The Harper government is dismissing calls for a public inquiry into damning
allegations that the military handed over prisoners to face torture in
Afghanistan.
And it's waging a campaign against
the federal intelligence officer who made the charges.
Defence Minister Peter MacKay told a
raucous House of Commons on Thursday that there's no evidence to support the
allegations by Richard Colvin, even going so far as to describe him as "a
suspect source."
Colvin told a Commons committee a day
earlier that prisoners were turned over to Afghanistan's notorious intelligence
service by the Canadian military in 2006-07 despite warnings that they would be
tortured. He also suggested the federal government may have tried to cover up
what was happening.
All three opposition parties attacked
the Conservatives and demanded an inquiry, but the Tories were unmoved.
MacKay said Colvin had not provided
"one scintilla of evidence" that wasn't second-or third-hand information.
He painted Colvin as a Taliban dupe
and said Canadians are being asked to accept the word of prisoners "who throw
acid in the face of school children, who blow up buses of civilians in their own
country."
He side-stepped questions about how a
"dupe" could be promoted by Ottawa to serve as an intelligence officer in
Washington, where Colvin now serves.
MacKay insisted the government dealt
with the concerns over possible torture by revising the prisoner transfer
agreement with Afghanistan in May 2007, but conceded later that the agreement
was changed partly because of the warnings Colvin issued while in Afghanistan.
Liberal MP Bob Rae described the
government's tactics as "reprehensible." He said it's incumbent on the
government to answer Colvin's allegations rather than trying to smear him.
New Democrat MP Paul Dewar said the
country's reputation as a champion of human rights has been tarnished.
"Torture is never, ever justified,"
Dewar told a news conference. "Mr Colvin's testimony suggests Canada has failed
to meet that moral standard. The damage to Canada's reputation could be serious
and lasting."
In his remarks Wednesday, Colvin said
he had concerns about the ongoing transfer of prisoners to the Afghan
intelligence service.
That prompted the NDP to demand that
Canada halt those transfers and negotiate an even better arrangement with the
government in Kabul that would put in place even more safeguards to prevent
abuse.
Under international law, Ottawa has
the responsibility to ensure that prisoners handed over to another nation are
not tortured.
Colvin told the special committee on
Afghanistan that all of Canada's prisoners captured in 2006 and early 2007 were
likely tortured in the hands of the National Directorate of Security, the Afghan
intelligence agency.
He said he interviewed four prisoners
in the NDS facility in Kabul who showed physical signs of abuse, but could only
confirm that one of them was captured by Canadians.
In Kandahar, the general in charge of
the military task force said Canada learned its lessons in the handling of
prisoners several years ago.
Brig.-Gen. Daniel Menard said the
army responded in 2007 after the allegations of abuse first surfaced.
He said there are more rigorous
handover procedures and new safeguards to ensure prisoners could be monitored
more effectively once in Afghan custody.
"One thing that has been done right
from the beginning is that every time that we have heard about anything to do
with torture or something that was similar to this, some actions were taken by
this task force in order to correct this," he said.
Also Thursday, a Red Cross official
in Washington clarified remarks that came out of the Commons committee the day
before.
Spokesman Bernard Barrett said the
agency tried and failed to get in touch with Canadians in Kandahar three times
in 2006 - not to warn them about Afghan prison conditions, but rather the
routine matter of discussing the country's responsibilities in notifying the Red
Cross.