...And Another Thing!

For one Canadian man, this year will undoubtedly be a hell of a lot happier than the last eight.
   
I’m referring to Abousfian Abdelrazik, a Sudanese-born Montrealer whose story I first reported in Uptown in October 2009.
   
First, a recap for those unfamiliar with his case: In 2003, having already endured several years of surveillance and harassment in Montreal by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) — possibly because he was a black Muslim living in a post-9/11 society, although who really knows — Abdelrazik flew to Sudan to visit his sick mother.
   
Once there, he was arrested by Sudanese authorities and sent to prison for nearly a year — the first of two detentions — during which time he alleges he was repeatedly tortured.
   
By the time he was released, his passport had expired and Canadian officials refused to help him secure emergency travel documents.
   
In 2006, while he was still stuck in Sudan, Abdelrazik’s name was placed on the United Nations Security Council’s "1267 list." Individuals on this list are subjected to a travel ban and a total asset freeze, which means they can’t open a bank account, or accept gifts of money or goods from others. He was never told why his name was added to the list, nor was he ever charged with any crime, either in Canada or Sudan.
   
In 2008, a now-desperate Abdelrazik retained council, went public with his story and sought safe haven at the Canadian embassy in Khartoum. He spent the next 14 months there.
   
In 2009, he was told he would be issued an emergency passport if he could come up with a plane ticket; Canadians who had heard about what was happening chipped in to purchase him one — but two hours before his flight was to depart, Canada’s then Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon rescinded the agreement. It took a federal judge’s order to get Abdelrazik repatriated; that same judge ruled CSIS had been complicit in his initial detainment and that the Canadian government had violated his constitutional rights by refusing to allow him to return home. Abdelrazik has since launched a $27 million lawsuit against both the government and Lawrence Cannon.
   
And now, a happy update: On Nov. 30, 2011, the UN’s 1267 Committee announced Abdelrazik, who’s now 49, has finally been delisted. Though the decision comes with no explanation, it means Abdelrazik is now allowed to once again earn money. (If the lawsuit doesn’t pan out in his favour, I’m thinking he should try selling his story to Hollywood.)
   
Read more about Abdelrazik’s case here: www.peoplescommission.org/en/abdelrazik/.

•  •  •
   
You know how 2011 was filled with all sorts of discussions about sexual assault that, inevitably, would begin with everyone agreeing that it’s never OK to blame victims (like a certain Manitoba judge and a certain Toronto police officer did) before veering into all the precautions that women must take — don’t wear a short skirt, don’t drink, don’t leave the house in possession of a vagina — in order to prevent "getting raped"?
   
Do you ever wonder why it’s always women who are expected to change their behaviour  when it’s usually men doing all the raping?
   
Me too — which is why I was pleased to come across this campaign: mystrength.org/5.0.html. Created by the California Department of Health Services and the California Coalition Against Sexual Assault, MyStrength is a rape-prevention campaign that targets men.
   
I know, right? How novel.
   
The posters, which actually date back to 2007, feature slogans such as "My strength is not for hurting... so when she wanted me to stop, I stopped" are particularly cool — and they reminded me of a somewhat similar Canadian effort, the "Don’t be that guy" campaign launched last spring in Ottawa (crimepreventionottawa.ca/en/initiatives/dont-be-that-guy).
   
I for one would love to see a lot more of these things.
   
If we’re ever to have a hope of reducing sexual violence within our communities, we need to focus our efforts on those who commit it.