General says detainee transfers halted over concerns for safety

OTTAWA – The commander of Canadian troops in Afghanistan in the fall of 2007 says transfers of detainees to Afghan custody were halted for three months because he could not satisfy a legal test that they "are not tortured and are treated like human beings."

Brig.-Gen. Guy Laroche also vigourously denied Tuesday an assertion by his former Canadian-Afghan translator in Kandahar that the Canadian military "subcontracted torture" to the Afghan National Directorate of Security to obtain information from Canadian captives. The NDS is an intelligence service that runs some of the prisons where Canadian detainees are transferred.

"This is totally incorrect," Laroche told the Military Police Complaints Commission. "It’s totally unacceptable . . . This did not happen."

Laroche said the risk of detainee mistreatment in Afghan custody was "a recurring theme" of discussion from the start of his posting as commander of Task Force Afghanistan Aug. 1, 2007- May 14, 2008.

The legal requirement to ensure detainees are not transferred to torture was contained in Canada’s commitment to treat Afghan captives the same as prisoners of war are supposed to be treated under the Geneva Convention, an international law governing armed conflict.

Laroche ordered transfers halted that November after a Foreign Affairs detainee monitoring team discovered tools of torture – an electric cable and a rubber hose – in a prison interview room where a detainee recounted how he had been beaten unconscious during interrogation. But that was not the only reason, he said.

Although a Canada-Afghanistan detainee transfer agreement provided for Foreign Affairs monitoring, he said visits had decreased and they were not regular or rigorous. In October, he brought this to the attention of his superior officer to "put pressure" on Foreign Affairs. Five allegations of mistreatment were reported in September, he said, but all were deemed unfounded.

Transfers were resumed three months later after the person in charge of NDS had been fired, resources for more prison visits were put in place, a video camera was acquired to tape detainee interviews and RCMP and Correctional Services personnel were available to follow up on allegations of mistreatment.

The commission is holding public interest hearings into a complaint by Amnesty International and the B.C. Civil Liberties Association that Canadian armed forces aided and abetted torture by transferring detainees when the risk of torture was known and because military police failed to investigate.

Meantime, the four federal political parties agreed Tuesday to ask House of Commons Speaker Peter Milliken to extend at least until Friday a deadline for coming up with a procedure that gives MPs access to uncensored detainee-related documents while preventing public disclosure of passages that could injure national security, defence or international relations.

"What is encouraging is that all parties are of the same mind on this point, which indicates I think that everybody is making an honest effort to try to come to a conclusion on a reasonable basis, within a reasonable period of time," said Liberal House leader Ralph Goodale, following a private meeting between representatives of the government and the opposition parties.

Opposition MPs said they had reached a consensus on some of the points discussed, but none of the MPs was willing to publicly reveal details about exactly what they were negotiating.

"This is a complex matter and it deals with extremely sensitive issues, not just national security, but issues related to what the government knew and when it knew about issues related to torture in Afghanistan," said Goodale. "It’s complex and it’s exceedingly important that we get it right, both in defending the public interest and in defending national security and getting the right balance between the two."