bogeyman
4th April 2014, 04:59
North American Aerospace Defense Command, has Canada, United States and Alaska under it's Aero of Responsibility (AOR). As such it is described as a bi-national organisation. It's status is a curious one, since neither the US Freedom of Information Act not the Canadian Access to Information Act is applicable to this organisation, so accessing NORAD records from a legal point of view is very difficult.
A far as I am aware nothing for the last 18-20 years has been released regarding its activities nor any documentation describing their activities, including Tracks of Interest and Unknown Tracks, let alone the methods employed to identify such tracks.
NORAD say's they do follow the spirit of both the ATIA and the FOIA, yet each is a different law with different parameters thus it is an uneasy balance favouring one country over the other. Apparently according to NORAD some systems are under Canadian authority and thus the information on those systems are only accessible to Canadian citizens (potential) via the ATIA and not the US FOIA. So this dilemma has seemly place a Canadian citizen in a better position to access (potentially) all records in all systems in NORAD than an US/Alaskan citizen. So much for the bi-national organisation, a seemly unbalance affair. Also are not all systems under ultimately NORAD operational jurisdiction?
It begs the question if the ATIA and FOIA are not applicable to NORAD why invoke them in the first place? Maybe it is another tactic to restrict access to NORAD records by using both acts to charge outlandish fees and other legal methods which is solely in the interests of NORAD.
If these matters are not clarified I intent to contact both Senators in the state of Colorado to see if anything can be done on the political level to level out this bias state of affairs. Further I will also contact local news and national news organisations to see if they can provide any further insight into the matter of access NORAD records.
A far as I am aware nothing for the last 18-20 years has been released regarding its activities nor any documentation describing their activities, including Tracks of Interest and Unknown Tracks, let alone the methods employed to identify such tracks.
NORAD say's they do follow the spirit of both the ATIA and the FOIA, yet each is a different law with different parameters thus it is an uneasy balance favouring one country over the other. Apparently according to NORAD some systems are under Canadian authority and thus the information on those systems are only accessible to Canadian citizens (potential) via the ATIA and not the US FOIA. So this dilemma has seemly place a Canadian citizen in a better position to access (potentially) all records in all systems in NORAD than an US/Alaskan citizen. So much for the bi-national organisation, a seemly unbalance affair. Also are not all systems under ultimately NORAD operational jurisdiction?
It begs the question if the ATIA and FOIA are not applicable to NORAD why invoke them in the first place? Maybe it is another tactic to restrict access to NORAD records by using both acts to charge outlandish fees and other legal methods which is solely in the interests of NORAD.
If these matters are not clarified I intent to contact both Senators in the state of Colorado to see if anything can be done on the political level to level out this bias state of affairs. Further I will also contact local news and national news organisations to see if they can provide any further insight into the matter of access NORAD records.