PM hired sound expert to prove that tape was altered, but expert says tape was not changed

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THE CANADIAN PRESS

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OTTAWA - A tape recording at the centre of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's $3.5-million defamation suit against the Liberal party was not altered as the prime minister has claimed, a court-ordered analysis of the tape by Harper's own audio expert has found.

The key portion of the recorded interview of Harper by a B.C. journalist contains no splices, edits or alterations, says the finding by a U.S. forensic audio expert.

The findings may call into question Harper's testimony about the interview during a sworn cross-examination conducted by a Liberal party lawyer in August.

The analysis was filed in Ontario Superior Court yesterday by lawyers for the Liberal party, despite attempts by Harper's lawyer to keep the opinion out of the court file until at least next week.

Harper sued the Liberals in the midst of a raging controversy earlier this year over claims in a book by B.C. author Tom Zytaruk that the Conservatives offered the late Independent MP Chuck Cadman a $1-million life insurance policy in return for help defeating the minority Liberal government in 2005.

The prime minister maintains that Zytaruk doctored the tape of an interview he conducted with Harper after Cadman died.

Harper denies that he told Zytaruk he was unaware of the "details" of the insurance policy offer. He insists that he only confirmed the party had offered Cadman "financial considerations" in return for rejoining the Tories and voting against the Liberals in a Commons confidence vote.

But former FBI agent Bruce Koenig, the sound expert Harper hired to prove his allegations, submitted a report dated yesterday to Harper's lawyer, which also had to be sent to the Liberal lawyer Chris Paliare.

In the report Koenig concluded that the first part of Zytaruk's interview with Harper, which contains the key portions that the prime minister has contested, was intact.