Canada Complicit in TORTURE

Quote:

All detainees transferred by Canadians to Afghan prisons were likely tortured by Afghan officials and many of the prisoners were innocent, says a former senior diplomat with Canada's mission in Afghanistan.

Appearing before a House of Commons committee Wednesday, Richard Colvin blasted the detainees policies of Canada and compared them with the policies of the British and the Netherlands.

The detainees were captured by Canadian soldiers then handed over to the Afghan intelligence service, called the NDS.

Colvin said Canada was taking six times as many detainees as British troops and 20 times as many as the Dutch.

He said unlike the British and Dutch, Canada did not monitor their conditions; took days, weeks or months to notify the Red Cross; kept poor records; and to prevent scrutiny, the Canadian Forces leadership concealed this behind "walls of secrecy."

"As I learned more about our detainee practices, I came to a conclusion they were contrary to Canada's values, contrary to Canada's interests, contrary to Canada's official policies and also contrary to international law.

That is, they were un-Canadian, counterproductive and probably illegal.

kropotkin wrote:

This report implies that our PMO is complaisant in war crimes and if true it is a very very serious accusation

There should be calls to action going out about this to MP's......as a bolster to this:

Quote:

The opposition is calling for a full public inquiry into explosive allegations that all Afghan detainees taken by Canadian soldiers in Kandahar were knowingly sent to local jails where they were certainly tortured.

The revelations came when senior diplomat Richard Colvin testified before a House of Commons committee Wednesday that abuse of prisoners was the "standard operating procedure" of local authorities that top Canadian bureaucrats and military officials turned a blind eye for more than a year beginning in 2006 while he tried to bring his troubling findings to the attention of his superiors.

"Rather than investigate allegations in full, the Conservative government has only attacked his credibility. It's outrageous that the government would question his judgement," said NDP foreign affairs critic Paul Dewar.

"The only way to get to the bottom of this is a full public inquiry. The women and the men of the Canadian Forces deserve nothing less."

List of MP's with email addresses

NoDifferencePartyPooper wrote:

I am charmed by the way the MSM, pretends they haven't heard the detainee torture story before and that this is "news".

That's good! Keep this story fresh in the minds of Canadians. Hopefully this will turn enough Canadian voters in the next federal election so that the Cons[ervatives] will be voted out of office!

Quote:

"We are being asked to accept testimony from people who throw acid in the faces of schoolchildren and who blow up buses of civilians in their own country," Mr. MacKay told the Commons.(Globe & Mail)

Gulbuddin Heymatyar was infamous for throwing acid in the faces of women at the University of Kabul! He was the recipient of billions in aid from the CIA and Saudis in the 1980's during their anticommunist jihad!

And now Pete Mackay's bosses in Warshington and London are offering Hekmatyar a power sharing role in Karzai's government!

Someone should tell Pete Mackay that his imperialist masters aided and abetted the throwing of acid in women's faces not so long ago.

Fidel wrote:

Quote:

"We are being asked to accept testimony from people who throw acid in the faces of schoolchildren and who blow up buses of civilians in their own country," Mr. MacKay told the Commons.(Globe & Mail)

 

Gulbuddin Heymatyar was infamous for throwing acid in the faces of women at the University of Kabul! He was the recipient of billions in aid from the CIA and Saudis in the 1980's during their anticommunist jihad!

 

And now Pete Mackay's bosses in Warshington and London are offering Hekmatyar a power sharing role in Karzai's government!

 

Someone should tell Pete Mackay that his imperialist masters aided and abetted the throwing of acid in women's faces not so long ago.

Not only that, but Peter MacKay makes the assumption that these prisoners were "Taliban". An assumption that has yet to be proven.

Gulbuddin Hekmatyar does not belong to a member organization of the Taliban. He is the commander of an insurgent group known as the Hezb-i-Islami Gulbuddin or the HIG Hekmatyar network. Hekmatyar and and his network usually operates on its own. Hekmatyar and his HIG network usually operates in northeast Afghanistan, not Kandahar province, south Afghanistan.

[url=http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/many-detainees-were-just-farme... detainees were just local farmers[/color][/url]

Quote:

In fact, Amrullah Saleh, chief of Afghanistan's National Directorate of Security, told Canadians most prisoners were later released – meaning they weren't likely high-value captures, according to the memo.

Mr. Saleh told Canadians that rank-and-file soldiers weren't very good at identifying the bad guys when rounding up suspects. “He suggested that, in general, conventional forces are not necessarily the best instrument for identifying high-value combatants … most of those detained by Canadian forces, he guessed, would subsequently have been released,” Mr. Colvin wrote in a memo.

Overall, though, I'm guessing that the locals are overwhelmingly grateful to their Canadian saviours for building schools etc.

The U.S. offers bounties to those who bring in "Al-Qaeda" and "Taliban" "terrorists". Anyone wanting to make a quick buck can either make a "citizen's arrest" or "finger" (along with two, or more, others who bear false witness) a totally innocent person to U.S. or Canadian or other NATO/ISAF troops (think Afghans can tell them apart, or care? They're all hated feringhees or foreigners or "Americans" to them.) Off to Bagram prison for them.

Anyone seen "Taxi to the Dark Side"?

Where's the petition to see charges laid against Hillier, Harper and MacKay? I want to sign.

Tigana wrote:

Unionist wrote:

Overall, though, I'm guessing that the locals are overwhelmingly grateful to their Canadian saviours for building schools etc.

Unionist, is this an ironic comment?

Yes.

Frmrsldr wrote:

The U.S. offers bounties to those who bring in "Al-Qaeda" and "Taliban" "terrorists". Anyone wanting to make a quick buck can either make a "citizen's arrest" or "finger" (along with two, or more, others who bear false witness) a totally innocent person to U.S. or Canadian or other NATO/ISAF troops (think Afghans can tell them apart, or care? They're all hated feringhees or foreigners or "Americans" to them.) Off to Bagram prison for them.

Anyone seen "Taxi to the Dark Side"?

In Afghan tribal culture, revenge doesn't always involve direct violence. Many of the innocent victims of false terrorism charges are simply fingered due to domestic or financial disputes. 

Another example of culturally insensitive American expediency being utilised by Afghans to settle scores. As in Iraq, American policies have turned the population against them. The sad part is that Canada's feeble aid efforts are marginalised by a tribal culture that does not differentiate between occupying nationalities - they are all enemies.

Lard Tunderin Jeezus wrote:

Where's the petition to see charges laid against Hillier, Harper and MacKay? I want to sign.

Why stop there? The whole pack of 'I didn't see that email' jowly porkers in expensive suits should walk the plank.

Lard Tunderin Jeezus wrote:

Where's the petition to see charges laid against Hillier, Harper and MacKay? I want to sign.

In his book, (just out) A Soldier First: Bullets, Breaucrats and the Politics of War, tricky Rick attempts to cover his ass on the earlier controversy, and plows on in singularly insensitive fashion:

"Things had changed after spring 2006, however, when we moved south of Kandahar and our soldiers would often take prisoners after firefights with Taliban or in other operations...the decision was made...that the right thing to do was transfer prisoners to the Afghans and let the Afghan judicial system, fledgling though it may have been, handle them. After all, Afghanistan is a sovereign country and, almost without exception, it was Afghans that we were detaining."

Hillier writes - in classic Blimp fashion: "We thought we had a good process in place, although obviously it was not perfect. Eventually - no surprise - people back in Canada started squawking about the issue. Opposition politicians and several specific individuals were trying to spin the story for their own purposes, and the result was that screaming newspaper headline insinuating that Canadian soldiers were abusing detainees."

He continues: "This suggestion that Canadian soldiers were not abiding by the laws of war coincided with complaints that the Afghans were abusing some of those handed to them. Their judicial and prison systems were still somewhat nascent, and there was always some risk that abuse would occur. That, unfortunately, is not abnormal in failed states and occurs even in solid countries like Canada. After indications that some abuse might have occurred (ed. the Globe pointed out that it had) the CF felt it was a necessity to have Candian officials make regular, unannounced visits to Afghan prison to ensure the people we transferred were being treated humanely. "

He plows on, about the Manley Report of January 2008 and the "improvements in prison infrastructure and Afghan police training..." But, of course, the general's concerns came late, after admitting that, yes, shit happens.  Which makes the sounds from the government benches these days, expressions of pure flatulence.  

Unionist wrote:

canuquetoo wrote:

The sad part is that Canada's feeble aid efforts are marginalised by a tribal culture that does not differentiate between occupying nationalities - they are all enemies.

Ah, tribal culture - so that's why those Afghans aren't thanking us...

Whassamadda? Fish not biting? You run out of friends to chat with in your 'the Afghan people will win' fantasy world?

You're pushing it. 

How about some substantive comments instead of this trash. 

This person has caused a lot of Canada's problems in recent times, and he needs to be taken down a notch or three. 

Hillier as Chief of the Defence Staff

On February 4 2005, he became Chief of the Defence Staff. At the change-of-command ceremony he repeated his call, more broadly, for increased military funding. "In this country, we could probably not give enough resources to the men and women to do all the things that we ask them to do," he said, with Prime Minister Paul Martin and Defence Minister Bill Graham looking on. "But we can give them too little, and that is what we are now doing. Remember them in your budgets."[5] His willingness to speak openly and on the record about the Canadian Forces' financial resources, and about the Defence budget in particular, distinguishes Hillier from previous Chiefs of the Defence Staff.[citation needed]

After his appointment, Hillier maintained a very high profile, frequently talking with the media and arguing his case for defence planning. He has been called the most prominent Chief of the Defence Staff in decades, with popularity not just in the military, but among a broad spectrum of Canadian civilians.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Hillier

Frmrsldr wrote:

Anyone remember the Euro classic movies "Battle of Algiers" and "Z"?

Absolutely - I even watched Battle of Algiers very recently for the first time in decades - would love to see Z again, it had a major influence on my world view at the time. You're quite right, today's events are a case of nature imitating art. Nothing much has changed.

Canuquetoo get off your high horse.  While I wouldn't necessarily characterize you as "Islamiphobe", at least based on this thread, your remarks about "Afghan tribal culture" reek of white western privlige and superiority. Stop it.  If you don't like unionists posts don't read them.

The image that you refer to as "the dude in the hoody" has become a symbol for the issue of torture by western forces in Iraq.  I'm a bit shocked anyone would not be familiar with it.

Google Abu Ghraib and just look at images. A picture is worth a thousand words. See what's been done in our name. Tribalism indeed.

Lies based on lies based on lies. The entire setup often looks so utterly corrupted that the nazipoohs can race around knocking over fax like they was bowling pins (and the nazipoohs themselves bowlingballs) w/out worrying what the OPPOSITION says- and get this: the media is liberal, so whattaya expect?  Meanwhile, on cbc's 'Ideas' the other evening Paul Kennedy was talking with some phony liberal frontman named 'Wolf' who is selling a doorstopper ('the case for liberalism'?) and ...well, didya know the junyer Kristol is a 'romantic' for thinking western democracy/freedom can be transplanted to Iraq/Afghanistan etc via shock'n'awe warfare? And the geebush admin was the most 'conservative' in US history? And liberal ignatief knows that terrorism has got to be fought, which hamstrings his criticisms (and nevermind that the US, Britain and Israel- along with their puppet states re saudia arabia- spend two thirds of entire global military budget, whilst 'alciada' doesn't even have a state base to operate in)... How do you fight such seamless dishonesty? It's a plain fact they say, that the 'war' in Afghanistan has been going on for 'generations' according to the talkers on 'Sunday Edition' (actually, Afghanistan was easily one of freest places on earth up until late 70's-there was a huge 'hippie' colony there of western expats- and that was while it was considered under the Soviet umbrella...the carter cia then began funding the 'muhajadeen'in order to ruin the USSR, which the MSM has been celebrating recently, as if nobody recalls the real history)

If the liars weren't so untterly despicable, there'd be no inspiration to carry on, imho. The people really seem bovine indifferent, or overwhelmed.

canuquetoo wrote:

Unionist wrote:

NorthReport wrote:

You're pushing it. 

How about some substantive comments instead of this trash. 

He's an Islamophobic troll, not worth responding to - I forgot for a moment, and I apologize for commenting on one of his posts.

 

 

When was the trial? Or, in your world, is a trial is an unnecessary nuisance when it conflicts with your agenda?

I thought labeling was contrary to babble policy, or is that policy also only  reserved for those who do not drink from your poisoned chalice?

The intent to paint me an "Islamophobic troll" contrary to any evidence or even the courtesy of asking my position is simply a disingenuous attempt to frame my stance on issues in an unfavourable light that, if repeated often enough, will have me banned.

Your alarcity, unionist, to use foul play to furthur your biases stand in stark contrast with your perpetual claim to all the moral high ground. Your reach exceeds your grasp and, it does you no justice.

Hey, Canuqetoo, this is just par for Babble. Trolls and trash if you're not one of "them" and like unionist said - "not worth responding to". Don't know what's wrong with calling a tribe a tribe.

canuquetoo wrote:

What is the symbolism of the dude in the hoody?

Torture and abuse of prisoners by Americans at Abu Ghraib, Iraq. Remember Pvt. Lindy England? If not, watch the DVD "Taxi to the Dark Side", if you have the opportunity.

Frmrsldr wrote:

canuquetoo wrote:

What is the symbolism of the dude in the hoody?

Torture and abuse of prisoners by Americans at Abu Ghraib, Iraq. Remember Pvt. Lindy England? If not, watch the DVD "Taxi to the Dark Side", if you have the opportunity.

oldgoat wrote:

Canuquetoo get off your high horse.  While I wouldn't necessarily characterize you as "Islamiphobe", at least based on this thread, your remarks about "Afghan tribal culture" reek of white western privlige and superiority. Stop it.  If you don't like unionists posts don't read them.

 Sure, I'll get off my high horse, at least its not a pompous jackass I'm riding. I'm no Islamophobe at all, differentiating between all religions and the use of religion to furthur political goals through violence, INCLUDING THE USE OF CHRISTIANITY TO FOMENT DISTRUST OF ISLAM [ sorry, but i need to shout that part].The unseemly haste with which violence is embraced in the name of religion cannot be laid at the feet of religion itself but it can be laid at the feet of those who espouse violence to furthur secular goals.

  My remarks about "Afghan tribal culture" are presented in the context of the full force of western imperialism attempting to impose a central government upon distinct tribal cultures that have their own dispute mechanisms based upon jirgas and sharia law. As far as "reeking of white western privilege and superiority" is concerned, its bs. Far from feeling privileged and superior, I admire and respect the common sense dispute resolutions and the tenacity with which these peoples defend their interests. Perhaps you can enlighten me as to the politically correct non-reeking terminology

The image that you refer to as "the dude in the hoody" has become a symbol for the issue of torture by western forces in Iraq.  I'm a bit shocked anyone would not be familiar with it.

 Well, I'm not familiar with it, that why I asked. I thought it striking but not definative. No disrespect intended -I figured it simply someone's artwork.

Google Abu Ghraib and just look at images. A picture is worth a thousand words. See what's been done in our name. Tribalism indeed.

I know about Abu Ghraib just not the connection to the graphic.  Done in our name? Not in mine  -  I'm not taking any ownership of American war crimes - although I may have to take ownership of Canadian ones if the truth can ever be forced from the lying bastards.

Thanks for the lecture. I'm an ordinary progressive Canadian, not a PhD of political correctness. 

By the way, I hear over CBC radio that now Walt Natynczyk has weighed in saying that yep, Canadian Forces have had to from time to time stop handing over prisoners. (That's all I caught).

George Victor wrote:

People get excited here, canuquetoo, and forget others would like to join in without fear. My use of "tribal" (once) has led me to shun the word hereabouts - even though it was used in the most innocuous fashion.  It is too bad, since it's  very difficult to discuss some events without its use. But those events are never discussed, because the politically correct will not let one get farther than our imperial past. We are bound to wear that damned bird around our necks forever, and never come to grips with the new reality of the new "imperialisms" on the rise. We created them, you see, and now have to do penance (well, not we, but our forbears) and never ever forget.

I can only paraphrase Orwell: 'all pigs are equal but some pigs are more equal than others' when I ponder babble policy de jure and babble policy de facto.

While lurking, I thought babble was an interesting place for an inquiring mind  but after dealing with unionist's relentless non-sequitur that disagreeing with his position equals disagreeing with the anti-war movement and experiencing oldgoat's dedication to inclusiveness and diversity, the potential here for open discussion seems limited.

After spending good money on Pervez Musharraf's self-serving autobiography, I wouldn't waste the breath needed to stand at the till to purchase Hillier's drivel. I did, however, get good value for the amount spent to purchase Sarah Chayes' excellent work: The Punishment of Virtue which goes into some detail about the tribal culture of southern Afghanistan and the intricacies of inter-tribal relations. This, plus reading South Asian papers online, is the basis for my arguments that American policy is counterproductive and harming efforts to form a central government because Afghans have tribal based cultures that do not lend themselves to centralised control.

This umbrage at the usage of "tribal" is a strawman to use as another club against any poster with the temerity to challenge the ideology of the more extreme element of babble.

For the moderators, de facto enforcement of policy is more the convenience of moving the saltbowl to regulate those who sit below the salt (with apologies to Thomas B. Costain) than principled enforcement of policy de jure.

canuquetoo wrote:

Thanks for a simple answer to a simple question. I am well aware of Abu Ghraib but not the symbolism.

When news of the torture broke, it was the result of the release of the Abu Ghraib torture photos, the hooded man being one of them. Photos and motion picture images were taken by U.S. Army prison guards with their cell phones and camcorders. Some of the torture was extracurricular activity that the soldiers did for their "amusement". Behavior that was endorsed by then U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld in his infamous "Torture Memo".

Concerning this particular photograph, the hood was used as a blindfold - part of sensory deprivation. The man could have been exposed to loud heavy metal music or the drone of the fans that made the prison cells uncomfortably cold (many were in fact, subjected to this). Temperature was varied from uncomfortably cold to uncomfortably warm.

This particular man was forced to stand on a box with his arms outstretched in the manner as you can see by the image, for hours. This is called a "stress position". Wires were placed on his fingers of both hands. I believe a wire was also placed around his penis. He was ordered to maintain this position. He was also told (in this particular case actually not true) that if he changed his position, the movement would be sensed by the wires and that he would be shocked by jolts of electricity.

This and in other sickening ways, is how amateur "prison guards" at Abu Ghraib, Iraq and Bagram, Afghanistan prisons (keep in mind, before the treaty Gen. Rick Hillier signed with the Karzai government concerning the handing of PoWs to Afghan authorities, the Canadian military handed Afghan PoWs to the U.S. Like the U.S., the Canadian military took a dragnet approach and captured large numbers of prisoners - all to please the Bush administration and the Pentagon) amused themselves.

All in the name of fighting the" War on of Terror".