Recognizing the Canadian Friends of Torture

The Villains Who Torture and Their Canadian Friends

by John McNamer - Media with Conscience

The information about "brutal" CIA torture programs just "revealed" by a U.S. Senate committee has been widely known and well documented over much of the past decade and this information has been provided many times to responsible Canadian officials, who chose to ignore.

These responsible officials include the Governor General/Commander-in-Chief; Attorney General/Justice Minister; Prime Minister, and opposition party leaders; Minister of Defence; Minister of Foreign Affairs; Royal Canadian Mounted Police; Privy Council; Military Police Complaints Commission; Provost Marshall; Canadian Forces National Investigation Service, and the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada.

All have remained silent, failing to exercise their various unique legal responsibilities under terms of the Geneva Conventions and the Rome Statute, and related Canadian law. In large part due to this dark blanket of repressed denial which somehow covers all of Ottawa -- and by extension the rest of Canada -- Canadians will likely not be hearing much about the CIA torture report, even though it is a blockbuster worldwide story with large legal implications for many governments and individuals.

Torture has been a dead issue in Canada since the Harper Government's successful derailment, with heavy-handed intimidation tactics, of all legitimate attempts to investigate. This included threatened prosecution for the release of torture evidence such as the detailed information Canadian diplomat in Afghanistan, Richard Colvin, attempted to bring forward in 2009, as well as the unilateral axing of a parliamentary inquiry into torture complicity when the Harper Government was able to achieve a majority at election.

Colvin had said in remarks to a parliamentary committee that all detainees which Canadian soldiers transferred for years to Afghan authorities likely ended up being tortured – even though many were possibly innocent. Colvin also described a startling pattern of indifference and obstruction to his attempts to warn higher ups of what was happening in 2006 and 2007.

Former foreign service officer, Richard Colvin

He went on to say Canada`s "complicity in torture" ultimately thwarted its military aims in the Afghan province of Kandahar. Colvin was prepared to hand over documents in support of his statements on instructions from the House of Commons, but was stopped by threats of prosecution from officials of the Harper government.

In recent years there have been very substantial documentations of Canada’s illegal behaviors over the past decade. Most notable is the UN Committee Against Torture’s 2012 condemnation of Canada’s “complicity in torture” and flawed detainee handover policies.

Also notable are the naming of Canada as a primary collaborator in the CIA extraordinary rendition program by the UN Special Rapporteur in 2009; a 2012 UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan report documenting widespread harsh torture of detainees by Afghan NDS security forces -- Canada's mission in Afghanistan transferred detainees either to the U.S. or the Afghans -- and The Rendition Project study in 2013, which said Canada was second only to the U.S. of countries visited by aircraft associated with the rendition program.

What's interesting now for Canadians is that unlike the U.S., Canada is a full signatory to the Rome Statute, which specifies jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC) and specifically outlaws torture and complicity in torture.

I have submitted these documentations and many others to the chief prosecutor at the International Criminal Court, asking for a formal investigation of Canada’s complicity in torture. This request has been given a file number and prosecutors are currently examining it, promising to communicate their decision when it is reached, and reasons for the decision.


An article containing links to the full request to the ICC and all supporting documents can be found here:
http://www.mwcnews.net/focus/letters-to-editors/48430-canada-detainee-torture.html

John McNamer is an independent journalist and human rights activist in Kamloops, British Columbia. A Canadian citizen, he was awarded the Bronze Star Medal for service with the U.S. Army's 4th Infantry Division in Vietnam.