Source: CTV News
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Date: April 25, 2012
[PHOTO: Mohamed Harkat is shown as he leaves Canada Border Services Agency after receiving his deportation papers in Ottawa Friday Jan. 21, 2011.]
Both the federal government and suspected terrorist Mohamed Harkat can claim partial victories, after the Federal Court of Appeal issued a complex ruling Wednesday on the process that placed Harkat under a security certificate.
In its ruling, the court upheld the constitutionality of the government's security certificate process.
However, it referred Harkat's case for a new hearing because the Ottawa man was not privy to the full contents of recorded evidence used against him. Those recordings have since been destroyed in keeping with policy of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service.
The court said only the recorded conversations that Harkat was privy to may be used as evidence.
The court also ruled that it was wrong for Harkat's trial judge to create a special "class privilege" for CSIS informers that guaranteed them rights to confidentiality and anonymity similar to police informants.
The Ottawa gas station attendant and pizza delivery man was arrested in December 2002 on accusations that he had affiliation with al Qaeda, allegations he denies.
His lawyers have also been fighting a deportation order to Harkat's native Algeria.
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