Canada's Supreme Court agreed Thursday to hear the appeal of a second Arab Muslim held under a secretive process allowing the government to detain and deport terror suspects without revealing the intelligence used to build the case against them. Hassan Almrei, who faces deportation to his native Syria, is one of five Arab Muslim men detained since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks under Canada's new "security certificate" process. Almrei says he fears death or torture if he is returned to Syria. Last month, he ended a 73-day hunger strike protesting his solitary confinement.The high court agreed in August to hear the case of Adil Charkaoui and is considering a third appeal application by Mohamed Harkat. "We're pleased that we'll be able to address what are clearly issues of national importance before the Supreme Court," said Almrei's lawyer, John Norris. "Mr. Almrei's case is part of the fundamentally important project of defining what are, and what are not, acceptable responses under Canadian law to allegations of terrorism." Charkaoui, 32, is the only one of the five not in jail. The Montrealer was released on $43,000 bail in February and continues to fight deportation to his native Morocco.
Almrei, 31, has been held in solitary confinement at a Toronto detention center since Oct. 19, 2001. He admitted training in Afghanistan and lying about his past to get into Canada as a refugee claimant in 1999, but he denied any link to al-Qaida or Osama bin Laden, as alleged by federal intel