Detainee abuse incident renews debate in House
Last Updated: Monday, December 7, 2009 11:01 PM ET Comments0Recommend1
CBC News
A previously known incident of abuse of a detainee by Afghan policemen was raised in the House of Commons on Monday as evidence of serious problems in Canada's handling of prisoners.
"What kind of government, what kind of Canadian government, refuses to act on credible accusations of torture — evidence of torture, in this case, evidence provided by Canadian Forces?" Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff said during question period.
In June 2006, a joint Canadian-Afghan operation in Zangabad village, about 40 kilometres southwest of Kandahar city, netted several prisoners. The Afghan National Police eventually took custody of the prisoners, all of whom were freed except one. That man was beaten by a group of five or six local ANP members.
The details were recorded in notes taken by Canadian soldiers in the field and were among documents submitted as part of a Federal Court action in which Amnesty International and the B.C. Civil Liberties Association sought to stop further prisoner transfers.
The notes reveal Canadian soldiers took custody of the prisoner, provided medical treatment and eventually handed him to provincial ANP. The incident was first outlined in a May 2007 affidavit by Col. Steven Noonan, the first Canadian Task Force-Afghanistan commander.
On Monday, the federal government said those reports reveal nothing nefarious was going on — at least not involving a detainee held by Canadians.
'Not a Canadian detainee'
"The Afghan in question was not a Canadian detainee, and our men and women in uniform did the right thing," Transport Minister John Baird said.
Baird's distinction is based on a legal question about whether a detainee caught by Canadian soldiers during a joint Canadian-Afghan operation is a Canadian detainee, as opposed to a prisoner caught by Canadian soldiers and transferred to Afghan authorities later.
When the incident first broke in May 2007, the government stressed that the prisoner was never a Canadian detainee. But the field notes obtained by CBC News indicate the soldiers on the ground didn't make that distinction, nor did Noonan who testified before the Federal Court.
"I think it's frankly outrageous," said NDP defence critic Jack Harris, "that ministers would get up in the House and essentially say that sworn evidence of soldiers, generals and contemporaneous notes of soldiers, are in fact lies."