Canadian Court slams release of "Ocean Lady" migrant

The Federal Court of Canada has rebuked the Immigration and Refugee Board for putting the rights of a foreign national being investigated for possible links to a terrorist group above the protection of Canadians.

The sternly worded court ruling overturns the IRB's release of one of 76 Tamil migrants fleeing the Sri Lankan war who arrived off the West Coast in October aboard the "Ocean Lady" before the government could finish investigating any links to the Tigers, saying the IRB "effectively usurped" the government's role of probing security threats."While the importance of not unduly detaining such persons cannot be forgotten, the protection of Canadians and Canada's pressing interest in securing its borders are also worthy considerations," wrote Justice Robert L. Barnes in his ruling released this week.

While the government cannot use the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA) to detain a foreign national indefinitely, "it is entitled to a reasonable time to complete its admissibility investigation," he wrote.

The case assessed for the first time the power of the IRB to dismiss government suspicion of migrants for security reasons and found it was "misconstruing the scope of its authority."

The migrant, who cannot be identified by order of the court, was among those found aboard a ship intercepted off the coast of Vancouver Island on Oct. 17. All were detained under IRPA until their admissibility to Canada was determined - particularly while the Government investigated if any are members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), an outlawed terrorist group under Canadian law.At a detention review on Nov. 5, an adjudicator for the IRB agreed his detention was justified while the investigation was under way.

Another detention hearing, as required by law, was convened on Dec. 9, at which IRB adjudicator Otto Nupponen ordered the man's release.Mr. Nupponen accepted the government's evidence that the "Ocean Lady" was, in fact, a ship named Princess Easwary that "possibly was an LTTE-controlled ship;" that there were likely "several" LTTE members among the passengers; "traces of several explosives" had been found on board; and the clothing of two passengers also tested positive for explosives.

(National Post, Canada)