Japanese Justice And Air India 182.

The 1985 bombing of Air India Flight 182 was back in the news in Canada today.  Inderjit Singh Reyat, the only person convicted of their involvement in the attack, was sentenced to nine years for perjury due to his actions during the trial of Ripudaman Singh Malik and Ajiab Singh Bagri.  Reyat had taken a plea bargain in 2003 to reduce his sentence in exchange for testimony against them.  Malik and Bagri were found not guilty due to lack of evidence.

Hearing about this case again this morning made me wonder why there has been no Japanese prosecution of any of these people, or anyone else. On the same day Air India Flight 182 was blown up by a bomb a similar bomb blew up at Tokyo's Narita airport, killing two Japanese baggage handlers and injuring four others.  Despite two of their citizens being killed I have seen no indication Japan has made an effort to get any of those accused by Canada in the case into a Japanese court.  They probably didn't need to with Reyat, since he was convicted in 1991 in the Narita bomb case.  But what about Bagri and Malik?  You'd think that after their acquital in Canada the Japanese might want a crack at them as well.  If anyone knows the story here I'd love to know.

Today's cover of the Toronto Globe and Mail was rather interesting. Dealing with yesterdays acquital of Ripudaman Singh Malik and Ajaib Singh Bagri in the Air India case, it showed pictures of the two accused with "Not Guilty" printed beside them, while the rest of the page was taken up with a list of the victims below the word "Innocent." A rather interesting presentation, and I can't help but assume the subtext was supposed to be yes, they may have been acquited, but they may have gotten away with murder of these poor people. Are they truly guilty? I don't know. But the fact they've been acquited makes me wonder if a front page like that isn't putting the Globe at risk of being sued for defamation.

In somewhat more ridiculous news the Supreme Court has ensured that no one in Quebec will accidentally confuse butter and margarine by upholding a Quebec law that requires magarine to be white. Quebec's dairy industry claims that if margarine is coloured yellow people will be confused and it will hurt butter sales. At one time you could buy uncoloured margarine here in Saskatchewan, and perhaps still can, since you really don't need coloured margarine for most baking. I remember my grandmother having some once back in the mid or late '70s that came with a dye package so you could make it yellow.