Inkless Wells

Paul Wells on all the latest out of Ottawa—along with the occasional post about jazz. Follow Paul on Twitter: @InklessPW

Categories: Capital Read, Inkless Wells

Torture: the Liberals knew?

by Paul Wells on Wednesday, January 13, 2010 4:48pm - 79 Comments

The question mark is there only because I haven’t had time to go through all this, and won’t today, but our friends at The Torch are involved so I’m inclined to give it some credence. Aaron links to the details. Does this mean we should have an inquiry into the treatment of detainees going back to before the Conservatives formed the government? Sure. Absolutely. An inquiry with terms of reference that stretch from 2002 to 2007 sounds good to me.

Tags: Afghanistan, torture, turnabout, war

More by Paul Wells

http://intensedebate.com/people/Scott_Tribe Scott_Tribe

Ignatieff is on record as supporting an inquiry with those timelines.

http://intensedebate.com/people/psiclone psiclone

I never heard Iggy saying such!

http://intensedebate.com/people/Scott_Tribe Scott_Tribe

Check Hansard.
http://intensedebate.com/people/Scott_Tribe Scott_Tribe

Check Hansard.

Actually, just see for yourself:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXva041DJ0g
Lord Kitchener's Own

Well, I don't know if Ignatieff was physically in the House when the vote was held, but the Liberals voted with the NDP and Bloc (146-129) to hold an inquiry with precisely this timeline in its terms of reference.

You may not remember hearing Ignatieff discuss this on T.V., but voting in favour of it on the floor of the House of Commons is arguably a higher standard of "on record" than that anyway.

http://intensedebate.com/people/Scott_Tribe Scott_Tribe

As the youtube vid shows, he did indeed discuss it in the H of C.

Lord Kitchener's Own

Yes, and thanks for that. I must have been writing my comment while you were posting yours.

Lord Kitchener's Own

In addition to Scott's link, there's this Ignatieff quote from the online Hansard:

This is not a partisan exercise because we are prepared on this side of the House for the inquiry to examine the whole length of the mission in Afghanistan beginning in 2001 under the previous Liberal government.

DPT

he's bluffing

Lord Kitchener's Own

Given that the vote's already been held, that's a pretty big bluff.

Lord Kitchener's Own

For the record, an inquiry stretching back to 2002 sounds good to the Liberals and the other opposition parties too right? That is what they voted for isn't it?

Personally, I've always thought we should have an inquiry that covers the entire length of the mission. The Tories are by no means solely to blame for what transpired in Afghanistan, in fact, there are positive things they did that are to their credit, just like there are likely negative things that happened under the Liberals that need to be exposed and admonished.

catherine

The Tories are by no means solely to blame for what transpired in Afghanistan

Agreed. The Tories are solely to blame for the cover up, though. They've done everything they could to prevent an inquiry, and it would seem even went so far as to prorogue Parliament until March to avoid this issue (as none of the other excuses make any sense).
http://intensedebate.com/people/janicemaerose janicemaerose

Agreed that the inquiry should go back and expose all government weaknesses in this area with the aim of learning and moving forward. The big current issue is the Tory cover-up by whatever undemocratic means possible.

http://intensedebate.com/people/robert_mccl6309 Robert McClelland

Hey, so now conservatives are accusing our troops of war crimes.
http://intensedebate.com/people/Tidewaters Chrystal Ocean

Agree with Paul Wells. Glad to hear Iggy supports those dates for an inquiry.
Mark R

From The Torch.
"One wonders why the current media "cover-up" continues concerning what the Liberal government knew and when they knew it."

Lord Kitchener's Own

We ought to have a public inquiry to uncover anything that's been covered up, and dealing with the entirety of the mission under BOTH the Tories AND the Liberals. An inquiry just like the House of Commons voted for (146-129) over a month ago.
kcm

Ah the new Tory TPs have arrived…but by allmeans lets go back as far as necessary. It could even change the way foreign policy is conducted in this country – out with the secrecy i say!

http://intensedebate.com/people/Crit_Reasoning Crit_Reasoning

In the worst case scenario, Ignatieff can always hang Paul Martin out to dry for his politically motivated decision to transfer detainees to Afghans rather than Americans. Ignatieff doesn't have much to lose personally, even if a wide-ranging investigation exposes the fact that it was a Liberal government that created this mess in the first place, and anti-American political considerations trumped diplomatic warnings of potential abuse.

Instead, the focus will be on why the Conservatives took so long to fix this Liberal debacle. They acted in 2007, when they should have acted in 2006.

Lord Kitchener's Own

I'm still not totally convinced that their actions in 2007 were nearly sufficient, but otherwise I pretty much agree with everything you wrote there CR.
http://intensedebate.com/people/Ricard_S_Argent Richard_S_Argent

From a purely political perspective (as distasteful as it is to focus on), I can think there are worse things for Ignatieff than being able to distance himself from Chretien/Martin. It would appear however, that the whole enterprise will rest on whether they can capitalize on the Party Renewal, Thinker's Conference thing and being able to convincingly argue that this is not your daddy''s Liberal Party.
http://intensedebate.com/people/psiclone psiclone

maybe both CPC'ers and LPC'ers are being taken for a ride and neither Harper nor Iggy would really go full blown on this – in the meantime a very usefull issue with repsect to each party's base who knows
http://intensedebate.com/people/Jenn_ Jenn_

I agree with everything except the anti-American political considerations trumped diplomatic warnings of potential abuse. I did a quick google (yahoo) and got over three million hits, most similar to this one
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2004/jun/23/usa.a…
So I think it was more than "anti-American political considerations" it was "warnings of potential abuse"
http://intensedebate.com/people/SirJohn_Eh SirJohn_Eh

I think the focus would again mainly be on why they took steps to cover up and avoid, abusing the convention of proroguing, making phony excuses for proroguing, diminishing Parliaments power in relation to PM's…..and using tactics of making it an issue of supporting troops or not, and the whole trashing of Colvin, etc. etc.
Hopefully these issues will stay close to the fore in the months leading up to any invest. which so far is not in the works, and I dont think is coming any time soon.

Andre

Those are P.R. issues, not political or legal issues. I have no appreciable understanding of Harper's PR tactics but they seem to work.

Mike T.

Sounds about right and I'm glad to see Iggy is on board.

(I don't want to start rumours like some partisan, but how untoward would it be to speculate that there's something really really bad that implicates only the Conservatives that Harper is scrambling to protect?)

Lord Kitchener's Own

Well, it may be untoward, but such speculation is certainly out there. Rampant even in some quarters.

I often wonder how the Opposition circa 1993-2006 would have reacted if Chretien or Martin had ignored a majority vote on the floor of the House of Commons calling upon their government to hold a public inquiry into their actions on a file?

http://intensedebate.com/people/WernerPatels WernerPatels

Of course, they did, which is why I have been calling them hypocrites for berating the government over an old system put in place by …. the previous Liberal government!

http://intensedebate.com/people/Scott_Tribe Scott_Tribe

So Werner, you'll have no problem calling on the Conservatives to host a public inquiry – as Michael Ignatieff has done – dating back to the start of the mission in 2001, right?

I'm not going to hold my breath waiting for that.

http://intensedebate.com/people/Inkless Inkless

Golly, it got all quiet after Scott asked that question, suddenly. Guess the head droog choked on his jaunty bowler.

http://intensedebate.com/people/Scott_Tribe Scott_Tribe

Well, seeing as I know Werner's blogging history (unfortunately), that's why I said I wasnt going to hold my breath.
http://intensedebate.com/people/WernerPatels WernerPatels

Those with oversized glasses should be afraid of having something choked off, I'd say ….

Glass houses and stones, remember, Inky?

Andre

Holy cow, you're from Liverpool… I knew there was a stink somewhere.

http://intensedebate.com/people/WernerPatels WernerPatels

Scott, the typical lefty, always quick to make assmptions about others. Have you gotten a job yet, or are you still living off the taxpayers?

I digress …. since the issue of whether Afghans torture their own people is an Afghan and not a Canadian problem, why should we waste even more tax dollars on that country? Let them solve their own problems. Canadians have done nothing wrong in Afghanistan — except for being there and sacrificing precious Canadian lives.

Andre

Case closed, the Government had nothing to hide…

http://intensedebate.com/people/WernerPatels WernerPatels

Exactly. The previous Liberal government, perhaps, but not the current one.

http://intensedebate.com/people/Scott_Tribe Scott_Tribe

I haven't made any assumptions, Werner; in fact, you've done exactly what I expected you would ; instead of directly replying to my question, you've gone straight to the personal attacks.

http://intensedebate.com/people/WernerPatels WernerPatels

You started with the "personal stuff". Don't dish it out if you can't handle it. Besides, someone who's forever been living on taxpayers' handouts shouldn't open their trap this wide. You're way over 40; time to take responsibility for your own life and work for a living for a change. It would help you with the mental disease that is left-wing ideology.
http://intensedebate.com/people/Crit_Reasoning Crit_Reasoning

Unleash the Patels! Tintor wasn't available.

http://intensedebate.com/people/M_A_N M_A_N

Actually, there's a fair bit of agreement that "afghans torture their own people", but since that's not what's at issue here, I'm not sure what your point is.

Who knew what, when, and what steps were taken/not taken once the info was known. It's pretty basic stuff on the accountability scale.

Since you don't know anything about me personally, i do hope we can keep this argument about the topic at hand.
http://intensedebate.com/people/OntarioTown OntarioTown

Boy you're a piece of work. Funny, you jump from party support to party support on a regular basis.

Getting personal about someone's life is pretty low.

http://intensedebate.com/people/WernerPatels WernerPatels

It may be low, but still skyscrapers above Scott
http://intensedebate.com/people/OntarioTown OntarioTown

Is this your twisted humble opinion?

Scott seems like a pretty decent and caring guy to me.
http://intensedebate.com/people/WernerPatels WernerPatels

Besides, I don't jump around parties. Unfortunately, at the federal level there is not one party that represents common sense – reasonable and reduced immigration, small to very little government, low taxation, commitment to self-reliance, etc. Apart from the Wildrose Alliance in Alberta, there is no party anywhere in this "country" (Canada is a fiction and not a real, functional country) that comes even remotely close to the "Common Sense Party" I wish to see.
http://intensedebate.com/people/Crit_Reasoning Crit_Reasoning

Canada is a fiction and not a real, functional country

What bullshit.
http://intensedebate.com/people/Crit_Reasoning Crit_Reasoning

Canada is a fiction and not a real, functional country

What bullsh*t.
http://intensedebate.com/people/Crit_Reasoning Crit_Reasoning

Canada is a fiction and not a real, functional country

What bullsh*t. F*ck you and your anti-Canadian diatribes.
Loraine Lamontagne

Canada is a fiction and not a real, functional country.

Monsieur Patels reprend le discours des indépendantistes québécois.
http://intensedebate.com/people/OntarioTown OntarioTown

Another twisted humble opinion from the guy who supported Gerard Kennedy, then thought Harper was good, then decided NDP was good and has changed his mind again.

Your arrogance is astounding.
http://intensedebate.com/people/WernerPatels WernerPatels

You shouldn't advertise your origin (Ontario), the crappiest place in "Canada"
http://intensedebate.com/people/OntarioTown OntarioTown

How long have you been in Canada? Given your name I assume you may be German.

You always complain, yet still live here.
http://intensedebate.com/people/WernerPatels WernerPatels

Proof again that lefties, especially those from the cesspool Ontario, get it wrong all the time. My ethnic headgear should have told you a thing or two, but logical reasoning is not part of the lefty's toolbox.

I am also wondering if any of you (including, shame on him, Paul Wells) would make jokes about or ridicule my ethnic headgear if it were a turban. But I suppose making jokes about towels is considered politically incorrect, whereas the good old bowler is fair game (for silly lefties).

By the by: political correctness is a mental disease. Keep that in mind.
http://intensedebate.com/people/OntarioTown OntarioTown

LOL, gotcha. You're always criticizing Ontario and always have, are arrogant and like to dish it out but can't take it.

I knew that what I wrote would bring out the true you – LOL

Considering your track record on criticizing immigrants… nevermind, you're so easy to make angry.
http://intensedebate.com/people/WernerPatels WernerPatels

Unlike you, I stand by my views and don't hide behind a "user name". But lefties rarely ever have the courage to put their names to their (diseased) views.

Then again, every Ontarian should wear a full-body veil and hide in shame.

catherine

The issue is not who did or knew what – because we don't have full information to make that judgement. The issue is whether one should investigate these very serious allegations which are implied by the bits of information we do have. The Liberals say yes and the Conservative say no. Those are the two sides.

The Liberals have a responsibility to hammer the Conservatives on this until they allow an investigation, which should cover the years 2001 to the present.

I'm really surprised that Wells was not aware that the Liberals supported the entire time period being investigated. Meanwhile, the National Post insists on pretending they are unaware of this fact. Seems like a lot of CPC spin is floating around today on this issue. The point is simple: do we investigate or not?

http://intensedebate.com/people/Jenn_ Jenn_

That is a good point, and it isn't just Paul Wells (though his ignorance is the most surprising). I haven't done a full accounting of Scott Tribe's comments, but I'm sure he must be up to two dozen times with the comment "Ignatieff is on record as supporting an inquiry with those timelines." or words to that effect. And that's here on the Maclean's boards, alone. I'm fairly confident he would have said it other places, as well. That's also just one commenter–he's not the only person to point this out

Hey, maybe this is how MacKay figures there's never been a single credible allegation of abuse. Because they just don't listen?

http://intensedebate.com/people/Scott_Tribe Scott_Tribe

It doesnt take much accounting; you'll see a video that Chris in KW posted below here that shows Iggy saying exactly what I said.. and Wherry has another post that says the same thing.. so I'm say6ing it because I know he said it.

tobyornottoby

Why stop at 2002-2007?

The inquiry needs to include 2008 and 2009 so we can investigate the arguably more significant ongoing issues related to accountability:

Allegations of deliberate obstruction of the MPCC
Allegations of intimidation of a parliamentary committee witness
Release of privileged documents to retired military officers and a sympathetic reporter
Allegations of selective redaction unrelated to security interests
Refusal to provide documents to a parliamentary committee as ordered by the House of Commons

As much as I am concerned for Canada's international reputation and the primary allegation of indifference to torture, these are core accountability issues that are about the right of the public and parliament to question and prevent similar behaviour by future governments. Who cares if we figure out what was wrong in Afghanistan in 2002-2007 but don't address the means for correcting problems here in Canada from now on?

Lord Kitchener's Own

It's always the cover-up…

(Ironic considering it's at least possible that there wasn't much for the Tories to cover up).

http://intensedebate.com/people/ChrisInKW ChrisInKW

[youtube UXva041DJ0g http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXva041DJ0g youtube]
Candace

Question for you, Paul – in one of the year-end/new year interviews, PM Harper said "your viewers need to educate themselves" on how the documents demanded by the Opposition parties get released, and said that lawyers & others have to first review the information and will only release info that doesn't contravene the Privacy or Security (or other related) acts. He said the government couldn't withhold those documents/that information any more than the Opposition could demand (and enforce their demand) the release, whether within a certain timeline or at all.

Is that accurate? And if so, why the continued cries of coverup from both the Opposition parties (who have a vested interest, so I know why they would continue with that) AND the media?

If it isn't accurate, why hasn't someone called him on that? Why didn't the interviewers (I'm thinking this was in the Robertson/Fife interview) call BS on the spot?
http://intensedebate.com/people/M_A_D_world M_A_D_world

The trouble is with the notion that there's blame to be assigned. If the arrangement had been to give the detainees to the Americans we would be very much having a similar debate over transfers. If we set up our own jails then we would not have had international blessing to do so. The legal option was to transfer them to Afghan authorities but now here we are trying to lay blame for choosing the legally correct option.
Neither government did a very good job of dealing with the realities of handing detainees over to their trans-generational rivals. The only other option would have been to set up joint international/national run prisons ensuring interests of humanitarian and information.
Settle for progress on stopping the passing the buck for the decision should be the focus.
Mulletaur

Yup.
Greg

Seems to me that the government should release all Afghan-related documents and let Canadians decide who was to blame.
http://canadiansinafghanista.blogspot.com Neil Kitson

Bill Graham made excuses for transferring prisoners to Afghan jurisdiction on the basis of being "practical". Janice Gross Stein recently made the same argument.

Canadian prisoners of war were transferred to Canada in World War 2 in much more difficult circumstances. The Liberals are in this up to their eyeballs.

http://intensedebate.com/people/Crit_Reasoning Crit_Reasoning

The saddest thing is that prior to the 1990s, Canada had a nearly spotless track record in the POW department. Our country probably had the best record for POW treatment of any country that fought in the Second World War.

http://www.google.com/gwt/x/e?ei=DkVOS-WCF6SqoAfHvMnjAg&source=m&u=http%3A%2F%2Fbloodypoetry09.blogspot.com/2009/11/from-rose-concordance.html&whp=1view_unadapted%3B2http%3A%2F%2Fbloodypoe I WANT MY NAME BACK

I’m sure it is easier for the Liberals to force the release of those documents than it is for me to force the release of my name.

I want my name back.
Pat

I confess to some confusion. I thought it was obvious from the reports that the allegations of torture were made while the liberals were still in government. Wasn't that why they put measures into the agreement to protect people from torture?

I do not think the issue for the liberal government is knowingly allowing prisoners to be transferred to be tortured, but rather that the safety measures to protect them from this fate were insufficient. This latter fact was not apparent until the conservatives won the election, since the agreement was only negotiated and signed a few weeks before the election happened.

http://intensedebate.com/people/Jenn_ Jenn_

Good news, Pat, you aren't the confused one!
Mike T.

Sounds possible, even plausible.

Let's have an investigation to get to the bottom of it!

http://www.toyoufromfailinghands.blogspot.com Damian

I'd suggest everyone take yet another step back from this issue: the bigger problem is that there's no accepted international protocols for dealing with transnational insurgencies. The Geneva Conventions were designed for nation on nation fights. International human rights law was developed without regard for times of war. The nexus of the two is one big, wide grey area.

The Government of Canada – diplomats, politicians, soldiers, and all manner of mandarins – came up with the best solution they could from a spectrum of imperfect options. When deficiencies were pointed out, they changed their protocols to adapt to that feedback. It might not have been as quickly as some would prefer, but it should be remembered that everyone involved was inventing this process as they went along. There's no standard that would please everyone, and meet every legal test.

In that context, an inquiry into Afghan detainee procedures misses the bigger point. I'm with Morse and Lang: a bigger inquiry into how our government enters into and manages an international commitment such as the Afghan mission would be much more productive than a he-said-she-said finger pointer for political gotcha points.

For heaven's sake – most of the MPs on the committee don't hold a security clearance that would even allow them to read Richard Colvin's unredacted e-mails! How can they get to the bottom of anything that way? How could this charade produce anything other than pure political theatre?

A wider inquiry with the sober understanding that no perfect solution exists to the problem of detainees in a counterinsurgency campaign, or none at all.

NordicNorm

"For heaven's sake – most of the MPs on the committee don't hold a security clearance that would even allow them to read Richard Colvin's unredacted e-mails!""

Wrong. All committee members have top secret clearance. They even get issued decoder rings. (OK, I made that last one up!)

http://intensedebate.com/people/Jenn_ Jenn_

No, sorry, I think you misunderstood me. I was saying that someone (I think it was you) has repeatedly posted around here that Ignatieff has gone on the record calling for an inquiry back as far as 2002 pretty much since Ignatieff said it. This isn't a big surprise of today. I just didn't bother going into your intensedebate profile to count the number of times you posted it. The point being, why is it that psiclone and Paul Wells didn't know, when it's been mentioned numerous times on these boards and I know they read these boards? It's also been mentioned numerous other places, by numerous other people as well.
http://www.toyoufromfailinghands.blogspot.com Damian

One more thing…

The selective outrage on this is staggering. Canada has been deploying troops to difficult regions for decades under the banner of UN peacekeeping. What do you think we did with detainees in Cyprus? In the Golan or Sinai? In Haiti? We don't operate Canadian prisons in any of those areas.

If the only places Canadian troops can be sent are places with a squeaky clean judicial system, that will be a very short list of trouble spots indeed. So much for "the world needs more Canada."

Lord Kitchener's Own

Anyone know how many prisoners Canada has captured in the history of UN peacekeeping operations? I could be worng, but I don't think the Peacekeeping operations Damian cites exactly involved a lot of prisoners being rounded up by Canadian troops.

http://www.toyoufromfailinghands.blogspot.com Damian

So it's about numbers? If we'd only taken half the detainees in Afghanistan, it would be OK? Or if we'd apprehended twice as many in the Golan, it would have been a war crime to turn them over to the Syrian authorities? Really?

hosertohoosier

How can peacekeepers take prisoners when they are
1. supposed to be neutral in the conflict
2. essentially not allowed to shoot people

The relevant precedents with Afghanistan would be to go back to our last fighting wars – the Second World War and the Korean war. I'm not sure how Canada handled POW's back then, but I know for darn sure that the POW's arrested by Canadians were not tortured or abused.

shouldIsellyourwheat

How about expanding the investigation into the CIA rendition flights that Chretien and Martin allowed to refuel and to transit Canada?

The media has been complicit for too long with the Liberals on this file, going along with the Liberal spin that Hillier signed the original transfer agreement, when it was Paul Martin's transfer agreement. Evan Solomon had Paul Martin on his show in December, when the detainee crisis was already raging, and didn't ask Paul Martin a question about his agreement. Solomon has Eugene Lang on all the time, and he is never asked questions about his role as Bill Graham's chief-of-staff.

http://intensedebate.com/people/VinceClortho VinceClortho

Sadly this is what it would all turn into. Only in Canada would we think to beat ourselves up over something this small.

The only point regarding the government actions with the Liberals in power is to say this was government policy. That being said, it hardly requires an inquiry when the consequences are that at worst the Canadian governement was somewhat tardy in responding, which as always will be a matter of opinion. The Liberal offer is a empty one because they know that the government will be loathe to call an inquiry, not just the political side but the bureacratic side. It would be the same no matter who was in charge.

time honored way get an issue on the table, make the most outrageous charge you can. And just what will be acheived from an inquiry, since I am still unconvinced any government has done anything substantial drawing outside the lines. Is there a barely concealed hope that someone is going to be convicted of war crimes? Is it that there is some on going problem?….saying we dont know doesnt count, because there are many things we "dont know" that likely rank higher in priority than this.