Probe launched into complaints by three detainees in Kandahar

Toronto Star: Bruce Campion-Smith, February 6th

OTTAWA–Two separate probes are underway into a complaint that up to three prisoners suffered injuries while in the custody of Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan, the Toronto Star has learned.

The allegation, if substantiated, could rock military morale and further undermine public support in Canada’s dangerous – and controversial – mission in Kandahar.

Questions are being asked about how as many as three unidentified men suffered injuries to their upper body while being detained by Canadian soldiers in the Kandahar region last April.

And investigators want to know why the military police officers who eventually took charge of the detainees didn’t do their own probe of the injuries.

“We have received allegations of mistreatment,” Stan Blythe, of the Military Police Complaints Commission, said yesterday. This independent civilian body, responsible for probing reports of misconduct by military police officers, received the complaint of possible abuse last week.

“The allegations relate to an alleged failure by the military police to follow up and investigate,” said Blythe, chief of staff and special adviser to commission chair Peter Tinsley.

Tinsley has written chief of defence staff Gen. Rick Hillier as well as navy Capt. Steve Moore, the military’s provost marshal, to alert them to the allegations.

“The complaint suggests various failings by the military police members involved relative to safeguarding the well-being of the persons in custody, and, more particularly, in respect of their failure to investigate the causes of various injuries which may have been sustained while in (Canadian Forces) as opposed to military police custody,” Tinsley wrote on Jan. 30.

While the injuries in this incident don’t appear to be life-threatening, the allegation of abuse could evoke memories of a dark chapter for the military – the ill-fated 1993 mission to Somalia where Canadian troops took trophy pictures of their captives and were charged in the torture death of 16-year-old Somali Shidane Arone.

Under his office’s mandate, the provost marshal – head of military police – is given first crack at investigating complaints. But Tinsley is also looking at whether to exercise his “public interest discretion” to investigate and hold a public hearing.

In the meantime, Tinsley, former head of Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit, the watchdog for police forces in Ontario, has asked the Canadian Forces to “preserve all relevant evidence pertaining to the incident(s) in question.”

The National Investigation Service, another independent military branch that looks into serious criminal matters and sensitive files involving all Canadian Forces members, also launched a formal investigation after Tinsley’s letter arrived at defence headquarters.

Blythe said it’s not clear how many detainees were involved. “It’s difficult to trace which individuals were involved. … It could be up to three or it could be one,” he said.

The concerns have also drawn the attention of officials at Amnesty International Canada, who have been vocal critics of Ottawa’s policy concerning detainees in Afghanistan.

“We have heard there are three instances where – and no one is conclusively saying anything about ill-treatment – prisoners taken into custody by Canadian Forces have had injuries, contusions and bruises,” said Alex Neve, the secretary general of Amnesty International’s English Canada branch.

“Obviously there could be a multitude of different explanations for that,” Neve said in an interview. “We’re not at all even reaching any tentative conclusions that Canadian soldiers have been responsible for ill-treatment or abuse. But allegations are out there and there are some injuries that were suffered so it’s perfectly appropriate … for there to be a review.”

Defence officials were tight-lipped yesterday but more details could emerge today when they formally respond to the complaints commission.

Lt.-Cmdr. Pierre Babinsky, spokesperson for the defence department’s legal services division, couldn’t answer why the Canadian Forces are only looking into the incident now, almost 10 months after it is alleged to have happened.

Canada has about 2,500 military personnel serving in Afghanistan.

Since 2002, 44 Canadian soldiers and one diplomat have been killed there.

Soldiers in Afghanistan must treat detainees “humanely” and to the “highest standard” of international law, according to standing orders on the conduct of troops.

The advice given to individual soldiers drives home the point, warning mistreatment of a prisoner is a crime.

Neve said he hopes this case sparks a “comprehensive overhaul” of how Canadian soldiers handle the Afghans they detain in the Kandahar region.

Under an agreement with the Afghan government, those detainees are passed over to Afghan authorities, but human-rights advocates say the transfer deal provides few safeguards to ensure that prisoners don’t suffer the abuse that runs “rampant” in local prisons.

“We don’t seem to have the right approach to handling prisoners in Afghanistan,” Neve said.