Governments make mistakes. Our government made a mistake in telling the United States that Maher Arar was a security threat. Does history repeat itself? Are those individuals subjected to Canada's immigration "security certificates," for example, true security threats, or victims of misplaced suspicions? Only a handful of people can answer this question, because only a handful see the information the government says justifies its concerns. Indeed, even those against whom the certificates have been issued are left to meet an unknown case against them. If they fail to do so, they will be removed from Canada, possibly even to countries that might torture them. If they fight this fate, they are detained or subjected to stringent conditions that may last a lifetime. A year ago, the Supreme Court said this system is unconstitutional in its operation but did not reject the concept as a whole. The fix, for the court, is some approach that gives us more hope that the government's evidence is being carefully probed. Parliament was given a year - until Feb. 23 - to devise this system.

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