by Monia Mazigh
But the Syrians were still refusing to give access to Maher. Was it a tactic to demonstrate that they were in charge, or was Maher’s condition so bad that they dared not let him be seen? Four months had passed since the last visit, which had been Marlene’s. Since then, there had been nothing but silence. In spite of the success of the press conference, I was terribly afraid that something dreadful had happened to Maher.
The Syrian Human Rights Committee letter on torture had set off a kind of media frenzy; overnight, it seemed, everyone wanted to talk about Maher Arar. While for months I had not been able to persuade one journalist to write a single line on Maher’s story, now the “news” of a plot targeting the American Embassy together with the torture report had generated an almost continuous flood of calls to me and to Kerry. Journalism has become just like high fashion, I said to myself. It only takes one to dare to do something different to make all the others start doing the same thing.
AUGUST 14, 2003. For once I was not teaching; I was planning to stay at home and do some housecleaning instead. The children were playing in their room. In recent weeks, I’d observed that they were becoming quite close. They were five years apart and relations between them were sometimes tense, especially since Barâa liked to talk and Houd could only babble a few words. So when I saw them playing peacefully together I would avoid disturbing them until I heard shrill voices or crying. On this particular day things were going pretty well and I had begun to clean the bathroom when the telephone rang.
It was Myra. Gar Pardy had not called me for a very long time, nor had I made an effort to call him either, ever since the plan for a letter to the Syrian minister had fallen through. I knew he was not responsible for that failure, but I no longer had much confidence in his diplomatic network. Had he realized this or was he very busy with other things? In any event, it was Myra I was talking to at the moment. She told me that the Canadian consul at Damascus, who was still Leo Martel, had finally obtained authorization to visit Maher. I thought, Oh, that means he’s still alive, at least. Myra expected to receive the consul’s report within hours and promised to send it to me at once. I thanked her and hung up.
I intended to keep cleaning the bathroom, but my mind was now elsewhere. After four months of silence, what was I going to hear? That all was well? That Maher was in excellent health? That the Syrians would give us greater visiting rights? Perhaps, but I wanted to know where he was being held, if he was going to be released, and when. With these things leaping about in my head, the loud voices of the children squabbling brought me back to reality. A few hours later, Houd had just begun his nap, Barâa was alone, happily playing in peace again, and I turned on my computer to find a message from Myra:
Monia: Further to our telecom of today … I now have the report of the visit. Maher has passed a message to you: Monia: I just miss you and the children very much. Hope to be with you soon. Maher.
He will also be allowed a lawyer of his choice at the civil court trial next week, and has asked for you to take care of his defence through family. Given his wish for not attracting adverse media publicity, he has asked for this to be done discreetly. He said that this was possible through a cousin of his father.
Gar and I will call you later today.
I didn’t know what to think. The message seemed to be written in code; I had never received anything like it. First I was being told that Maher would shortly be brought before a civil court, but without a word about the charges against him. And what was this about adverse publicity? Why should that worry him? Everything published recently in the Canadian press had been sympathetic to him, or at least neutral. Were these his words, or were the Syrians dictating them? I knew accusations of torture were the worst publicity a country could have. Was that the message I was supposed to get? And who was this lawyer Maher spoke of? I remember vaguely hearing talk in the family about a distant cousin who was a lawyer in Syria, but why would Maher want him as his lawyer? I couldn’t make sense of it; I was getting more and more upset.
At this juncture, Kerry called me on her cellphone; she was short of breath, walking fast in the street.
“Guess what? Bill Graham is giving a press conference in Toronto. I heard about it from journalists who called me. He’s going to talk about Maher.”
I told Kerry what I had just heard. I was angry. Why had Myra called me just a few hours before this press conference without telling me about it? Kerry was in a hurry and had to hang up.
“I’ll find out what Bill Graham says at his press conference and call you back,” she promised.
I wracked my brain. Why hadn’t they notified me? Were they afraid I would talk to the media before the minister did? And why hold the press conference in Toronto? The journalists who knew Maher’s file were in Ottawa, not Toronto. How could uninformed journalists ask pertinent questions and report correctly? So the Maher Arar case had become a political football and the minister wanted to score points in the wake of the torture report of the previous week.
I didn’t know what to think. Yes, I was happy to know that Maher was still alive, but no more than that because I was told nothing about his physical or mental condition or about where he was being held. And talk of a civil court in Syria, what did that mean? The unanswered questions were piling up.
The day dawned hot and humid. Since morning, I had kept the living room curtains closed in hopes of preserving some coolness in the apartment, in vain. Waiting for Kerry to call and let me know what Bill Graham had told the media, I lay down on my bed but couldn’t relax; the children were running in all directions.
Finally, she called: “The journalists tell me that Graham said Maher has not been tortured. He was well and will soon be brought before a civil court.”
So the government was dismissing the charges of torture with a wave of the hand, even though they were documented by a Syrian human rights organization. I would have loved to believe it, and could have if there had been an independent doctor present during the visit in question, or if the visit had taken place in a known location and without Maher’s Syrian jailors. But the minister had simply refuted the allegations without offering anything to support his position. It was impossible for me to believe Mr. Graham’s assurances. Originally I’d been a rather naive young woman; but the past months’ events had given me a lesson in the value of caution and clear thinking. I could see neither in what the minister had said.
Kerry suggested I talk to some of the Toronto journalists who were going to report on Bill Graham’s press conference and gave me their names and phone numbers. Bottling up my despair as best I could, I agreed, sat down at the table, and called one of them. After the first few words, I realized that the young woman knew practically nothing of the case. She wanted to have me believe that my husband was fine. After all, that was what she had heard from the minister’s mouth. I of course tried to change her mind, explaining the case so she could put things into perspective. But she persisted, and I was beginning to lose patience when suddenly there was nothing but silence at the end of the line. At the same time I heard the refrigerator motor stop. There was a power failure; that was why my cordless phone was not working. Expecting everything to return to normal soon, I waited in the living room in the darkness.
My mother turned on her little transistor radio; we quickly learned that a massive blackout had struck the entire northeastern power grid of North America. I thought back to the ice storm that had struck Quebec and parts of Ontario in January 1998. At the time, Maher and I were already living in Ottawa, but I had gone to Montreal for a few days to consult with my Ph.D. thesis director at McGill. I was staying at my parents’ with Barâa, who was ten months old. After the power went off, the apartment became colder and colder and I could no longer warm Barâa’s milk and food. We were stuck for two days like this before Maher could come and take us back to Ottawa.
What if the blackout lasted for days? I was afraid of losing all the food in the fridge. Now Barâa came to me with questions; she wa
s afraid of the dark. I went to get candles and matches that I kept in a plastic bag for emergencies and we prepared for the night in the stifling heat.
When we woke the next day the power was still off, but I left for work anyway. I wondered if the article by the journalist I’d talked to the day before had been published, curious to see how she had treated the story of the consular visit. During the morning break, I phoned Kerry, who had no power either. I told her about my conversation with the journalist and asked her if she had read her article.
“I’m going to the office. I’ll send you all today’s articles I find,” she replied.
I was very worried by the thought of Maher being brought to trial. I still had no idea of the charges against him but wanted to be prepared for the worst. It was imperative to find a lawyer as soon as possible. Putting his defence in the hands of “a cousin of his father’s” who had been long established in Syria didn’t appeal to me. Was that really Maher’s wish or his jailers’? I was determined to find a human rights lawyer in Syria who was recognized in his field and independent. I wrote an email to Saleem el-Hasan of the Syrian Human Rights Committee asking him to give me a list of names.
When I came home from work, I phoned the parliamentary office of Irwin Cotler, the MP and lawyer who had offered to defend Maher free of charge. He was not there, but I left him a message. I wanted to bring him up to date and ask for his help finding a good lawyer in Syria. I was aware that the country’s judicial system was not independent of the political authorities; everything was in the hands of the president and his circle of cronies. Even if Maher was defended by the best lawyer in the world, I knew there could be no real justice in Syria because the judges were politically influenced and even the most upright of them had their hands tied by directives from above. But that was no reason to leave him alone without a lawyer to defend him. We had to demand a public trial, and if the Syrians agreed to such a thing, I knew that Maher would be found innocent. In my mind, however, the whole court business was farcical: what were the charges, when was the trial to be held, where would it be held? I wasn’t even sure the trial would take place, but I was behaving as if it would.
That evening, when I read Kerry’s email with the articles published after Mr. Graham’s press conference, the one I was looking for was not there. I called her.
“There was only one article on the consular visit,” I said. “The reporter I was talking to just before the blackout didn’t write hers.”
Kerry burst out laughing. “So it was the hand of God that brought about the power failure! Perfect timing … !” It was something that Kerry, who was not a believer, loved to tease me about. “Don’t you see, when the power was cut that journalist was foiled, the one who didn’t know a thing about her subject but wanted to write an article anyway.” I had to smile in spite of the tension that was nearly stifling me. I appreciated Kerry’s warm-hearted humour.
Saleem el-Hassan responded with two lawyers’ names: Haytham al-Maleh and Anwar al-Bunni. The same two were recommended by Amnesty International’s London office. Irwin Cotler also confirmed that a Syrian acquaintance spoke highly of both lawyers. I read the information on the two and chose Haytham al-Maleh, who had been imprisoned in Syria for his work on free speech and his support of political prisoners. He impressed me, although I had not met him. But before phoning him, I wanted more information about the trial, and I thought Mr. Pardy would be the only one who could help me with that. I called him and he confirmed that the Syrians were preparing for a trial soon, and without hesitation agreed to meet me. I called Kerry and asked her to come along.
AUGUST 19, 2003. Ever since we’d heard that Maher would be brought before a civil court, I had not known which way to turn. My hope was that Mr. Pardy would be able to give me some pointers. I picked up Kerry at home and parked behind the Foreign Affairs building. Myra and Mr. Pardy were waiting for us. Mr. Pardy seemed to be in a good mood, which was reassuring. He began by telling me that, four days earlier, the Department of Foreign Affairs had asked the Syrian ambassador, Ahmed Arnous, to state the charges against Maher, the date of the trial, and whether Syria would grant me a visa to attend the hearings. I was very surprised by this last request, because I had never even raised the possibility myself. But this was not the time to interrupt; I kept quiet. Mr. Pardy also told me that he wanted to obtain a visa for James Lockyer, a lawyer known for his defence of people wrongly accused, so that he could attend the trial as a legal observer. The Syrian ambassador had taken note of the requests but had not yet responded.
“Why do you think the Syrians have changed their tactics and are now talking about a civil trial instead of a military tribunal?” I asked Mr. Pardy. “The president never even bothered to reply to Prime Minister Chrétien’s letter!”
“In my opinion,” he replied, “everything that’s happening now is precisely the result of the letter we sent to President al-Assad. It could very well be that, by going through the motions of a trial, the Syrians want to wash their hands of Maher’s case and release him. They may just want to save face.” My heart began to pound, then I sharply reminded myself this was probably another false hope. I pretended not to have heard and let Mr. Pardy keep talking: “On the other hand, I’m not very optimistic about your choice of lawyer. Haytham al-Maleh is not much appreciated by the Damascus regime and people there could be pretty annoyed.”
“But I never wanted a trial in Syria,” I retorted. “My husband will never be able to defend himself there, and defend himself against what, besides? The charges aren’t even known yet. With Haytham al-Maleh, I’m not taking any chances. And if the Syrians try to be really nasty, then Haytham al-Maleh is the man to see through their dirty work.”
Mr. Pardy’s tone of voice and expression changed. “We have to know what your aim is, Monia: to get your husband out of prison or to keep fighting just for the sake of fighting. If you choose the first, well, you have to go along with this trial and do it as discreetly as possible. It’s your choice.” Then, as if to change the subject, he went on to talk about James Lockyer. I didn’t know him, though I had heard of him. I knew that he had taken the defence of several prisoners and succeeded in clearing them of all suspicion and having them released. “James Lockyer is not only a very good lawyer,” Mr. Pardy continued, “but he also understands politics. The Syrians have not yet replied about his visa, but we can also discuss your trip to Syria.”
I wanted to shout no! but held back. Then I asked, “What guarantees will I have if I go to Syria?”
Mr. Pardy seemed exasperated this time. “There won’t be any. You will be with the people from the Canadian Embassy in Syria at all times, but if the Syrians want to arrest you, there’s nothing we can do about it.”
I thought at once of the children and told myself I would never be crazy enough to go and risk leaving my children alone. I would rather wait here with my children for Maher’s return, even if that might take years.
Throughout the meeting, Myra was taking notes, not saying a word.
Kerry asked Mr. Pardy: “Do you know where the last consular visit to Maher was held?”
He replied that it was held at the office of Major General Hassan Khalil, the head of military intelligence. My eyes widened; this was the first time I had heard this kind of detail.
Kerry continued, “Who was present at the visit?”
Mr. Pardy didn’t seem surprised: “General Khalil, an interpreter, two Syrian agents, and Leo Martel, the Canadian consul. The Canadian ambassador to Syria talked with General Khalil for two hours after the consular visit.”
So tongues were loosening. Immediately I asked if there were things in the report I had not been told. Myra turned to Mr. Pardy with an inquiring look as if to say: May I? Showing no expression, Mr. Pardy nodded. In a low voice, Myra read:
Arar was able to express himself freely and said the press will know the truth when he gets home and that the long detention had destroyed him mentally. He said that he was not being treat
ed any worse than the other prisoners.
In shock, I listened to words I was hearing for the first time. I glanced at Kerry; her expression had changed. I didn’t know what to do, what to think. I had been sent an incomplete report a few days earlier. Now I was getting the other part, much harsher, closer to the truth than I had ever imagined. I had nothing more to say. The trial, the lawyers, and all the rest had disappeared. Maher was suffering, I knew it. My heart had told me from the beginning, now the words Myra had just read confirmed it. Kerry and Mr. Pardy continued to talk, but I wasn’t listening, I wasn’t interested; I just wanted the meeting to end so I could talk to Kerry alone.
But there was another surprise coming: Myra told us this was the last time we would see Mr. Pardy. He would be retiring at the end of the month, to be replaced by Conrad Sigurdson.
“I’ve been working for too long,” Mr. Pardy said light-heartedly. “It’s time I took some rest.”
I didn’t say anything. It was too much to swallow all at once. Kerry and I thanked Myra, wished Mr. Pardy good luck, and left.
The meeting left a bitter taste in my mouth. I couldn’t forget what I’d heard about Maher’s mental state and about his treatment as a prisoner. Mr. Pardy could have prevented Myra from reading the original report of the consular visit, but he didn’t. Why? Was it because he was soon to retire and could soon enough wash his hands of the whole matter? Or hadn’t he been able to keep it in?
That night I couldn’t sleep. I tossed and turned in the heat of my airless bedroom. My skin felt sticky, my pillow wasn’t comfortable any more, I hated it. My life since Maher’s arrest passed before my eyes: the first meeting with Mr. Pardy, the hopes, the doubts, and the disappointments, Marlene’s visit to Syria, the letter that was never authorized by the RCMP and Canadian intelligence services, the letter from Jean Chrétien … and now the civil trial that was fast approaching and could either be the key to Maher’s release – or the trap that would mean he would never come home.
