The Very Strange Case of Hussein Ali Sumaida

Sumaida was born into privilege and wealth in Iraq. His Tunisian-born father, Ali Mahmoud Sumaida, a senior member of Hussein’s Baathist regime, was rewarded with top diplomatic postings in Europe and the US. Growing up, his son enjoyed the lavish by-products of his father’s nomadic lifestyle and, occasionally, the company of the Iraqi dictator’s sons Uday and Qusay.

Like other members of the Iraqi elite, Sumaida was sent to school overseas. In 1983, he attended the University of Salford in England to study computer electronics. There, he grew disenchanted with Hussein’s authoritarian regime and gravitated to al-Da’wah, a Shia Muslim opposition movement. Later, he became convinced that al-Da’wah was determined to establish a theocratic dictatorship in Iraq. So, despite his disdain for Hussein, Sumaida agreed to become a mole for the Iraqi secret police – the notorious Mukhabarat – informing on as many as thirty-five al-Da’wah members active in England. He also provided the Mukhabarat with details of a route that al-Da’wah members used to secretly re-enter Iraq. (In its 1991 ruling, the IRB concluded that Sumaida was a “valuable asset” to the Mukhabarat.)

By 1985, Sumaida, then 20, grew disillusioned with his role in Hussein’s “killing machine,” and to exact some measure of revenge, he contacted the Mossad and began feeding information on two members of the Palestine Liberation Organization in London and Brussels. An Arab collaborating with Israel’s spy service, Sumaida has said, was “akin to a Jew working for the Gestapo.” Nevertheless, his double-dealing satisfied an appetite for intrigue and money. “It was a very fast life,” Sumaida says.

But Sumaida wasn’t done flipping sides. When the Mukhabarat became suspicious that he was dealing with the Mossad, Sumaida “confessed” that he was framed into working for the Israelis. The ploy worked and his life, he says, was spared by Hussein himself on condition that he act as a double agent. Eventually, he returned to Iraq and continued working for the Mukhabarat, in one case helping to broker an arms deal with Abu Abbas, the mastermind of the infamous 1985 hijacking of the cruise ship Achille Lauro.

In the meantime, Sumaida made plans to leave Iraq. He obtained a Tunisian passport (through his father’s citizenship) and travelled to Yemen, where he obtained a Canadian temporary visitor’s visa. Carrying that vital document he arrived in Toronto on April 26, 1990. His long legal journey to remain in Canada had begun.

Sumaida got busy while his quest to find sanctuary in Canada meandered through immigration tribunals and the courts. He married a Christian (who later obtained refugee status in Canada) and they had two children. He built a lucrative leather business in Toronto that financed a home, two cars, and a comfortable life. In 1991, Sumaida co-wrote a bestselling book with Canadian journalist Carole Jerome, recounting his years as a double agent. (Sumaida says he now regrets writing Circle of Fear: A Renegade’s Journey from the Mossad to the Iraqi Secret Service, ruefully calling it “a mistake.”)

On July 9, 1991, an immigration panel ruled that Sumaida was a “credible witness” who had a “credible basis” to make a refugee claim. However, on December 12, 1991, the IRB denied him asylum, concluding that his work for the Mukhabarat might have led to the deaths of Iraqi dissidents. The panel found that while “there is a reasonable chance that [Sumaida] would face persecution should he return to Iraq or Tunisia,” the former spy “personally participated in exposing large numbers of persons and their families to probable torture and execution.” Sumaida acknowledged passing on information but emphatically denied any role in torture or killings. (Sumaida has never been charged with crimes against humanity.)

For the following decade, Sumaida worked to undo the panel’s decision. In November 1995, the Federal Court of Canada gave Sumaida renewed hope when it set aside the IRB’s ruling and ordered the refugee board to review its decision. But after a series of duelling appeals, the Federal Court restored the IRB’s original ruling on January 7, 2000. Later that year, Amnesty International took up his case, insisting that Sumaida would face grave risks if Canada shipped him back to Iraq or Tunisia. The appeal had little effect. On December 6, 2004, CIC concluded that Sumaida wasn’t at risk if he returned to Tunisia and ordered him out of the country immediately.

It wasn’t immediately, but on September 6, 2005, Canada finally got its wish when Sumaida boarded an Alitalia flight, with two immigration officers in tow, destined for Tunisia via Milan. At Toronto’s international airport he bid his new wife – Sumaida divorced his first wife in 2003 – and a newborn son, John Paul, an emotional farewell. The Canadians handed their charge over to Tunisian security officers when they arrived in the capital, Tunis, following the thirteen-hour journey.

With his lawyer nearby and in a calm voice, Sumaida recounts the story of his detention and questioning in detail. He was whisked to a compound about a half-hour’s drive from the airport and ordered to remove his tie, wedding ring, Seiko watch, and belt. He was photographed and fingerprinted. (Amnesty International later reported in an “Urgent Action” alert that Sumaida was “believed to be held at the headquarters of the Ministry of the Interior’s State Security Department . . . and at risk of torture or ill-treatment.”)