Man held in Toronto handed to FBI - Passenger diverted to Pearson carried suspicious photograph

Toronto - A man who was questioned by Canadian authorities in connection with last week's terrorist attacks was handed over to U.S. officials Sunday.

The man was travelling on a U.S.-bound flight that was diverted to Toronto's Pearson International Airport after hijackers commandeered and crashed four airplanes in the United States on Tuesday, killing thousands of people.

"This individual was of interest following his arrival in Toronto, obviously, because found in his possession were materials of interest," said Sergeant Greg Peters, an RCMP spokesman.

Law-enforcement sources told The Globe and Mail last week the man had a photo of himself in a flight-crew uniform against a fake backdrop of the World Trade Center — one of last week's targets — and aviation paraphernalia. The unidentified man, said to be in his mid-20s, had a Palestinian Authority travel document and a visa to enter the United States.

Canadian immigration officials detained him and he was questioned by the RCMP and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service in connection with the hijackings. Sgt. Peters said Sunday that the man was escorted to an Ontario-U.S. border point by RCMP and Citizenship and Immigration Canada officials and immediately taken into custody by U.S. Immigration officials. He said the FBI planned to question the man and is the lead agency in the case.

FBI special agent Paul Moskal said the man is one of several people intercepted by Canadian authorities in recent days who are of interest to his organization. Some have already been questioned.

"Obviously, we're looking for any information that people may have with regard to those terrorist acts," he said from Buffalo, N.Y.

Huguette Shouldice, a spokeswoman for the Canadian Immigration Department, said people who are subject to a pending exclusion or deportation order can voluntarily be sent to a country of their choice, as long as that country agrees to accept them.

"This person in this case voluntarily agreed to leave and asked to leave and go to the United States. The United States have agreed that he can go there," she said.

Sources told The Globe and Mail that, like the other passengers of 19 U.S.-bound flights diverted to Pearson in the hours after Tuesday's strikes, the man underwent the usual customs and immigration procedures.

They said he was not carrying a visa to enter Canada, but would not have been expected to because his stated destination was in the eastern United States. Further, they said the man was inexplicably delayed from arriving at his destination days before the attacks.

As well, they said the photo and other suspicious items were discovered during a secondary immigration examination and search. The man identified himself as an aircraft maintenance engineer working at Gaza airport.

He was detained on the grounds that he was inadmissible to Canada and was issued a standard removal order.

Sources also told The Globe last week that two other men, believed to be Saudi Arabian and Palestinian, were arrested at Pearson airport and questioned. One or more were headed for Raleigh, N.C. It was unknown whether they were connected to the U.S. attacks.

Sgt. Peters would not comment on reports that a second man is being held in a detention centre in Thorold, Ont., near St. Catharines, on immigration grounds.

The RCMP, along with other Canadian police forces, are continuing their investigation to determine whether any of the people responsible for the U.S. strikes had ties to Canada. Sgt. Peters said none have been uncovered.

"To date, there is no Canadian connection to these tragic events that took place in the United States," he said.

In the days after last Tuesday's attacks, U.S. law-enforcement sources told American media outlets they believed some of the hijackers had travelled to the United States through Canada.

More than 600 calls have been made to an RCMP tip line since its activation Friday. Sgt. Peters said all leads are being pursued and relevant information is being passed to U.S. authorities.

The perpetrators of the assaults are believed to have been part of a massive multicountry underground network led by Saudi millionaire Osama bin Laden, who is thought to be in exile in Afghanistan.

I agree that Canada has a real problem with terrorist organizations using Canada as a safe haven and a base of operations.

So, I submit, does the United States.

The problem is that both countries are pluralistic heterogenous, open societies with a respect for procedural rights, including the procedural rights of aliens found within our domains. Also, both countries have civil services that are infected with political rectitude that makes them extremely reluctant to deal vigourously with those illegally resident aliens who are visible minorities.

But there is no evidence to date, and Canada has looked long and hard, that any of those involved in this attack came through Canada or used Canada for any planning or staging purpose.

Canada has tracked down any lead provided by the United States and has mounted its own police and security investigations. Remember that Canadian police forces are as well integrated into the US police spectrum as is any US police agency.

On the other hand, there is evidence that some of these terrorists have:
- taken out US pilot licences after training at US flight schools,
- Used US residences or Saudi post office boxes as their residences on their US pilot licences,
- Paid personally for time on jet aircraft flight simulators without any apparent connection to any airline, foreign or domestic,
- Rented automobiles and travelled up and down the Eastern Seaboard in them,
- Travelled by airline back and forth between Germany and the US.
- Remained at large using their own names despite the existance of Federal BOLOs,

None of which can be attributed to Canada.

I have been highly critical of my own government for pusillanimity in deporting illegals when they are visible minorities, and the RCMP and CSIS for incompetence in tracking illegals who are under deportation orders.

We both have a problem, and if we are to maintain the easy relationship that Canadians and Americans have with each other, we need a uniform continental immigration and naturalization policy with tribunals that follow common rules and practices, both at first instance and at all appellate levels.

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