I believe the fundamental illegality here lies at the interface between section 15 and its various subheadings, which were not indicated precisely, and as Mr. Esau said, the law says they should be indicated precisely when they're used. The violation lies at the intersection between section 15 and section 67.1, which is the criminal law part of the act. Subsection 67.1(1) reads: “No person shall, with intent to deny a right of access under this Act,” and continues in paragraph 67.1(1)(c), “conceal a record”. I believe records were concealed.
I did not mention in my chronology a detail that is probably relevant at this point. On April 23 Madame Sabourin gave the CD to me containing the various Afghan human rights reports--not the U.S. one, which is still not answered. On the night of April 23 I reviewed those documents that had been given to me earlier in the day, and I found the excisions very heavy-handed. I wrote to her on the night of April 23, saying that I would like her to reconsider the excisions that were made and that I did not believe them to be lawful exercises of the act. In other words, I put her on notice that I believed an illegality had taken place. I offered to her to re-evaluate those excisions and get back to me within 24 hours. She got back to me on April 24, saying that the excisions would be maintained.
Why is that important? To the extent that you could say an accident occurred, that something was excised that shouldn't have been, and that it would have been an illegal concealment under section 67.1, I expressly asked for a reconsideration. The reconsideration was that we will withhold exactly what we've withheld. Therefore, it was not accidental.