Abdelrazik: Sudan vs. Canada

Now I will admit that I am not an expert on Sudan. I don't know much about its history, its human rights record or the culture of its people. I've just always been given this vague sense that your average de-colonialized African nation is slightly more chaotic and slightly less observant of human rights than my own country.

I guess I was wrong. Not only has my government not done anything to get Omar Khadr out of Gitmo. Not only did it acquiesce to Maher Arar's torture in Syria. Our government (two governments in a row) have upset the Sudanese by disregarding human rights.

Go here and read the timeline at the bottom of the page.

Sept 28, 2004. Abousfian Abdelrazik is being held in a Sudanese jail, at Canada's request, and a Sudanese official doesn't like it:

He repeated there was nothing against him in Sudan, stressing those last two words. He said Sudan realized however that keeping an innocent man in detention was a human-rights violation ... He thought that protest and public attention would impact adversely on both our countries ... He said he was convinced Canada could deal with this airline ban if it wanted to.

Sudan later offers to fly Abdelrazik home to Canada, but Canada apparently thwarts that too.

Doesn't anyone find it offensive that other countries are having to remind and teach Canada about human rights?

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