[JURIST] The son of late Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau [Wikipedia profile], the architect of Canada's civil rights charter, denounced the Canadian government's controversial use of security certificates [official backgrounder] to indefinitely detain uncharged terror suspects in a court hearing Tuesday. Alexandre "Sasha" Trudeau [Wikipedia profile] took the witness stand in Federal Court on behalf of Hassan Almrei [CBC profile], a Syrian national with alleged links to al-Qaeda. Trudeau had offered to be one of several people who would voluntarily accompany Almrei if he were granted bail and left his home at any point, and told a prosecutor that "It's in the interest of Canada to not be detaining people who haven't been charged." Canada's security certificate policy has also been criticized by the UN and Amnesty International [AI call for reform] as a violation of fundamental human rights. Almrei, who has been held in solitary confinement for four years in Toronto, argues that he must not sent back to Syria because he will face torture. Canadian Press has more.
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