The Torture Coverup: Today's Developments

- The military police complaints commission hearings are scheduled to resume in March, 2010, "but whether the federal government actually lets it proceed is uncertain." Meanwhile:

The Liberals turned up the heat on the Tories Thursday by using their opposition day to introduce a Commons motion to force the government to release documents on the detainee issue.

Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff accused the government of censoring with "Soviet zeal" and demanded to see all records related to incident referred to by Natynczyk.

- I really don't know why Ottawa-centered journalists think this issue has no legs outside of their little bubble. The latest EKOS poll shows that the majority think Afghan detainees were tortured and that this government knew about it.

Only Conservative supporters are slightly less likely to believe that the government was aware that prisoners might be tortured. Even so, nearly 68 per cent of Conservative supporters think the government was aware of that possibility.

That is definitely significant. And the fact that parliament will go on hiatus tonite for its holiday break does not ensure that this scandal won't come back with even more force in the new year - especially since Richard Colvin is drafting a rebuttal to the testimony of the government-friendly witnesses.

The fact that the one 2006 incident that we know of (and which alludes to others), thanks to the affidavit of Noonan in 2007, is front and center again 2 years of being shelved shows that the Conservatives can't run away from reality or accountability.

When that incident came to light in May, 2007, Peter Van Loan was the government's bully-boy who tried endlessly to make it go away. He called it "roughhousing". More recently, General Lewis MacKenzie, appearing on the right-wing talk radio David Rutherford Show in Calgary this week said he wasn't all that concerned about some guy being beaten up. Shit happens. It's a war. Rick Hillier recently minimized the incident as well. These generals don't seem to care that Canadian soldiers were so concerned about the fate of their transferred detainees that they resorted to taking before and after pictures because they knew abuse was happening. They weren't listened to. Their reports were dismissed and censored.

When Peter MacKay gave his opening statement to the special committee on Wednesday, he said that torture was "abhorrent". But it obviously was not "abhorrent" enough for him to pay attention to as foreign minister since he then went on to pathetically justify his inaction by droning on repeatedly about how "complex" the Afghanistan situation was. He should have just admitted that he was too incompetent to handle all of the duties he was responsible for at that time.

On top of all of that, and this is perhaps one of the most shocking revelations about this government's disdain for the law considering it's coming from our current Foreign Affairs minister, Lawrence Cannon, in his opening statement he wondered why people were "fixated on the well-being of individuals who are suspected of being our enemies". (h/t BCCLA blog) He obviously refuses to even acknowledge the Geneva Conventions. This is the same man who banned the phrase "child soldiers" from the department's vocabulary and took "humanitarian" out of the phrase "international humanitarian law".

Typical of this Conservative party - thinking they can make issues of justice disappear by simply censoring them.

That obviously hasn't worked. And Cannon's performance has been despicable.

...this April [2009], when Cannon blamed Omar Khadr, a former child recruit of Al Qaeda held since 2002 at the U.S. detention centre in Guantanamo Bay, for making bombs that killed Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan.

"We saw this man apparently making the same bombs that have taken the life of a certain number of our soldiers," he said, referring to TV footage of Khadr making bombs. The comments were false.

Khadr was not in the vicinity where Canadians were operating at the time. A retraction followed.

It's clear that the Conservative agenda is to fearmonger and paint their critics as enemies of the military as long as they think they can get away with it. The problem is that actual evidence is corroding what little shred of credibility there was that they thought they had in the first place. They are their own worst enemies. If they truly believed in their collective innocence, they would release all of the documents they have - unredacted - in order to prove it. Instead, they are fighting their release every step of the way using the tired "national security" excuse.

And, in case you're keeping score, it's now:

Former Canadian ambassadors: 71

Conservatives: 0
 

Natynczyk Changes his Testimony

Schadenfreude:

General changes story on Taliban suspect

Gen. Walter Natynczyk, Canada's top military commander, is now saying a suspected Taliban fighter abused by Afghan police in June 2006 had been detained by Canadian troops, contrary to comments the defence staff chief made Tuesday.

"The individual who was beaten by the Afghan police was, in fact, in Canadian custody," Natynczyk told reporters in Ottawa on Wednesday.

Natynczyk had told a parliamentary committee that Canadian troops questioned the man who was picked up during operations in Zangabad. But Natynczyk said it was the Afghans who took him into custody.

On Wednesday, Natynczyk said he has since received new information and has learned that Canadians had taken the suspect into custody before handing him over to the Afghans.

Natynczyk read from a report of the incident by the section commander, who said they had the suspect get down on his stomach before they conducted a detailed seach [sic] of the Afghan, which included emptying his pockets, cataloging all the items and photgraphing him.

"I did not have this information in May of 2007 nor yesterday when I made my statement. But I am responsible for the information provided by the Canadian Forces and I am accountable for it today," Natynczyk said.

Damn straight he's responsible. And he's either lying or incompetent:

The Canadian soldier's account, handwritten in a field notebook in the hours after the June 19, 2006 incident, is corroborated by a medic's examination of the detainee's injuries and photographs, which the government refuses to release. The account, first outlined in a May, 2007 affidavit by Colonel Steve Noonan, Canada's first task force commander, was subsequently confirmed by then Brigadier-General Joseph Deschamps, who was chief-of-staff for operations in Canada's expeditionary forces command when he was cross-examined about it in January, 2008.

After Col. Noonan's first disclosure of the incident, the military denied the detainee ever really qualified as a Canadian captive. Then Lieutenant-General Walt Natynczyk – who has since been promoted to chief of defence staff – issued a statement in May 2007 denying that the beaten detainee had originally been captured and transferred by Canadian troops.

“Media reporting of a specific example of an individual detained by Afghan Authorities are inaccurate,” Gen. Natynczyk said in a statement.

And Peter MacKay, who's been pushing the Canadian heroes [read: generals] always tell the truth - screw the diplomats and soldiers on the ground meme for weeks just got his already red face politically slapped.

On top of that, the number of former ambassadors chiding MacKay for going after Richard Colvin has now risen from 23 yesterday to near 50 today (h/t this-on-that) and calls for his resignation and a public inquiry are growing.

"The minister has on nine separate occasions told the House there is not a scintilla of evidence of mistreatment even as the entire country was shown evidence that torture did take place," said the NDP's defence critic Jack Harris. "Will he resign?"

Instead, Mr. MacKay's parliamentary secretary, Laurie Hawn, mouthed "bullshit" as opposition MPs insisted the government knew of transfers to torture.

There's "bullshit" and then there's Toryshit.

In response to Ignatieff's question about this bombshell today, Harper said (with a straight face), "General Natynczyk has indicated what the government has said from the very outset."

And what would that be, Steve? That there were no credible reports of abuse?

Stay tuned this afternoon when MacKay is set to appear before the Special Committee on the Canadian Mission in Afghanistan along with Lawrence Cannon and former defence minister (who was forced to resign over his lies on this file) Gordon O'Connor. (This is turning out to be all rather special, isn't it?) You can watch it live on CPAC's site at 3:30 pm ET.
 

The Cons vs 23 Former Ambassadors

You know your attack style of governing sucks when...Former ambassadors condemn Ottawa's attack on diplomat

Twenty-three former ambassadors are speaking out against the Conservative government's attacks on the credibility of diplomat Richard Colvin, saying Ottawa's response to his Afghan detainee abuse testimony threatens to cast a chill over Canada's foreign service.

The ex-heads of Canadian diplomatic missions say in a letter released to the media that they're worried the treatment of Mr. Colvin will discourage diplomats from reporting frankly to Ottawa from their foreign postings.

Actually Cons, Colvin WAS Muzzled

The Conservatives are living in their own twisted version of Through the Looking Glass.

Last week, when David Mulroney testified in front of the special committee on Afghanistan, he attempted to rebut Richard Colvin's allegations that he was "muzzled" when he tried to report on detainee abuse allegations. Mulroney admitted that he told his officials that he preferred that they communicate by phone first - because all of those e-mails (which could be tracked later) were just too confusing to those in charge. No paper trail. How convenient.

Now we learn, via the Globe and Mail that parts of Colvin's reports were "edited":

Canada's former ambassador to Afghanistan asked a diplomat to erase two bluntly worded sections from an April, 2007, report on how Ottawa's delays in notifying the Red Cross of prisoner transfers to Afghan authorities left these detainees vulnerable to abuse.

The Globe and Mail has learned that Arif Lalani asked for the edits from Richard Colvin, a diplomat at the centre of an unfolding controversy over whether Canada turned a blind eye when handing prisoners to Afghanistan's torture-prone authorities.

This editing took place in April, 2007, only days after a Globe investigation revealed disturbing allegations of abuse and torture among prisoners transferred by Canadians to Afghan detention - stories that kicked off a stormy debate in Ottawa.

In one of the sections he was requested to delete, Mr. Colvin remarked on a pattern observed by the Red Cross: that abuse took place almost immediately after prisoners were transferred to the Afghans - timing that meant Canada's tardiness made it very hard for the human-rights monitor to guard against torture.

"[A Red Cross official], who had read The Globe and Mail's reporting, said that the allegations of abuse made by those Afghans interviewed by [reporter] Graeme Smith fit a common pattern," Mr. Colvin wrote in text that was cut out.

"In the International Committee of the Red Cross's experience, 'a lot of abuse happens in the first days,' " he wrote, adding that the human-rights monitor argued this was cause for "more rapid notification" that "would offer better protection to the detainees."

[...]

In another section he was asked by Mr. Lalani to erase, Mr. Colvin reminded Ottawa that it had been warned about 10 months earlier of these dangerous delays in notifying the Red Cross of detainees.

In the deleted text, Mr. Colvin even acknowledged that Ottawa's own internal statistics on notification delays corroborated the Red Cross's estimates. "Our own records substantiate ICRC's comments about continued delays in notification," the diplomat wrote. "For the four-month period of December 1, 2006, to March 30, 2007, the gap from detention by Canadian Forces to ICRC being informed was as long as 34 days," he wrote.

Somebody in Steve's government needs to look up the word "muzzled" in the dictionary.
 

Quote du Jour: How Low Can Steve Go?

Via The TO Star:

PORT OF SPAIN–Prime Minister Stephen Harper took a partisan shot at his opposition critics while touring the HMCS Quebec in Trinidad-Tobago Sunday.

The Canadian ship and navy officers are helping with security for the Commonwealth summit. Harper, in brief comments to the Canadians, was addressing allegations that Canadian civilian and military leaders ignored warnings of a risk of torture in Afghan prisons.

"Let me just say this: living as we do, in a time when some in the political arena do not hesitate before throwing the most serious of allegations at our men and women in uniform, based on the most flimsy of evidence, remember that Canadians from coast to coast to coast are proud of you and stand behind you, and I am proud of you, and I stand beside you."

What Jeff Jedras said.

And, let me just add: Peter MacKay is a Terminally Confused Man.

First there were no allegations. Then there were "credible" allegations so they changed the transfer agreement. Then Richard Colvin was lying because he said there were allegations. Then David Mulroney said there were no allegations (but he could not vouch 100% that Canadian soldiers did not, in fact, hand over detainees who were then abused). Then Peter MacKay said there were no allegations - credible or otherwise - but they changed the agreement apparently just for the hell of it.

2 questions remain:

1. Will there be a public inquiry?

2. Will MacKay lose his job?

The answer to both is: doubtful.

The Cons are running scared from an inquiry - looking as guilty as the cat that ate the canary. And MacKay, the Con who allowed Harper to take the lead when the old Reform and Progressive Conservative parties merged, isn't likely to go down easily. Steve owes him. That's why he's held the high-ranking government positions he's had since that mismatched marriage.

When this scandal came up a couple of years ago, then incompetent Defence minister Gordon O'Connor was turfed - having become a political liability once his inconsistencies and lies began to emerge. He was expendable. MacKay is following the same path of untruthfulness. But he is being heavily protected at every turn. If he does fall on his sword, the resulting ripples that would run through the party could cause a major mess for the Harperites. I could be wrong about the current state of the inside baseball. But that's the way I see it.

The Cons are struggling to contain this scandal and the opposition parties have to keep pushing as hard as they can. This cannot be one of those issues over which the Cons are given another pass - especially since the ICC has now injected itself into the affair.

The ICC's chief prosecutor, though, has no intention of waiting for Washington to submit to the court's authority. Luis Moreno Ocampo says he already has jurisdiction—at least with respect to Afghanistan.

Because Kabul in 2003 ratified the Rome Statute—the ICC's founding treaty—all soldiers on Afghan territory, even those from nontreaty countries, fall under the ICC's oversight, Mr. Ocampo told me. And the chief prosecutor says he is already conducting a "preliminary examination" into whether NATO troops, including American soldiers, fighting the Taliban may have to be put in the dock.

"We have to check if crimes against humanity, war crimes or genocide have been committed in Afghanistan," Mr. Ocampo told me. "There are serious allegations against the Taliban and al Qaeda and serious allegations about warlords, even against some who are connected with members of the government." Taking up his inquiry of Allied soldiers, he added, "there are different reports about problems with bombings and there are also allegations about torture."

Wait a minute there: did he just impugn the might military? Quick. Someone alert Steve and his bully buddies so they can jump all over Mr Ocampo too.

And, if you need more proof of our western exceptionalist attitude, check out this bit by the author of that same WSJ article:

I asked the obvious follow-up. "If this is the 'new world,' why do you bother collecting information about NATO and U.S. troops in Afghanistan?" Why, in other words, when his task is to end the impunity for the worst war crimes, does he spend his limited resources on the most advanced democracies in the world—which operate under strict rules of engagement, have their own chain-of-command investigations and swift prosecution of criminals? Mr. Ocampo got slightly irritated.

No doubt. The arrogance of that reporter is astounding. But it's only symbolic of how we view ourselves and our conduct in these so-called wars of "necessity" despite the fact that we have failed miserably to be anything near accountable for the horrors we are responsible for.
 

How to hide torture: Obama-style

Oh Yes We Can!, so oh yes he did.

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court has thrown out an appeals court ruling ordering the disclosure of photographs of detainees being abused by their U.S. captors.

In doing so Monday, the high court cited a recent change in federal law that allows the pictures to be withheld.

The justices issued a brief, and expected, order Monday directing the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York to take another look at a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union to obtain the photos of detainee abuse. President Barack Obama at first didn't oppose the release, but he changed his mind, saying they could whip up anti-American sentiment overseas and endanger U.S. troops.

The administration appealed the matter to the Supreme Court, but also worked with Congress to give Defense Secretary Robert Gates the power to keep from the public all pictures of foreign detainees being abused.

Gates invoked his new authority in mid-November, saying widespread distribution of the pictures would endanger American soldiers.

Just substitute the names "Obama" and "Gates" with "Bush" and "Rumsfeld" and you'll see just how much has changed.

In case you weren't paying attention (and who could blame you with all of those shiny photo ops Obama and Michelle have been hiding behind), back in June the US senate passed a law [the Detainee Photographic Records Protection Act] barring the release of those photos.

The bill, sponsored by Sens. Joe Lieberman, a Connecticut Independent, and Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, had originally been part of the war funding supplemental bill passed Tuesday by the House.

But House Democrats stripped that part of the measure from the bill, and the senators proposed it as stand-alone legislation.

Earlier Wednesday, Graham said at a Judiciary Committee hearing that he had received assurance from White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel "that the president will not let these photos see the light of day."

Yes, Obama sided with those progressive beacons of light: Lieberman, Graham and Emanuel using the same fearmongering tactics that the Bush administration was quite fond of. In October, the provision passed when it was included in a homeland security appropriations bill.

The photos have been at the center of a years-long lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union. Congress last month gave the Obama administration specific authority to prevent any release of the 44 photos. Afterward, Gates signed a certificate of authorization, or order, to prevent the photos' release, saying their disclosure would endanger U.S. troops serving abroad.

The order covers all photographs taken of people captured or detained in overseas military operations between September 11, 2001, the day of the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, and January 22, 2009, shortly after President Obama took office.

Obama: Fear you can believe in! while hope is fading fast
 

Mulroney Contradicts MacKay

Ever since Peter MacKay has been under fire about allegations of torture in Afghanistan during the period of 2006-2007, he has repeatedly said in the house that the transfer agreement was changed once the government had credible evidence to back up those claims.

From November 25, 2009, Hansard:

Hon. Peter MacKay (Minister of National Defence and Minister for the Atlantic Gateway, CPC):

Mr. Speaker, when officials at Foreign Affairs and officials at the Department of National Defence were in possession of credible allegations, they acted. Going back two and a half years the action began. The action began to clean up the mess that we had inherited from the party opposite. The action began to rewrite the transfer arrangement, to arrange for more prison visits and to train officials inside the prison.

But, here's what David Mulroney said during his opening statement when he testified in front of the special committee today.

From the video (approximately 7 minutes in)

When I took up my responsibilities at Foreign Affairs in February, 2007, the department was already exploring ways of engaging in monitoring and tracking detainees. At the same time, we had an exchange of letters with the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, an organization for which we are a major funder, in which the AIHRC agreed to notify Canada should it learn of any mistreatment of Canadian-transferred detainees. In mid-March, we began detailed work to create a detailed contingency plan, a standard operating procedure in the event of well-founded allegations of mistreatment. We did this not because of confirmed instances of real and substantial risk of torture or mistreatment of Canadian-transferred detainees but because it was clear that what we had in place at the time could and should be further reinforced.

One of these men is lying.
 

It's Hillier Time

General Rick Hillier, who has already told the press that he doesn't recall reading any reports about Afghan detainee torture from Richard Colvin, testifies at the Special Committee on the Canadian Mission in Afghanistan this afternoon along with two of his military colleagues. (Watch online at CPAC.)

The denials by Harper et al continued today during QP even in the face of media reports that the Red Cross [was] told late about prisoner transfers and a revelation in Le Devoir that supports Colvin's testimony:

...the lead story in Le Devoir, “Torture: Ottawa should have acted sooner," which has a senior official reporting that the prisoner transfer issue finally appeared on Ottawa’s radar screen around Christmas 2006. By then, “it was increasingly apparent to everyone that there were big holes in the Protocol and that there was a real possibility that inmates were being abused.” While not criticizing the Army, which was doing "difficult work in a difficult environment" our source says that they "did not take this issue [of torture] seriously".

The Cons are betting the farm on Canadians lapping up every word of David Mulroney, who is hurriedly flying back from China this week to contradict Colvin's testimony when he appears before the committee on Thursday. Mulroney, without offering up any documentation, is more credible you see because Stephen Harper and Peter MacKay say he is. Case closed.

Except that it isn't. Not by a longshot.

During Hillier's opening statement, he said that he didn't receive any reports of torture in 2006. If that's true, why was it necessary to change the detainee transfer agreement? He even contradicted himself about who the detainees were. They weren't just "farmers", he maintained - then saying that, okay, maybe some of them were farmers but the military let them go. Or they were "farmers by day, Taliban by nite".

Between Harper and his various denialists, there are holes big enough to drive a truck through.

Related:

Colvin says he sent torture reports to minister's office

and...

Canadians tend to believe Colvin: poll

A Canadian Press-Harris/Decima survey released Wednesday suggests twice as many Canadians believe Colvin's testimony than believe, as the government states, that he lacks credibility.

The survey found 51 per cent of respondents believed Colvin's statement that prisoners handed over by Canadian soldiers to Afghan authorities were likely abused and that the government knew of the problem.

Twenty-five per cent said they believed the Harper government's assertion that Colvin's claims are flimsy.

Update:

Colvin testimony on detainee torture 'ludicrous': Hillier

Feds bar whistleblower diplomat from handing over torture documents to MPs

but...

Evan Solomon on CBC this afternoon reports that Colvin's lawyer said today that Colvin will give the documents he has to the committee - obviously risking the legal sanctions the Harper government has threatened him with.
 

Quote du Jour: Man Without a Conscience

Hillier minimizes detainee abuse:

Mr. Hillier derisively compared the political uproar that surrounded Mr. Colvin's parliamentary testimony to people “howling at the moon” and said nobody ever raised torture concerns with him during the 2006-2007 period in question.

“I don't remember reading a single one of those cables [from Mr. Colvin] ... He doesn't stick out in my mind,” Mr. Hillier said of the diplomat's warnings and criticism.

“He appears to have covered an incredibly broad spectrum, much of which I'm not sure he's qualified to talk about.”

The former soldier rejected suggestions Canada was “complicit in any war crimes” – saying Ottawa had a responsible system in place. He also played down the fact Afghan prisoners got hurt in jails.

“Even in our own prisons [in Canada] somebody can get beaten up. We know that.”

- The Globe and Mail

At least he didn't call it "fraternity hazing".

But let's get real: the man is lying to cover his ass:

Retired general Rick Hillier, who led Canada's 2006 military foray into southern Afghanistan, joined the Conservatives in dismissing Mr. Colvin's story. He told a Toronto audience Thursday night that he can't recall ever coming across reports from the diplomat, who was a senior Foreign Affairs staffer in Afghanistan for 17 months.

From the Globe and Mail, April 2007:

The Harper government knew from its own officials that prisoners held by Afghan security forces faced the possibility of torture, abuse and extrajudicial killing, The Globe and Mail has learned.

But the government has eradicated every single reference to torture and abuse in prison from a heavily blacked-out version of a report prepared by Canadian diplomats in Kabul and released under an access to information request.

Initially, the government denied the existence of the report, responding in writing that "no such report on human-rights performance in other countries exists." After complaints to the Access to Information Commissioner, it released a heavily edited version this week.

Among the sentences blacked out by the Foreign Affairs Department in the report's summary is "Extrajudicial executions, disappearances, torture and detention without trial are all too common," according to full passages of the report obtained independently by The Globe.

The Foreign Affairs report, titled Afghanistan-2006; Good Governance, Democratic Development and Human Rights, was marked "CEO" for Canadian Eyes Only. It seems to remove any last vestige of doubt that the senior officials and ministers knew that torture and abuse were rife in Afghan jails.

Peter MacKay is Lying About Detainee Abuse

Via the CBC:

Defence Minister Peter MacKay defended his government Thursday in the face of claims that detainees in Afghanistan were routinely abused by Afghan authorities after being handed over by Canadian soldiers.

"There has not been a single, solitary proven allegation of abuse involving a transferred Taliban prisoner by Canadian forces," MacKay said Thursday in the House of Commons.

His comments came a day after Richard Colvin, a former senior diplomat with Canada's Afghanistan mission, dropped a political bombshell on Parliament, alleging that suspects handed over by Canada to Afghan authorities were tortured, and that the government was at best indifferent and at worst tried to cover it up.

Flashback to May, 2007:

Federal opposition parties continued to hammer the Harper government yesterday over the treatment of prisoners in Afghanistan after revelations that the Afghan police beat up a detainee given to them by the Canadian Forces.

Colonel Steven Noonan, a former task-force commander in Afghanistan, disclosed the incident in a Federal Court affidavit that forms part of the government's response to a legal challenge by Amnesty International Canada and the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association to stop all further detainee transfers.

Col. Noonan's sworn evidence was cited by the opposition in Question Period to demonstrate that the Conservative government was far from telling the truth when its members repeatedly denied that they had no specific examples that any detainee transferred by Canadian troops to Afghan authorities was later subject to abuse or torture.

The Canadian military responded by accusing Noonan of lying under oath and then they shut down the story based on "national security" concerns.

And if the Conservatives had any credibility whatsoever, they'd relish the chance to have a public inquiry considering that detainee abuse was also alleged to have occured under the previous Liberal government as well.

This, from the Globe and Mail in 2007:

KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN -- Afghans detained by Canadian soldiers and sent to Kandahar's notorious jails say they were beaten, whipped, starved, frozen, choked and subjected to electric shocks during interrogation.

In 30 face-to-face interviews with men recently captured in Kandahar province, a Globe and Mail investigation has uncovered a litany of gruesome stories and a clear pattern of abuse by the Afghan authorities who work closely with Canadian troops, despite Canada's assurances that the rights of detainees are protected.

Canadian forces regularly hold detainees for a few days of questioning at Kandahar Air Field, then give them to the National Directorate of Security, Afghanistan's feared intelligence police. Over and over, detainees described how Canadians tied their hands with plastic straps, marking the start of nightmarish journeys through shadowy jails and blood-spattered interrogation rooms.

And it's no wonder that Hillier is denying allegations now being made by Colvin since Hillier and former Defence minister Gordon O'Connor allegedly committed war crimes.

This government cannot be trusted to investigate itself. Neither can the military.

It's long past the time for an independent public inquiry.

Related:

Wiki's Canadian Afghan detainee abuse scandal timeline.
 

Quote du Jour: Omar Khadr's Despair

"I always say that I've never seen anyone who's been so abused and so abandoned by so many who should know better."

CSIS ignored Khadr's human rights: report
 

ACLU: Government Ordered to Release Detainee Abuse Photos

From the ACLU's site, a court decision that could have ramifications in Canada:

NEW YORK – A federal court today ordered the Department of Defense to release photographs depicting the abuse of detainees by U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit rejected the government's appeal of a 2006 order directing the Defense Department to release the photos. Today's decision comes as part of an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit seeking information on the abuse of prisoners held in U.S. custody overseas.

"This is a resounding victory for the public's right to hold the government accountable," said ACLU staff attorney Amrit Singh, who argued before the court. "These photographs demonstrate that the abuse of prisoners held in U.S. custody abroad was not aberrational and not confined to Abu Ghraib, but the result of policies adopted by high-ranking officials. Their release is critical for bringing an end to the administration's torture policies and for deterring further prisoner abuse."

Those who followed the Conservative's government's shoddy handling of the detainee abuse file in Afghanistan will recognize that the revelation of these photos could put an abrupt end to earlier claims that detainee abuse was just "Taliban propaganda" which our defence and foreign affairs department, along with the PMO and every single Con MP, used as an excuse to write off real concerns about what our military may have been involved in when it turned over prisoners to the US military (until that was stopped) and then to the Afghan government. Remember the infamous filibuster of committee testimony and the other ridiculous lengths the Cons went to trying to hide the truth? If this court decision is allowed to stand unchallenged and these photos are released, expect yet another house of cards to come crashing down.

 

Afghanistan Detainees: Buckler says she "misspoke"

Sandra Buckler, the PMO spokespuppet, now claims she "misspoke" the other day on the issue of the transfer of Afghanistan detainees. As a Globe & Mail commenter wrote on reading that news:

mispoke (mis spok), vb. 1)the past tense of misspeak; 2) Conservative Idiom, to have lied about something of which their is proof of the contrary. eg. the Conservative gov't. misspoke when it blamed the military for its screw up.

From The G&M article:

OTTAWA — The Harper government's position that it was not aware the military had suspended the transfer of prisoners to Afghan custody fully unravelled Friday as the Prime Minister's communications director retracted comments she had made to that effect, while the Opposition claimed it was briefed on the policy change two weeks ago.

Mr. Harper made no mention of the controversy late Friday in a speech for party supporters to celebrate the Tories' second anniversary in power.

In an e-mail to The Globe and Mail on Thursday, Prime Minister Stephen Harper's communications director, Sandra Buckler, said the military did not tell the government about the suspension.

Ms. Buckler called Friday to say she “misspoke” but would not say whether the military had or had not informed the government.

“I should not have said what I said to you, I misspoke, and I wanted to make sure you were aware of that,” she said. “I made a mistake…what I said was wrong.”

In other words, Harper blamed the military and when that didn't fly, he had his spokespuppet come out to claim she was wrong. The most overused phrase in the next few months will be "operational details".

When the house resumes next week, we'll be bombarded with continuing Conservative party spin and lies. I'm not sure if I'll even be able to stand watching them pose during question period. It's been nauseating enough to this point. No matter what they say however, if it can be proven that these bastards lied in the house, there will be absolutely no reason for them not to face a vote of no-confidence. And, even if that can't be proven, how can anyone in their right mind think they should be trusted to keep running our part in the Afghanistan war?

Would you buy a used car from this bunch of liars?

And yet we're talking about peoples' lives being at risk.

If the opposition parties can't break through on this issue, our democracy is nothing but a farce.
 

Britain's Alberto Gonzales

The Independent reports:

The Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith, is facing accusations that he told the Army its soldiers were not bound by the Human Rights Act when arresting, detaining and interrogating Iraqi prisoners.

Previously confidential emails, seen by The Independent, between London and British military head-quarters in Iraq soon after the start of the war suggest Lord Goldsmith's advice was to adopt a "pragmatic" approach when handling prisoners and it was not necessary to follow the " higher standards" of the protection of the Human Rights Act.

That, according to human rights lawyers, was tantamount to the Attorney General advising the military to ignore the Human Rights Act and to simply observe the Geneva Conventions. It was also contrary to advice given by the Army's senior lawyer in Iraq, who urged higher standards to be met.

Today, rights groups and experts in international law will call on the Government to disclose Lord Goldsmith's legal opinion, which they say could have helped create a culture of abuse of Iraqis by British soldiers.

Who are these heartless men who obviously have no functioning conscience who decide that torturing and abusing human beings is acceptable in any instance - especially considering that the Geneva Conventions have been in place for decades to stop these horrendous practices? And who are the extremely ignorant people who give them promotions as rewards for their unconscionable and illegal opinions? And who are the lawmakers who support these crimes against humanity?

Cowards. They're all cowardly criminals.

Related:
Shami Chakrabarti: We risk the values that make Britain worth defending
An abuse of human rights - and a blot on our integrity
 

40% of US Troops Believe Torture is Justified

This is what happens when a torture-supporting Bush administration won't endorse an all out ban on the practice:

WASHINGTON — More than one-third of U.S. soldiers surveyed in Iraq said they think torture should be allowed if it helps gather important information about insurgents, the Pentagon disclosed Friday. Four in every 10 said they approve of such illegal abuse if it would save the life of a fellow soldier.

They apparently never got the memo that says torture doesn't work.

The Pentagon released these numbers as part of its survey into the mental health problems faced by the troops, but a predisposition to torture would seem to have more to do with whether or not the commander-in-chief and his war cabinet really believe torture is a violation of human rights. This president has not made that clear since he issued a signing statement last fall after the torture bill was passed by congress that, in effect, lets him decide what's acceptable as far as detainee treatement goes. He did not ban torture. He gives it lip service while congress gave CIA agents immunity from prosecution for torturing people. What's a soldier to think in that instance?

...experts said, the new findings raised concern about the possibility of more incidents such as the November 2005 massacre of civilians at Haditha or the mistreatment of detainees at Abu Ghraib as tours grow longer to accommodate the present buildup in forces.

"What it says to me is we should get out of Iraq before a real disaster happens for us," said Cindy Williams, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology researcher who specializes in military-personnel policies. "Iraq is already in chaos, but for us to stay there and continue to wreck our Army over this is a big mistake."

Although the present military strategy emphasizes the need to make the Iraqi populace feel safe, fewer than half of the service members questioned said that all noncombatants should be treated with dignity and respect.

About 10 percent of U.S. service members surveyed reported they had mistreated civilians in Iraq, such as kicking them or damaging their possessions needlessly.

Well, I don't what Williams considered the Abu Ghraib torture to be if not a "real disaster". And since that time, only cosmetic changes have been made to the army's training manual while soldiers who have been in the field far too long - powder kegs just waiting to explode - have never been given a strong enough message that abuse and torture not only violate the Geneva Conventions, but that they are inhumane practices. Period.

At a news conference to discuss the report, Pollock urged that the responses about the use of torture be viewed in the context of the war.

"These men and women have been seeing their friends injured, and I think that having that thought is normal," Pollock said. "But what it speaks to is the leadership that the military is providing, because they're not acting on those thoughts. They're not torturing the people."

How do we know if that's true? We don't. Not in an age where the Pentagon and CENTCOM do everything they can to either lie, fabricate or misinform people about what's really going on in Afghanistan and Iraq. They spend millions on propaganda programs so the public will never know the truth. Just look at how long it took for Vietnam war stories to make it to the public's radar screen. These spokespeople are not to be trusted.

And check out this contradiction:

Pollock acknowledged that the longer tours would increase stress. But in the wake of the report, she said, the military was doing more to train leaders to support troops and reduce stress.

The report recommends that after a deployment, soldiers be given between 18 and 36 months at their home station before being sent overseas again. The demand for soldiers in Iraq, however, has meant that few combat units are allowed to remain home for more than a year.

Pollock acknowledged that, for now, there was no possibility the Army could give soldiers that much time at home.

Ergo, the army is fueling potential Geneva Conventions violations by refusing to treat its soldiers according to what would be in their best interests. The military is creating this nightmare scenario once again.

And just look at how convenient the timing of the release of this report is for Bushco:

The survey was taken between Aug. 28 and Oct. 3, 2006. Although the report was completed in November, months before the decision to extend Army tours, the Pentagon did not release it until Friday.

Why?

So they could back up Bush's so-called surge plan which has only endangered even more lives on all sides.

That's what the so-called "commander guy" thinks of the soldiers doing his dirty work. They're just throwaway pawns. And if the congressional Democrats were able to find a collective spine they would demand that this war cease immediately instead of playing political games with peoples' lives.

The only things anyone can count on in this sorry chapter of imperialistic hubris are that more stories of torture and abuse will come out and that, by the time this so-called president leaves office, the Iraq and Afghanistan wars will still be raging on.

(h/t to Stageleft)
 

Time Magazine Honours Maher Arar

Time Magazine has named its 100 most influential people of 2006 and Canada's Maher Arar is among them in the "Heroes and Pioneers" section.

Vermont Democratic senator Patrick Leahy, who has championed Arar's cause writes for Time:

Maher Arar

By Patrick Leahy

Sending a Canadian technology consultant to be confined in a gravelike cell and tortured did nothing to make Americans safer. A Syrian-born Canadian citizen, Maher Arar, 36, was returning home from a vacation in September 2002 when U.S. federal agents detained him in New York City on suspicion of ties to terrorism. Rather than send him to his home and our close ally, Canada, for interrogation, the U.S. government sent him to Syria, a nation with a history of engaging in torture. A year later he was released. Three years later a Canadian commission found no evidence that Arar had any terrorist connection. The commission also concluded that he was systematically tortured and held under horrendous conditions.

The Bush Administration refuses to acknowledge any responsibility, instead offering the tepid explanation that Syrian officials assured the U.S. that Arar would not be tortured. These are the same Syrian officials with whom our government now says it will not negotiate because they are not trustworthy. Maher Arar's case stands as a sad example of how we have been too willing to sacrifice our core principles to overarching government power in the name of security, when doing so only undermines the principles we stand for and makes us less safe.

Mr Arar responded saying 'he is "very honored" by the distinction, and thanked his supporters during his "struggle for justice." Although his lawsuit against the US government has been dismissed on the grounds of "national security", his lawyers are mounting an appeal.

Meanwhile, in Canada:

OTTAWA -- One of Canada's most respected judges yesterday formed a united front with Maher Arar aimed at lifting a veil of government secrecy around 1,500 words censored from last fall's report into possible Canadian government complicity in Syrian torture.

Counsel acting for Mr. Justice Dennis O'Connor, the author of last fall's more than 800-page report on the Maher Arar affair, yesterday tried to persuade Federal Court Judge Simon Noël to force the government to reveal censored portions of the report. The public is still not allowed to see the blacked-out portion of the report, not even after a $15-million public inquiry that lasted more than three years.

Justice Department lawyers, who argue the government was hardly heavy-handed with its censor's pen, say that it is Ottawa's prerogative to shield portions of inquiry findings for security reasons. Crown lawyer Alain Préfontaine said that fewer than 1,500 words, or less than one half of 1 per cent of the overall Arar Inquiry report, have been censored.

But Paul Cavalluzzo, Judge O'Connor's commission counsel, argued at the Federal Court that "it's not a matter of the quantity of the evidence, it's a matter of the quality of the evidence."

He argued that Canadians need to know the entirety of the judge's report to have faith in government and to keep it accountable.

"The public demands to know what happened, why it happened," Mr. Cavalluzzo argued.

Some of the language surrounding the censored parts of the report appears to indicate that Judge O'Connor might believe that untested intelligence, possibly derived from the torture of a Canadian truck driver then held in the Middle East, may have found its way into RCMP search warrants in early 2002.

(The truck driver, Ahmad El Maati, is a former Afghanistan-based mujahed [holy warrior] who says he was tortured into naming other Canadians, and to being forced to confess to being behind a fake al-Qaeda bomb plot in Ottawa.

Just what, if anything, Canada did with this intelligence has never been made clear; Mr. El-Maati has never been charged with a crime.)

The full text of the search warrants has never been revealed.

There are still many unanswered questions on both sides of the border that, most likely, we'll never know the answers to.

Mr Arar's name surfaced again in parliament this past week during the debates about the allegations of torture launched by several Afghan citizens who had been turned over by Canadian troops to Afghan authorities for imprisonment. Public Safety minister Stockwell Day repeatedly, without any conclusive investigation (many of which are now underway), referred to those claims as being "false". This is the same Day who, in 2002, accused Arar of having possible terrorist ties in parliament. Day was reminded by opposition members that his propensity for jumping to conclusions serves absolutely no one but himself and his party hacks, from the PM on down, who are now using the false equivalency argument that torture allegations are undermining Canadian troops when what's really demeaning to our soldiers is the fact that these conservatives are trying to blow off serious claims by calling all of the individuals involved members of the Taliban (when they don't even know if that's true), seemingly making it okay then to somehow justify their possible torture and diminish their status as human beings with rights.

They did that with Mr Arar too. You'd think that experience would have taught them something.

Mr Arar's inclusion in the "Heroes and Pioneers" section of Time magazine's 100 Most Influential People issue ought to be a very sobering reminder to all (and that includes you, George Tenet) that the use of torture is never justified and that every single case involves a person who does not deserve to be proclaimed guilty before being proved innocent. Far too many victims are never heard from. How many have died? How many are still in secret prisons around the world?

Mr Arar is a symbol for all of the wrongfully accused that have been subject to severe abuse as a result of the overwhelming fearmongering and paranoia that so permeates our societies today thanks to an atmosphere of panic and the unwillingness of those in authority to see past the otherness of people who they believe fit their criminal profiles as defined by their skin colour, religion, political affiliations or beliefs.

During the 40s and 50s, it was the "commies". The 60s and 70s brought attacks against hippies and the anti-Vietnam crowd. The 80s - communists again. And now it's anyone deemed to be a possible "terrorist". There are always people who must be viewed as being less than in order to rationalize their treatment as sub-human subversives by those with the power to demean them. Meanwhile, the lives of countless innocent people are destroyed and sacrificed in order to "protect" the many. Funny though, that when asked for real evidence that the ends really did justify the means, that information is "top secret". In other words, the failure rate and the waste of lives is too high to admit.

Mr Arar lived through his horrendous experience. Who's dying, who's being tortured as we speak today? And who's doing something about it?

Related: Maher Arar's site
 

Day Changes His Story - Again

If you're an Albertan like me, you long ago had your fill of the extremely incompetent Stockwell Day. How that man rose through the ranks of the Conservative party to any position of responsibility is beyond me. His track record is outrageous and he continues to show exactly why he shouldn't be trusted to hold a position of power - especially one that affects the reputation of our country.

After insisting that allegations of torture and abuse were "false" this past week (even though none of the investigations into them had actually either happened or been concluded), we now discover this about Day:

OTTAWA (CP) - The Conservative government conceded Monday that it has received reports from Canadian officials about alleged torture in Afghan jails.

Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day says Corrections Canada officers in Kandahar have heard at least two first-hand allegations of abuse. "Yes, they have actually talked to detainees about the possibility if they were tortured or not," Day said early Monday in response to a reporter's question. "They actually had a couple of incidents where detainees said they were."

It is the first time a senior minister has admitted clearly that Canadian officials were informed of specific abuse allegations. Day said the claims came to light last week when he spoke by phone with staff overseas.

Corrections Canada has had two officers in Kandahar since early February, mentoring Afghan prison guards.

Day said the officers had no evidence to back up the abuse claims, but didn't say if an investigation had been conducted. "The officers saw no physical marks or anything else to substantiate the allegations," he said in a telephone interview late Monday.

There are so many investigations going on now with regards to these allegations that it's hard to keep track of them all. But there's CSI: Stockwell Day asserting again that there's nothing to see here, folks. Just move right along...

The Tories changed their strategy on Monday, toning down their claims that the allegations of abuse were fabricated.

Because they are proven liars. Period.

And check this out from this supposedly accountable "new" government that likes to sit on its high horse of moral superiority:

Liberal deputy leader Michael Ignatieff told the Commons that the government had lost control of the situation and again called for the resignation of Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor, who was not in the Commons on Monday.

His absence renewed a flurry of speculation, which started last week, that O'Connor was about to step down.

Unsolicited, his communications officers issued this terse e-mail note to reporters: "If any of you give credit to the rumour that (the minister of national defence) will resign, (you) will look (stupid). It is not true, he will NOT resign."

I'm sorry but who's really looking "stupid" here? (Nice sense of professionalism those communications officers have.)

O'Connor is Canada's Rumsfeld. Day is Canada's George Tenet. Guergis is Canada's Condi. Van Loan is Canada's Tony Snow. And Peter Mackay is just so bloody clueless that he could match far too many Bushco sycophants to name here.

The difference is that this is Canada and these clowns are a minority government so, thankfully, we don't have to put up with their ignorant hubris any longer than the date of the next election. As far as I'm concerned, they should all go now. You don't screw around with human rights and expect to get off scott free. Our country is supposed to be better than that. Our country is supposed to stand for something - an example of how to do things right oversees while actually respecting people in the process.

What's it going to take to hold these arrogant politicans responsible for what is fast becoming a national disgrace?

Also, via CBC:

Day said the officers had no evidence to back up the abuse claims, but didn't say if an investigation had been conducted.

CBC News spoke to three former prisoners who all say they were mistreated by Afghan authorities, after being handed over by Canadian troops.

They claim they were beaten, and in once case, a guard subjected one man to electric shocks.

And if that isn't enough:

On Monday, Prime Minister Stephen Harper maintained that there was no evidence of abuse.

"As I've said many times, the government takes these allegations seriously," Harper said.

"We have agreements with the government of Afghanistan and also with the Afghan independent human rights commission. The knowledge we have at this point is that those agreements are operating as they should."

Members of the Afghan independent human rights commission were able to examine prison conditions in Kandahar on Monday, although they couldn't talk privately with the detainees.

"The place where these men are being held is not fit for humans," said Shamsudin Taweer, an inspector with the commission. "The conditions are terrible."

He said that inside the prison, 24 men are crammed into two cells. He said some detainees aren't allowed to sleep and that at times, there isn't enough food for everyone.

"In other countries, human rights are respected in prisons," he said. "But in Afghanistan, we don't always treat human rights in the same way."

Enough is enough.

Related: MPs reject NDP call for immediate end to Afghan mission

It's just one long, endless mess.

Need more proof?

KABUL, Afghanistan, April 30 — United States Special Forces said they killed more than 130 Taliban in two recent days of heavy fighting in a valley in western Afghanistan, but hundreds of angry villagers protested in nearby Shindand on Monday, saying dozens of civilians had been killed when the Americans called in airstrikes.
[...]
Forty-nine Taliban fighters, including two leaders of the group, were killed in the first bombardment on Friday, and 87 militants were killed in bombing during a second battle on Sunday that raged for 14 hours, the military said in a statement from the United States-led coalition headquarters at the Bagram air base.

But the local residents said that civilians were killed in the bombardment and that some drowned in the river as they fled, according to a local member of Parliament, Maulavi Gul Ahmad. News agencies reported that demonstrators said women and children were among the dead.

Mr. Ahmad condemned the bombing and said that the fighting angered local residents because the Americans raided their houses at night.

“They should not do that,” he said in a telephone interview. “The number that they claim — that 130 Taliban were killed — is totally wrong. There are no Taliban there.”

Raiding houses touches a nerve in Afghanistan, especially in conservative tribal areas, because the local custom dictates that men who are not family members cannot enter the parts of homes where the women stay. Such raids were upsetting local sensibilities so much several years ago that the American forces made an agreement with the Afghan government that they would not raid houses without the presence of Afghan elders or the police. The Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission says that the agreement is still in effect, but that American troops do not always adhere to it.

So much for any weight being given to agreements with Afghanistan's Human Rights Commission - like the one the Harper government has been touting as the new be all and end all of ensuring the safety and security of the detainees. It's just one big horror show.
 

Afghanistan: The Denials Continue

What the hell is going on?

During question period on Monday, Stockwell Day told parliament that Canadian corrections officers have been monitoring Afghan detainees in that country since February, 2007. That conflicts with what the Afghan ambassador to Canada said just this past weekend:

OTTAWA - Urging an end to the "political circus" over Afghan detainees, Afghanistan's ambassador to Canada says no Canadians, including corrections officers, have monitored treatment of prisoners turned over by Canadian military forces.

However, Ambassador Omar Samad said in a Global National interview that Canadian officials will soon have "unrestricted access" to prisons under an agreement currently being worked out with Canada in the wake of political uproar over alleged torture of detainees.

Samad contradicted assertions by Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day that Corrections Canada officers have been monitoring prisoner treatment - an assertion Day repeated in the Commons Friday, saying they are there "to see if there are cases of torture."

Samad said Corrections Canada officers have for many months, under their mandate to help build Afghan police capacity, had access to some prisons in Afghanistan and may have come across prisoners.

"It doesn't mean those were detention centres of people who were arrested by Canadian forces," Samad said. "So if this has created confusion, I think that we all need to take a step back and define what we're talking about and to bring some clarity to this instead of turning it into a political circus."

"From the Afghan point of view, it's clear there was no followup or monitoring of detainees caught by Canadian forces turned over to Afghans, especially to the NDS (National Directorate of Security) that took place prior to this current time."

Just how long will Day keep lying in the house? And where is O'Connor? He seems to have disappeared.

Day had said Thursday that corrections staff had made 15 visits to Afghan jails. But his spokeswoman, Melissa Leclerc, had said later they have no mandate to monitor prisoner treatment.

On Friday, Day told the Commons "they are there to support the Afghan officers by training them in the work that they do in the prisons and also to ensure, to see if there are cases of torture."

Pure fabrication.

Day needs to resign.

In fact, all of the tories who have spun these allegations since they were brought to light should be turfed immediately. An obviously angry Denis Coderre slammed Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs Helena Guergis for smiling smugly when she answered a question about this situation in the house on Monday. And rightly so.

The Conservatives seem to think this is an opportunity to play political games - claiming they're somehow morally superior to the opposition parties because they are "dealing" with these allegations when they are actually doing everything they can to deny them and to offer political cover for their party colleagues. It's nothing short of disgusting - not to mention inhumane. If we had pictures, this would be their Abu Ghraib moment. They don't seem to get that.

Via the Globe and Mail, we also learn that O'Connor is whining instead of taking responsibility for his duties as defence minister:

Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor has also complained privately that he felt that he was left isolated by other departments on the issue of the detainees.

Is that what qualifies as leadership in this so-called "new" government? No one seems to want to step up to deal with any of this. No wonder they have no idea what's going on.

Meanhwile, in a related story about how this government washes its hands of allegations of torture by other governments, the US Supreme Court refused to hear appeals on Monday on behalf of Canadian Omar Khadr and Salim Ahmed Hamdan (of the Hamdan v Rumsfeld case):

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court declined on Monday to hear an appeal by two Guantanamo prisoners who face trial before a military tribunal and who sought review now of an anti-terrorism law that President George W. Bush pushed through Congress last year.

The high court sided with the Bush administration, which argued that the trials should be allowed to take place first before the two men could bring an appeal.

Justices David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer said they would hear the appeal but it takes four votes for the nine-member Supreme Court to do so.

Just one vote shy. More conservatives who refuse to protect human rights.

And don't expect our tory government to intervene on Khadr's behalf. During question period, Harper and his cronies laughed at an opposition party suggestion that Taliban prisoners be brought to Canada. That would obviously include Khadr as well, despite the fact that he has repeatedly calimed he has been tortured in Gitmo.

The bottom line is that this government just doesn't care. This is all about politics to them and they seem to believe that this track they're on, which is so wildly off the mark, is actually going to boost their shoddy reputations. The more they open their mouths, the more they lie. While it's satisfying to watch their complete and utter ineptitude as they dig themselves deeper into a hole every day, it's also incredibly maddening that it's at the expense of people who are allegedly being abused and tortured. They need to stop immediately and face reality. This isn't going away no matter how hard they wish they could wave their partisan wand to make it so.

Related: The Globe and Mail has a quick review of just some of last week's tory statements:

The government's changing story

Officials of our government will be following up these allegations with officials of the government of Afghanistan.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper on Monday

[We're] taking this matter seriously

Brigadier-General Al Howard on Tuesday

We have heard these allegations. We always take these allegations seriously.

Primer Minister Stephen Harper on Wednesday

... to make that suggestion [of torture] solely based on the allegations of the Taliban, I think is the height of irresponsibility.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper later on Wednesday

If they have a specific name, we'd be happy to have it investigated and chased down.

Government House Leader

Peter Van Loan yesterday

What did the Liberals know about detainee abuse?

La Presse (in French) is reporting that the former Liberal government knew about the mistreatment of Afghan detainees via annual reports between 2003-2005. The 2004 report, according to La Presse, includes allegations of torture by the Afghan police (who were supposed to be trained by war profiteers DynCorp, but weren't) and they were also accused of abusing women and children.

General Rick Hillier signed an agreement with the Afghan government in December, 2005 while the Liberals were still in power so, obviously, there was concern at the time about the handovers - most specifically that the detainess were being turned over to the American forces who did not have a good track record (to say the least).

«De 2002 à 2005, nous avons transféré nos détenus aux Américains. Mais cela est devenu intenable sur le plan politique à cause des histoires de Guantánamo et d'Abou Ghraib. Ces événements et la certitude que les choses allaient mieux dans le système carcéral afghan nous ont convaincus de signer une entente sur le transfert des détenus avec les Afghans», a expliqué cette source libérale.

The Liberal source explains that placing the detainees in the custody of the Americans became untenable after reports of abuse at Gitmo and Abu Ghraib. Therefore, the decision was made to deal directly with the Afghan authorities. As we all know now, the Hillier agreement was woefully inadequate since it offered no oversight of the fate of those detainees.

La Presse is also critical of the Harper government's mishandling of this grave situation and outlines the many contradictions it offered this past week in parliament to try to explain its incompetence. No matter what the Liberals did or did not do about these reports - and they share full responsibility if they didn't pay attention to them - it's now up to this so-called "new" government to fix the situation.

On Saturday, NATO's secretary general announced that his organization will now conduct an investigation as well.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the government in Afghanistan will investigate allegations that Afghan prisoners suspected of fighting for the Taliban have been abused, the head of NATO said on Saturday.

NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, speaking at a security forum in Brussels, praised the decision to investigate allegations that prisoners are being abused after troops hand them over to Afghan authorities.

De Hoop Scheffer said NATO forces are in Afghanistan to "defend universal values," including proper treatment of detainees.

During a NATO foreign ministers' meeting in Oslo on Friday, de Hoop Scheffer stressed that the allegations are not facts and he saw no reason to suspend the transfer of detainees "on the basis of the allegations we have seen."

That's not exactly encouraging considering what the Globe and Mail uncovered:

KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN -- Afghans detained by Canadian soldiers and sent to Kandahar's notorious jails say they were beaten, whipped, starved, frozen, choked and subjected to electric shocks during interrogation.

In 30 face-to-face interviews with men recently captured in Kandahar province, a Globe and Mail investigation has uncovered a litany of gruesome stories and a clear pattern of abuse by the Afghan authorities who work closely with Canadian troops, despite Canada's assurances that the rights of detainees are protected.

Canadian forces regularly hold detainees for a few days of questioning at Kandahar Air Field, then give them to the National Directorate of Security, Afghanistan's feared intelligence police. Over and over, detainees described how Canadians tied their hands with plastic straps, marking the start of nightmarish journeys through shadowy jails and blood-spattered interrogation rooms.

If this was happening to Canadians, the outrage from the ruling Conservatives would be deafening. Instead, they're doing everything they can to take political cover while people are allegedly being tortured. We have a public safety minister (whose portfolio doesn't even cover this area) stating as a fact that these are "false allegations" despite all of the current investigations that have just been launched. We have a defence minister who wouldn't even answer questions at all during question period by the end of last week because he'd made such a damn mess of things. We have a very defensive prime minister whose main concern should be the plight of these people but who's focused on his image instead. We have a completely incompetent bunch of politicians who don't seem to care about anybody but themselves.

As I've written before, this is not a partisan issue. This is a human rights issue and if our country's reputation means anything (not that it isn't already severely suffering because of the way we treat our first nations people - but that's another shameful story), this government ought to be doing everything it possibly can as quickly as possible to ensure the safety of these detainees. Why is that so difficult for these politicians to understand? They need to put their egos aside and get on with it.
 

War Crimes Allegations Against Hillier & O'Connor

Via CTV:

Chief of Staff Gen. Rick Hillier and Defence Minsiter [sic] Gordon O'Connor have both been named in a 14-page letter to the International Criminal Court by Michael Byers of the University of British Columbia and William Schabas, director of the Irish Centre for Human Rights in Galway.

The professors claim "possible war crimes" have been committed by Hillier and O'Connor, resulting from the prisoner transfer agreement between Canada and Afghanistan, and have asked the ICC to investigate.

More via the Globe and Mail:

The chief of Canadian defence has dismissed calls that he and Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor be investigated for “possible war crimes” in light of revelations Afghan prisoners handed to the local authorities are being abused.

General Rick Hillier dismissed the letter, sent to the International Criminal Court, during an appearance on CTV's Canada AM on Thursday.

“First of all, much attention has been paid to what is a very, very small part of our mission,” Gen. Hillier said. “I concentrate on setting our young men and women up for success . . . on reducing the risk to them.

“So I just let the theatrics, if you will, of these kinds of things go on around me. I've got a job to do. I'm going to do that job.”

"Theatrics"...."a very, very small part of our mission".

Since when is protecting the rights of detainees, which is required under the Geneva Conventions, something to be minimized? Once again, Hillier's absolute arrogance is on display for all to see.

In March, Hillier said he had "no regrets" about the 2005 detainee agreement he signed with the Afghan government - an agreement we now know was so fundamentally flawed and inferior to those signed by other countries that it offered no protections to the detainees handed over to Afghan officials.

In fact, this story in the Globe and Mail earlier this week shows exactly why the continual trail of lies told by our so-called defence minister Gordon O'Connor is so damaging to all involved:

The Harper government knew from its own officials that prisoners held by Afghan security forces faced the possibility of torture, abuse and extrajudicial killing, The Globe and Mail has learned.

But the government has eradicated every single reference to torture and abuse in prison from a heavily blacked-out version of a report prepared by Canadian diplomats in Kabul and released under an access to information request.

Initially, the government denied the existence of the report, responding in writing that "no such report on human-rights performance in other countries exists." After complaints to the Access to Information Commissioner, it released a heavily edited version this week.

Among the sentences blacked out by the Foreign Affairs Department in the report's summary is "Extrajudicial executions, disappearances, torture and detention without trial are all too common," according to full passages of the report obtained independently by The Globe.

The Foreign Affairs report, titled Afghanistan-2006; Good Governance, Democratic Development and Human Rights, was marked "CEO" for Canadian Eyes Only. It seems to remove any last vestige of doubt that the senior officials and ministers knew that torture and abuse were rife in Afghan jails.

On Wednesday, O'Connor insisted that Canada now has a new agreement with the Afghanistan government that would allow members of the RCMP and Corrections Canada to monitor detainee treatment in Afghanistan. During question period on Thursday however, Stephen Harper said "no formal agreement" has been signed yet.

First that was the ICRC's job. Then the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission was supposed to oversee their treatment. Now, it's the RCMP. Who's next?

Murky, shady, shifty and completely incompetent.

A very defensive Harper also tried his damn best during question period to accuse the opposition parties of disrespecting the troops by bringing up allegations of detainee abuse - a handy Bushco tactic. Don't like questions? Just attack the questioner's patriotism and insist they're attacking the troops. Don't like allegations? Claim they're false (repeatedly) even before they're investigated (and there are 4 investigations currently underway). Stockwell Day even had the nerve to repeat the Rumsfeld talking point that detainees are taught to lie about abuse. If that's what this tory government believes, why are they even investigating?

This should not be a partisan matter. If Canada's military is involved in possible war crimes, if detainees handed over by our soldiers are being abused, tortured or executed, if the Geneva Conventions have been violated, this government owes all Canadians a serious dose of humility - not defensiveness - and a promise to act on this country's behalf to resolve this situation as soon as possible while leaving no stone unturned in order to get to the truth. These tories seem to forget that they work for us and that their jobs require them to work for all of us and that means they need to get past playing politics - now - before more people suffer and die.

There are peoples' lives on the line here.

Both Hillier and O'Connor must be held to account. If this government won't do its job, perhaps a war crimes investigation at The Hague will, but we have to ask ourselves if that's what we've been reduced to - a country that refuses to take responsibility for its actions during a time of war.


Related: Irish Centre for Human Rights
Michael Byers, UBC (bio/contact info)