"[t]he Arrangement fails to meet the minimum standards of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms with respect to the care that Canadian Forces must take under Canada’s constitution to prevent detainees from being tortured after they are transferred to Afghanistan or another country. This problem is serious, and probably would result in the Arrangement being declared unconstitutional if it were judicially reviewed in a Canadian court."
Lawyers for the advocacy groups say the judicial review will raise significant legal issues, such as whether the Geneva Conventions apply when Canadian forces assert that terrorists are not "enemy combatants" under the Conventions, and whether the Charter extends due process rights to such combatants. Similar issues were raised by the US Supreme Court case of Hamdan v. Rumsfeld [opinion PDF; JURIST report], where the Court held in part that Article 3 [text] of the Geneva Conventions applies even though the US is at war with al Qaeda, which is not a signatory to the Conventions. The US military subsequently reversed its Article 3 policy [JURIST report] and decided that the Article 3 safeguards apply to all detainees in US custody. The Globe and Mail has more. Read the Amnesty International Canada press release.
http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2007/02/canada-afghanistan-detainee-agreement.php
[Proofreader's note: this article was edited for spelling and typos on February 22, 2007]
Note: http://jurist.law.pitt....
Canada-Afghan Detainee Agreement Allows Torture: Rights Groups
Posted on Thursday, February 22 at 09:08 by bracewellContributed By
Topic
Article Rating
(0 votes)
Options
Stumble It!Comments
view comments in forum
Page 1
1) "The Canada-Afghanistan Detainee Agreement does not provide adequate safeguards to ensure that detainees will not be tortured by Afghan forces."
Are they being tortured by Afghan Forces?
2) "Amnesty International and the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association are asking for a writ of prohibition preventing Canadian Forces in Afghanistan from transferring detainees to the Afghan authorities or any other state that is likely to torture them, including the United States."
If they are not transferred to Afghan Authority, then to whom?
Not transferring to Afghan authority is rather presumptious, as supposedly we regard the Afghan Government as the legitimate government, and the Afghan Army therefore as the authority to which transfer of these prisoners should be legal.
Article 3 of the Geneva conventions prevents transfer to a third party state that is likely to torture, but Afghan citizens in Afghanistan doesn't constitute a 3rd party. It's a 1st party.
---
"I think it's important to always carry enough technology to restart civilization, should it be necessary." Mark Tilden