In recent years, Ali Omar Ader, a 38-year-old, self-described freelance
journalist in the Somali capital of Mogadishu, had launched a publishing house
that he said he wanted to turn into a think tank studying the Horn of
Africa.
Unbeknownst to him, during that time he was the target of a complex
investigation by Canadian police that involved wiretaps, surveillance and
undercover agents.
On Thursday night, while Mr. Ader was in Ottawa, the RCMP arrested him on
allegations that he was involved in the kidnapping of Amanda Lindhout, the
Canadian freelance journalist who was held hostage for 15 months in Somalia.
“He was one of the main negotiators within the group involved in this,” RCMP
Assistant Commissioner James Malizia told reporters in Ottawa on Friday.
He said Mr. Ader is a Somali citizen and not a resident of Canada.
One of Ms. Lindhout’s former fixers in Somalia said he recognized the
man.
Abdifatah Mohammed Elmi was travelling with Ms. Lindhout and Australian
photographer Nigel Brennan when they were abducted off a road outside Mogadishu
in August, 2008.
Mr. Elmi and two other Somalis were kept in a separate room from the two
foreigners and were released a few months later. Ms. Lindhout and Mr. Brennan
were released in November, 2009
Mr. Elmi alleges that Mr. Ader was present and sometimes even joined in when
the captors would beat their Somali captives.
“I’m feeling very happy tonight,” Mr. Elmi said when reached by telephone in
Somalia.
Some of the kidnappers covered their faces, but Mr. Ader didn’t, Mr. Elmi
said.
In his social-media accounts, Mr. Ader describes himself as an author and
head of a publishing house in Mogadishu.
During the period when Ms. Lindhout and Mr. Brennan were in captivity, Mr.
Ader said he was a “Web innovator” for the Islamic Courts Union, then
self-employed.
Among the accounts he followed on Twitter were the pages for two tourism
agencies, Destination Canada and the Canadian Tourism Commission.
Samir Adam, a lawyer representing Mr. Ader, said his client was arrested in
Ottawa on Thursday night.
Mr. Ader made a very brief court appearance via video link on Friday as his
lawyer asked for the arraignment to be put on hold for a week.
He was charged under the Criminal Code with hostage-taking.
Assistant Commissioner Malizia said Mr. Ader was in Canada “for a few days”
when he was placed under arrest. He would not say how Mr. Ader came to
Canada.
A lengthy investigation, code-named Project Slype, was conducted overseas,
using undercover operators, surveillance and wiretap interceptions, he said.
“This investigation posed a number of significant challenges as it was
carried out in an extremely high-risk environment, in a country plagued with
political instability.”
One source with knowledge of the investigation said the Crown’s stratagem to
get Mr. Ader to Canada amounts to an intriguing one.
“It was an interesting manoeuvre, let’s put it that way,” the source said,
without elaborating.
Several lawyers and police officials consulted by The Globe and Mail said
that, in general, Mr. Ader would likely had to have been lured to Canada, given
there was no legal means of extraditing him from his turbulent home country.
They speculated such a ploy would likely have been done in conjunction with
paid police agents or undercover officers and that this is not in itself
novel.
In fact, just about every major terrorism prosecution in the past decade
involving Canadian suspects in Canada has involved such infiltrators. Yet police
were loath to publicly highlight the crucial roles played by these operatives
when the suspects in these conspiracies – the “Toronto 18,” “VIA Rail” and
Victoria legislature cases – were rounded up. It was only later, when evidence
was introduced in court, that the level of the state’s infiltration became
clear.
Any plans to use “extra-legal” force by military or intelligence agencies to
effect an arrest in a third country would likely severely undercut any Canadian
prosecution.
For example, in 2010, a U.S. bid to extradite Abdullah Khadr from Toronto to
the United States failed after a judge revealed that the United States had first
paid Pakistan a bounty to arrest him and hold him for interrogation, prior to
his return to Canada. Mr. Khadr was “still entitled to the safeguards and
benefit of the law, and not to arbitrary and illegal detention in a secret
detention centre where he was subjected to physical abuse,” the judge ruled as
he quashed that case.
A spokesman for the Department of National Defence said the Canadian Forces,
including its special forces command, were not involved “in any way” in Mr.
Ader’s coming to Canada.
Assistant Commissioner Malizia thanked Ms. Lindhout and Mr. Brennan for
providing witness statements that assisted in advancing the investigation.
“Victims and witnesses must relive events that they should not have had to
endure in the first place,” he said.
He said he had been personally in touch with Ms. Lindhout to update her with
the latest developments.
A representative said Ms. Lindhout was travelling and not available for an
interview.
Mr. Brennan could not be reached for comment Friday. “Amazing news …” he
wrote on Twitter. “Finally, justice will be served. #Karma,” he wrote.
For Canadian police and prosecutors, the case may represent a new approach in
files where both suspects are located and alleged offences occurred outside of
Canada.
Previous cases involved, for example, war-crime suspects who were already
residing in Canada.
In the past, Canadian suspects who have committed terrorist acts in foreign
jurisdictions and returned to Canada under their own volition have been
successfully prosecuted under the Anti-Terrorism Act for both foreign and
domestic crimes.
Such was the case, for example, in the landmark 2004 prosecution of bomb-plot
suspect Momin Khawaja, who hatched parts of his schemes in Canada, Pakistan and
Britain.
The RCMP have also issued warrants for suspected foreign kidnappers of
Canadian citizens – such as the al-Qaeda-inspired bandits in Africa who held two
Canadian diplomats for ransom in 2009.
With additional reporting from Kristy Hoffman, Verity
Stevenson and Oliver Sachgau in Toronto and Kim Mackrael in
Ottawa.
Editor’s note: An
earlier version of this story said Ali Omar Ader was apprehended abroad
and taken to Canada. In fact, it is not currently confirmed how he
arrived in Canada.
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