Canada PM vows to redress Air India families

The government of Canada has promised to make an apology and provide compensation to the families of victims of the 1985 Air India bombing, as a scathing report into the tragedy was released yesterday.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper made the commitment in a meeting with victims' families, who had gathered in Ottawa for the report's release.
Air India inquiry head John Major called for both compensation and an apology in his 3,000-page report, which attacked the way successive governments have treated families of the victims.
Major also said the RCMP is not properly structured to deal with terrorism prosecutions, and it may be spread too thin because of its contracts to provide policing in many provinces.
Air India Flight 182 took off from Montreal. Near the Irish coast on June 23, 1985, a terrorist bomb exploded. All 329 aboard were killed -- the deadliest terrorist attack in Canadian history. Only one person has been convicted in the bombing, Inderjit Singh Reyat, who was living in Duncan at the time.
In the House of Commons yesterday, Harper thanked Major for his report and for the "incredible devotion" he showed in "getting to the bottom and to the truth of this matter."
In his report, Major laid out the "turf wars" between the RCMP and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service that hampered the Air India bombing investigation. He criticized the government for not doing enough to find out what went wrong 25 years ago and to portray everything as fine today.
He recommended the government compensate victims' families who were unfairly treated for years. "We propose the creation of an independent body to recommend an appropriate . . . payment by the government and to oversee its distribution to the victims." He said victims' families have "often been treated as adversaries, as if they somehow brought this calamity upon themselves."
"The time to right this historic wrong is now," Major said.
18/06/10 Kim Bolan/Canwest News Service/Times Colonist

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Categories: Air India - International Jun 2010, Foreign Jun 2010, NACIL Jun 2010, Safety Jun 2010