then worked in private practice until 1987. She is the past President of the Canadian Federation of Social Sciences and Humanities, Canadian Council of Law Deans, of the Association des juristes d’expression française de l’Ontario (AJEFO), and the Canadian Association of Law Teachers. She was a member of the Environmental Appeal Board from 1988 to 2000 and a member of the Ontario Law Reform Commission from 1993 to 1996. She received the Médaille de l’Université Paris X in 2007, the Association of Professional Executives of the Public Service of Canada (APEX) Partnership Award in 2004, the Medal of the Law Society of Upper Canada in 1999, and the Order of Merit from AJEFO in 2000.
Paul Cavalluzzo is a leading constitutional, labour and administrative law lawyer, arguing significant cases before the Supreme Court of Canada, the Courts of Ontario, and labour and administrative tribunals. Paul was appointed by Associate Chief Justice Dennis O’Connor to act as lead commission counsel to the Commission of Inquiry into the Actions of Canadian Officials in Relation to Maher Arar. Previously, Paul acted as lead commission counsel in the Walkerton Inquiry. In this role, Paul was responsible for ensuring all necessary evidence was brought forward to determine the cause of the May, 2000 e coli water supply crisis.Paul has also recently acted for parties before other public inquiries such as the Air India Inquiry and the Inquiry into Pediatric Forensic Pathology in Ontario. More recently, Paul has been appointed by the Federal Minister of Justice to act as a Special Advocate in security certificate cases. In this regard, Paul acts as counsel representing the interests of persons alleged to be threats to the national security of Canada in top secret hearings before the Federal Court of Canada in Ottawa. Paul’s role is to ensure that the top secret evidence relied upon by the government is reliable and that as much information as possible is released to the named person so that he is given an opportunity to defend against the allegations. Paul is presently acting in two security certificate cases which have been ongoing since February 2008.
Peter Leuprecht received his Doctor of Law from the University of Innsbruck (Austria), and brings with him impressive experience in law, security, and government, both internationally as well as within Canada. Leuprecht has worked in academic institutions that include the Universities of Strasbourg and Nancy (France) and the European Academy of Law in Florence (Italy), and has held senior positions in the Council of Europe. Author of numerous publications in the field of international law and human rights, Leuprecht was the 1997-1999 Visiting Professor at the Faculty of Law of McGill University and at the Département des Sciences juridiques de l’Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM). Leuprecht went on to become Dean of the Faculty of Law of McGill University, Professor of Public and International Law at the Département des Sciences juridiques of UQAM, and Director of the Montreal Institute of International Studies. Peter was awarded the “Prix du Civisme Européen” in 1991, and received the Human Rights Award of the Lord Reading Law Society in 2001. From 2000 to 2005 he acted as Special Representative of the Secretary-General of the UN for human rights in Cambodia.
Warren Allmand is lawyer and human rights consultant, served as an M.P. for 31 years (1965- 97). From 1972 to 1979 served as Solicitor General, Minister of Indian and Northern Affairs, and Minister of Consumer Affairs in the Trudeau Government. He was President of Rights & Democracy (ICHRDD) from 1997 to 2002. Between 2002 and 2005 Lecturer in International Human Rights McGill University. He was elected as a City Councillor for the City of Montreal in 2005 and served until Nov. 2009. He is now the President of the World Federalist Movement – Canada, and is associated with the International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group, the Kairos Indigenous Rights Commission, Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East, and Canadem.
