In one harrowing account, an Afghan turned over by Canadian soldiers told of being beaten unconscious and tortured in the secret police prison in Kandahar. He showed Canadian diplomats fresh welts and then backed up his story by revealing where the electrical cable and the rubber hose that had been used on him were hidden.

“Under the chair we found a large piece of braided electrical cable as well as a rubber hose,” reads the subsequent diplomatic cable marked “secret” and distributed to some of the most senior officials in the Canadian government and officers in the Canadian military.

snip…

In Ottawa, under cross-examination before the parties are to appear in court Thursday, Nicholas Gosselin, Canada’s human-rights officer stationed in Kandahar, confirmed that he was the diplomat who picked up, examined and then carefully returned the cable and hose to beneath the chair in the secret police prison interrogation room.

1) Obviously those commiting torture and abuse are not exactly going to be issuing invitations to NATO nation diplomats to drop by and watch a torture session or two while they have a cup of tea

2) In terms of solid evidence of torture and/or abuse? There is no argument. There actually has been evidence presented, back in 2007. Note that… “The following excerpt is typical. In other instances, entire pages are blacked out.”

“Of the XXX detainees interviewed, XXX said XXX had been whipped with cables, shocked with electricity and/or otherwise ‘hurt’ while in NDS custody in Kandahar. This period of alleged abuse lasted from between XXX days and XXX days and was carried out in XXX and XXX and detainees still had XXX on XXX body; XXX traumatized.” Some of the allegations describe abuse and torture as occurring in Kandahar, others in Kabul. In some, the secret police accuse the regular police of the beatings. One transferred detainee, apparently confused, incoherent and seemingly suffering from mental problems, had no toenails. Others reported beatings and ill treatment. Many said they had never seen a lawyer. Some apparently had never been visited by international monitoring groups.

What is trouble is the appearance of a cover-up, that there is something to hide. Simply, if there were not this would simply be a matter of the Conservatives stating that there was a problem with the previously negotiated protocol (the one under the Martin Liberal government when Bill Graham was Defense Minister), we listened to and read the reports from Colvin (and presumably others stationed in Afghanistan), and fixed it. McKay has somewhat admitted parts of this. But largely what we are getting from the government is mendacity, obfuscation and smears (has the US been informed that we’ve assigned a ‘Taliban dupe’ to a top security level intelligence posting in their nation’s capitol?).

Quite simply we are not getting the whole story here and what we are getting is beyond credibility.

@Roll Tide – While what you quote wrt the liberation of Holland is correct, what may have been S.O.P. 64 years ago has long ago ceased to be S.O.P.

What happened in 1945 neither excuses nor justifies what is happening now.

So, is this issue about Harper, or is it about the alleged (mis)treatment of POW’s (that’s a rhetorical question)?

CSM article

http://features.csmonitor.com/politics/2009/11/14/fort-hood-review-may-challenge-political-correctness-up-the-ranks/

Former Walter Mondale Speech writer (a Canadian):

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/editorial/outlook/6721045.html

The Army failed to take action on Hasan because of his religious beliefs. People are afraid to speak out especially in the age of Obama. The hard left will accuse them of having a “warped view”, be uninvited to the right Georgetown-Manhattan elite parties.

We are not talking about “genocide” here. We are talking about the possibility of mistreatment of Taliban prisoners not by Canadian soldiers but by Afghan authorities…thus the WW2 Dutch analogy.

As for the first part, there is nothing “politically correct” about following international law. The Serbs found that out from their genocide of Bosnian Muslims at Srebenica. War crimes are war crimes – period. end. stop, and if our officials were complicit in allowing prisoners to be handed over knowing they were to be tortured.. or deliberately turned a blind eye to it.. then every single of them should be arrested and frog-marched before the International Criminal Court at the Hague.

I thought I’d read it all but this certainly proves, beyond a shadow of a doubt, some people haven’t got a clue about this issue.

This whole issue is about a government that turned a blind eye to the reports forwarded by Mr. Colvin.
Not only that they:
A) Had Colvin not include impirtant info in email/reports
B) refused to give him legal representation
C) Had the balls to threaten him with prosecution if he testified (Security act or something or other)
D) Tried everything in their power to preent him from testifying
E) He testifies, and the gov’t attempts to impugn his reputation/credibility
F) They refuse to hold an inquiry

If the government was concerned, they would have thanked Mr. Colvin, acted on the reports but instead they chose to cover it all up and “pretend it never happened”. For proof, read any paper, Hansard, watch Power Play, Power and Politics to see how this government is huffing and puffing trying to sway public opinion.

“During the occupation, the Dutch Nazis had already been ostracized by the nation. Merely having been a member of Anton Mussert’s National Socialist Movement (NSB or Nationaal-Socialistische Beweging) was sufficient reason for arrest. The spouses and children of many NSB members were also arrested and interned in camps. In the process, they were bullied and often severely abused. More than 120,000 suspects were forced to await trial in more than 100 makeshift internment camps, such as deserted factories and schools, old forts, prisons and former German concentration camps.”

http://www.questia.com/googleScholar.qst;jsessionid=LLjJJmyDJHwCn8y7vqXLN2Lp5n2J1x2nKn79M1dfx2qnSfpynnhv!921627548!-2106413634?docId=5002278431

I spoke with a Canadian War veteran who witnessed Dutch woman stripped naked, hair cut off and hauled in the middle of the town square to be shamed. Her crime, she dated a German Nazi during occupation. He could not do anything.

These things are sad, but you cannot run a perfect politically correct war.

The US Armies political correctness caused Fort Hood..