Geoffrey O’Brian, a lawyer for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, says the spy agency will do so in the rare instance where it can prevent a catastrophic terrorist attack.
He told the Commons public safety committee there will be “almost once-in-a-lifetime” situations where such information — even if gathered through coercion — can be useful for national security.
Many human-rights advocates say security officials should make no use whatsoever of information from torture.
The committee is looking at the government response to a federal inquiry into the Maher Arar affair and a more recent inquiry into the imprisonment of three other Arab-Canadian men.
Arar, a Syrian-born Canadian, was detained in New York in September 2002 and subsequently shipped abroad by U.S. authorities — ending up in a grave-like Damascus cell where he gave false confessions about terrorist ties.
The other inquiry found Canadian officials had a hand in the torture of Abdullah Almalki, Ahmad El Maati and Muayyed Nureddin in Syria through the sharing of information with foreign intelligence and police agencies.