This is an old article. For the latest on Cynthia Vanier from La politica es la politica, go here.
When Canada’s National Post broke the story of an attempt by members of Libya's deposed Gadhafi family to escape to Mexico, they identified Cynthia Vanier, a mediation consultant from Mount Forest, Ontario, as being one of the plotters.
However, Ms. Vanier, who has been in a Mexican detention
centre since Nov. 10, may be innocent of any crime. Meanwhile, Mexico’s Napoleón Gómez
Urrutia, General Secretary of the Sindicato
Nacional de Trabajadores Mineros, Metalúrgicos y Similares de la República
Méxicana (National Union of Mine, Metal, Steel and Allied Workers of the
Mexican Republic – also “Los Mineros”), remains in Canada despite being accused
by the Mexican government of misappropriating 55 million dollars in union
funds.
Ms. Vanier has yet to be charged (they can do that in
Mexico), but her behaviour does look suspicious, given that she was arrested in
Mexico City along with two Mexicans and a Danish national who are also
implicated in the plot to smuggle Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s playboy son Saadi
to Mexico using fraudulent travel documents. In fact, Mexican authorities consider
Ms. Vanier to be the “ringleader” of the entire operation.
There does seem to be damming evidence of falsified travel
papers, fake bank accounts, and the purchase of a luxury safe house in the Punta Mita resort community near Puerto
Vallarta. The complex operation apparently involved assumed identities (Mr.
Gaddafi was to be known as “Daniel Bejar Hanan”, and other family members “Amira
Sayed Nader”, “Moah Bejar Sayed” and “Sofia Bejar Sayed”), as well as chartering
private aircraft in Mexico, the U.S., Canada, Kosovo and the Middle East.
The problem seems to be that Ms. Vanier, a well-respected
mediator who has worked with indigenous communities in Canada, doesn’t fit the
bill as a major criminal. Her relatives, a biased group to be sure, can’t
believe she was involved in something so daring, dastardly and complex.
They suspect she may have been set up, and guilty only of
being “too trusting”. This may be reasonable given that she is accused of being
in charge of the operation’s finances, which seems to be beyond her role as a
consultant in a three-person firm in
rural Mount Forest, Ontario.
A Canadian security contractor who had served as a bodyguard
for members of the Gadhafi family has said there was a plan, but it was
abandoned in June. But, if that is true, what on earth was Ms. Vanier doing in
Mexico City in November?
Meanwhile, Canada is reluctant to extradite the Mexican
union boss Gomez Urrutia, despite the seriousness of the charges being levelled
against him by the Mexican government. To complicate matters, Gomez Urrutia has
become something of a hero to the labour movement.
Last month Gómez Urrutia received the AFL-CIO's 2011
George Meany-Lane Kirkland Human Rights Award at a ceremony held at the
AFL-CIO's headquarters in Washington, D.C. He now joins the company of the Zimbabwe
union activist Wellington
Chibebe, and Ela Bhatt,
founder of India's Self-Employed
Women's Association. Two U.S. Congress members – Linda Sanchez (D-CA) and Mike Machaud (D-ME) – spoke at the event.
Gómez Urrutia has lived in exile in Vancouver, Canada, since
2006, when the Mexican government filed numerous criminal charges against him.
The AFL-CIO argues that the Mexican government not only went after Gómez
Urrutia, they also attacked the “Los Mineros” union itself, freezing its bank
accounts and declaring all strikes to be illegal. Things got ugly when federal
troops were sent in to break strikes, with mine employers encouraged to replace
Los Mineros with company-sponsored unions.
Gómez Urrutia is a larger-than-life character, having accused
the former PAN administration of Vincente Fox with “industrial homicide” after
a mine explosion that killed 65 miners on February 19, 2006. But given that Gómez
Urrutia has strong popular support, and all but one of the eleven criminal
charges has been dropped, one wonders why he doesn’t just go home and face the music.
For those who claim to have been defrauded by Gómez Urrutia,
he is more fugitive than refugee. The specific accusation is that Gómez Urrutia
illegally wound-up a miner’s trust, keeping funds for himself that were
intended to be disbursed to miners after a mine was sold. It sounds, however,
like the evidence is weak, and that the final charge may also fail, as it is
based on similar evidence to previous charges.
It might be fair to ask: How is Gómez Urrutia supporting himself
in Canada, and has he repatriated significant funds to this country? One charge
coming from Mexico is that he has helped fund the Canadian unions
that support him, though no one has presented any evidence to support this.
There is plenty of evidence of legal harassment, however. None of Mexican government's charges have gone anywhere due to
lack of evidence. Still, they are now rumoured to be putting together yet
another indictment.
As far as Canada is concerned, it’s game over. In May 2011 Gómez
Urrutia was awarded permanent residency
on the grounds that "there are no credible allegations from the Mexican government."
Now, back to Ms. Vanier and her unfortunate circumstances. Ms.
Vanier travelled to Libya as part of a “fact-finding” tour paid by the Canadian
engineering and construction giant SNC-Lavalin, which had active interests in
the North African country. This resulted in a report, authored by Ms. Vanier,
which was sent to Canada's Department of Foreign Affairs, and which apparently
showed bias in favour of the Gadhafi regime.
And why was Vanier in Mexico? When she was arrested last
month she was in the process of buying a three-bedroom beach house. The plan,
apparently, was for Ms. Vanier and her husband to sell their condo in Canada
and move to Mexico. The allegedly nefarious role played by Ms. Vanier may have
really been a hail-Mary pass to set her up for her golden years. If so, it
looks like those plans have been delayed.
No comments:
Post a Comment