Homeland Security Boss rebuked by Canada for erroneous 9/11 statement

This is from canwest.

One expects a Homeland Security Secretary to be better briefed than this. Of course Homeland Security still considers Maher Arar a member of Al Qaeda and refuses to have his name taken off the no-fly list. Harper and Stockwell Day saw the secret evidence against Arar and it didn't impress them or change their opinion about Arar. The Arar case shows that there are many incompetents loose in US intelligence and they seem never to be held to account. Any attempt to take the govt. to court is blocked by invoking NATIONAL SECURITY.


Homeland Security boss rebuked by Canada for erroneous 9/11 statement


By Sheldon Alberts, Canwest News ServiceApril 21, 2009 4:02 PM


Janet Napolitano, the new U.S. Homeland Security secretary, sparked complaints from parliamentarians and government officials in Ottawa for remarks she made earlier this week in a Canadian television interview, in which she said terrorists entering America have come mostly from Canada.
Photograph by: Mark Wilson, Getty ImagesWASHINGTON — Canada's ambassador to the United States on Tuesday publicly rebuked Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano for suggesting that the 9/11 terrorists entered the U.S. from Canada, and has asked for a private meeting with her to set the record straight.


"Unfortunately, misconceptions arise on something as fundamental as where the 9/11 terrorists came from," Michael Wilson said at a Washington conference on cross-border trade.


"They flew in (from) major U.S. airports. They entered the U.S. with documents issued by the United States government and no 9/11 terrorists came from Canada."


Napolitano sparked a round of diplomatic and political complaints from parliamentarians and government officials in Ottawa for remarks she made earlier this week in a Canadian television interview.


Addressing a question on the different security challenges facing the U.S. on its borders with Canada and Mexico, Napolitano said terrorists entering America have come mostly from Canada.


"To the extent that terrorists have come into our country, or suspected or known terrorists have entered our country across a border, it's been across the Canadian border," Napolitano said.


Asked if she was referring to the 9/11 attackers, Napolitano replied: "Not just those, but others as well."


Wilson struck a diplomatic tone and did not mention Napolitano by name in prepared remarks to the Border Trade Alliance conference in Washington. But Canadian officials alerted media that he would be making the statement in response to the Homeland Security secretary.


In a statement Tuesday afternoon, Napolitano said: "I know that the Sept. 11th hijackers did not come through Canada to the United States."


But she added that several terrorists have attempted to cross into the U.S. from Canada, specifically citing Ahmed Ressam, the 'Millennium Bomber' who was caught in 1999 when he entered the U.S. at Port Angeles, Wash.


Ressam was convicted on a plot to bomb the Los Angeles airport.


Napolitano's predecessor at Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff, said in 2008 that "more than a dozen" suspected extremists had been caught trying to enter the U.S. from Canada.


"There are other instances . . . when suspected terrorists have attempted to enter our country from Canada to the United States," Napolitano said. "Some of these are well-known to the public — such as the Millennium Bomber — while others are not due to security reasons."


Wilson said Napolitano's office had separately told the Canadian Embassy that the Homeland Security secretary misunderstood the question from the Canadian interviewer.


Still, her remarks betrayed the persistence of a myth that has haunted the Canadian government ever since the 2001 attacks. Several prominent U.S. lawmakers, including former Senator Hillary Clinton, have in the past said the 9/11 attackers crossed into the U.S. from Canada.


The 9/11 Commission report on the attacks found no evidence to support the claim, but Wilson said he is regularly required to correct U.S. officials who still believe it happened.


"It is a problem. I think the first time I heard it expressed was about two months after I arrived here," said Wilson, who was named ambassador in 2006.


"It comes frequently from members of Congress. These are people who should know the difference, forget sometimes. It's frustrating to us because we have to address it every time that matter comes up."


In Ottawa, RCMP Commissioner William Elliott said Napolitano was ill-informed.


"I was a bit surprised and somewhat disappointed that the secretary isn't better informed," Elliott told reporters on Parliament Hill.


"I shouldn't overreact to what I see in the media, but there was a suggestion in the media that the secretary of Homeland Security in the United States made some reference linking terrorist threats in Canada to the 9/11 attacks," Elliott said. "There is certainly no link to be made there."


Canadian parliamentarians attending Tuesday's border trade conference said they are prepared to give Napolitano the benefit of the doubt, but expressed fears that U.S. border policy continues to be influenced by myth more than facts.


"This seems to underlie many of the conversations and the tension between trade and security," said John McKay, Liberal MP for Scarborough-Guildwood. "It is a myth. It is nothing more than a myth. But it is one that continually comes out of American media and possibly even believed by some members of Congress."


With file from Janice Tibbetts

© Copyright (c) Canwest News Service




Janet Napolitano, the new U.S. Homeland Security secretary, sparked complaints from parliamentarians and government officials in Ottawa for remarks she made earlier this week in a Canadian television interview, in which she said terrorists entering America have come mostly from Canada.
Photograph by: Mark Wilson, Getty Images