FRENCH COURT CONVICTS CANADIAN PROFESSOR FOR 1980 PARIS SYNAGOGUE BOMBING

Sat 22 Apr 2023:

A Lebanese-Canadian university professor was found guilty in absentia Friday for a bomb attack on a Paris synagogue more than 40 years ago.

Hassan Diab, 69, who was the only person accused in the attack, was given a life sentence and an arrest warrant was issued.

Diab did not attend the trial in Paris and his legal team claimed he was wrongly identified.

The success of a potential new extradition process for Diab is uncertain and such a move could potentially strain the relationship between Canada and France.

The decision was met with silence in court. Some victims and their families could be seen embracing at the end of three weeks of proceedings during which the suspect’s box remained empty.

Hassan Diab accusé de l’attentat à la bombe de la synagogue de la rue Copernic en France en 1980 attend à Ottawa le jugement du tribunal français.

Il est nerveux mais garde espoir #polcan pic.twitter.com/tQWlKjImFb

— Valerie-Micaela Bain (@ValerieMBain) April 21, 2023

Translation: Hassan Diab, accused in the bomb attack on the Copernic Street synagogue in France in 1980, waits in Ottawa for the French court’s decision. He is nervous but is maintaining hope.

French authorities accused Diab, who for years has maintained his innocence, of planting explosives on a motorcycle that detonated near a synagogue on Copernic Street in Paris’s 16th district in the early evening of October 3, 1980.

The blast killed a student passing by on a motorbike, a driver, an Israeli journalist and a caretaker, while 46 others were injured.

Destroyed vehicles and damaged buildings at the scene of the Copernic street synagogue in Paris on October 3, 1980. AP

The head of the Representative Council of French Jewish Institutions (CRIF) welcomed the conviction on Friday, saying “justice was finally served” and urging Canada to cooperate with the French judicial authorities.

But the sociology professor’s supporters rejected the court’s decision, with the former head of Amnesty International Canada, Alex Neve, calling it “disgraceful”.

“Justice very much needed for this bombing 42 yrs ago; not by scapegoating an innocent man,” Neve wrote on Twitter.

15 yrs of surreal injustice for Hassan Diab culminate in disgraceful in absentia verdict. Justice very much needed for this bombing 42 yrs ago; not by scapegoating an innocent man. If France seeks extradition for 2nd time, @DavidLametti must say no. https://t.co/AWvyJI1UPh

— Alex Neve (@AlexNeve24) April 21, 2023

It remains unclear if Canada will agree to Diab’s potential extradition, but Canadian human rights advocates have called on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government to refuse any requests from France.

“Canada must make it absolutely clear that no second request for the extradition of Dr. Diab will be accepted. There must be no further miscarriage of justice!” the Hassan Diab Support Committee said in a statement on Friday.

Asked to comment on the French court’s verdict, Trudeau told reporters that his government “would look carefully at next steps, at what the French government chooses to do, what the French tribunals choose to do”.

“But we will always be there to stand up for Canadians and their rights,” he said.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

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