Three Canadians who were held in Syrian prisons over the past few years say they should be given standing at an inquiry into the case of Maher Arar.

Inquiry Commissioner Dennis O'Connor heard arguments Friday from lawyers representing Abdullah Almalki, Ahmad Abou-Elmaati and Muayyed Nureddin.

Maher Arar
Maher Arar

The three men say Canadian security officials played a role in their detention and that their stories need to be heard to make sense of the Arar case.

Arar, a Canadian citizen, was detained in the U.S. in September 2002 while on the way home from a vacation to Tunisia.

Deported to Syria

He was deported to his native Syria and imprisoned for 12 months before returning home last October. He says he was tortured during his captivity.

Almalki and Elmaati both knew Arar and, like him, they've been investigated by the RCMP and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service.

Elmaati's lawyer, Rocco Galatti, made his case Friday in a teleconference.

"The facts of Mr. Elmaati's detention, his torture, his divulgence of Mr. Almalki and Mr. Arar, which later led to their own arrest and detention by the Syrians are intertwined," he said.

Muayyed Nureddin didn't know any of the other men, but was arrested and imprisoned in Syria after being investigated by the RCMP and CSIS.

His lawyer, Barbara Jackman, also urged O'Connor to grant him standing.

"I don't think you can understand fully what happened to Mr. Arar without investigating the context in which Canadian security officials act," she said.

The federal government opposes giving the men standing.

Barbara McIsaac, the lawyer for the Attorney General of Canada, says they can appear as witnesses, but giving them standing would divert the inquiry from its mandate.

O'Connor will decide next week who will get standing at the inquiry.