G Huxley Posted April 13, 2014 Report Posted April 13, 2014 (edited) http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/feds-secretly-gave-canadian-military-ok-to-share-info-despite-torture-risk-1.1773972 Lovely just lovely.... This following the Feds having knowingly handed over prisoners to be tortured in Afghanistan several years ago. Edited April 13, 2014 by G Huxley Quote
Shady Posted April 13, 2014 Report Posted April 13, 2014 I don't see what the big deal is. After all, we trade with countries who's governments have atrocious human rights records. But we can't share information? Faux outrage. Quote
On Guard for Thee Posted April 13, 2014 Report Posted April 13, 2014 http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/feds-secretly-gave-canadian-military-ok-to-share-info-despite-torture-risk-1.1773972 Lovely just lovely.... This following the Feds having knowingly handed over prisoners to be tortured in Afghanistan several years ago. Yes and hiding the report on that activity was part of what got Stephen Harper the dubious distinction of being the only PM in our history to be found in contempt of parliament. Quote
G Huxley Posted April 13, 2014 Author Report Posted April 13, 2014 (edited) Shady are you trying to live up to your name? The memo reveals Defence was slated to be the fifth and final federal agency to apply the Harper government's instruction to exchange information with a foreign agency when doing so may give rise to a "substantial risk" of torture. Read more: http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/feds-secretly-gave-canadian-military-ok-to-share-info-despite-torture-risk-1.1773972#ixzz2yo2cKzVU Edited April 13, 2014 by G Huxley Quote
Army Guy Posted April 14, 2014 Report Posted April 14, 2014 What if that info saves lives, maybe Canadian lives in a foreign country.....what then...and where do you draw the line is Canada responsable for the actions of a another country. Quote We, the willing, led by the unknowing, are doing the impossible for the ungrateful. We have now done so much for so long with so little, we are now capable of doing anything with nothing.
Big Guy Posted April 14, 2014 Report Posted April 14, 2014 What if that info saves lives, maybe Canadian lives in a foreign country.....what then...and where do you draw the line is Canada responsable for the actions of a another country. That is the challenge. The difficulty I find with that premise is that it smacks of "the end justifies the means" argument - and we know where that leads with different opinions of the severity of the "means" and the importance of the "ends". It has been used as an argument defending anything from the atom bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to the 9/11 attack on the USA. Where would it end? Why not rendition suspected murderers temporarily to countries who have a policy of successful “extracting” of information? That may save future potential victims. Treat your prisoners of war the way you would expect our captured to be treated if captured. Quote Note - For those expecting a response from Big Guy: I generally do not read or respond to posts longer then 300 words nor to parsed comments.
eyeball Posted April 14, 2014 Report Posted April 14, 2014 I don't see what the big deal is. After all, we trade with countries who's governments have atrocious human rights records. But we can't share information? Faux outrage. I'm amazed that we even have human rights but I'm guessing you must be outraged. Quote A government without public oversight is like a nuclear plant without lead shielding.
Army Guy Posted April 14, 2014 Report Posted April 14, 2014 Sometimes the end does justify the means, dropping of the bombs can be argued here for years, a whole topic on it's own.... and to break it down alittle further, when we did raids on suspected bombers in Afghanistan, i did never question where the intel came from, nor did i care ....the only thing i was thinking was we made the roads alittle bit safer for us to travel on... So if Canada has intel info that can prevent another 9/11, or for that matter any allied incident , we should remain silent, just incase those names mentioned in that intel might get tortured.....and what if that country does the same, and this time 3000 Canadians get killed, be it here or overseas.....we live with that because that way we will have stood on the high ground...thats a high price to pay for the high ground.... Be a hard sell to the surviving victims family.....yes we are sorry, yes we did know of the attack, but we could not tell anyone because we thought the info could trigger some country into torturing those responsable.... I get it there is no ticking bomb, or those cases are very rare.....but as allieds we share info all the time,even if it has been gathered through torture.....all info needs to be vetted, and sourced once again.....to verify it.... as we all don't have massive intel gathering networks, even a scrap piece of info may be the one, your missing to solve that problem....this saves lives....time and funds....info is time sensitive and dies an early life.....We share info all the time in Afghanistan, about bad guys, bombers, suspected terrorist operators and it saved lives.... I agree that Canada should not have anything to do with torture....But i also agree that once that info is out there... that we should not close our eyes to it so we can hold the high ground........if it is valid and a threat to Canada action should be taken, and that info used to it's fullest.....Does that make us evil....No... Canada has a high standing when it comes to treatment of prisoners of war, but anyone who served in Afghanistan knew exactly how becoming a prisoner of war would turn out.....regardless of what our actions had been....Canada was lucky we did not suffer any captives... Quote We, the willing, led by the unknowing, are doing the impossible for the ungrateful. We have now done so much for so long with so little, we are now capable of doing anything with nothing.
On Guard for Thee Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 I don't see what the big deal is. After all, we trade with countries who's governments have atrocious human rights records. But we can't share information? Faux outrage. Oh, like the US? Quote
Shady Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 Oh, like the US? I was thinking more along the lines of China and Cuba. We Canadians take routine vacations to Cuba, that locks up and tortures political dissidents. They also lock up people with AIDS. They also haven't allowed the Red Cross to visit said prisoners in decades. But we go there, willingly, and spend time in the sun and the surf, without a care. But now, we're suppose to be outraged, that several years ago, we shared some information with another government, and left people captured in that country to that government, that could have been tortured? Pulease. Quote
On Guard for Thee Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 I was thinking more along the lines of China and Cuba. We Canadians take routine vacations to Cuba, that locks up and tortures political dissidents. They also lock up people with AIDS. They also haven't allowed the Red Cross to visit said prisoners in decades. But we go there, willingly, and spend time in the sun and the surf, without a care. But now, we're suppose to be outraged, that several years ago, we shared some information with another government, and left people captured in that country to that government, that could have been tortured? Pulease. We didn't share information so much as we shared people. That is the crux of the issue. We turned over Afghani detainees knowing full well they could/would be tortured. That's illegal under our law. And it's part of why Harper was found in contempt. Quote
Shady Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 We didn't share information so much as we shared people. That is the crux of the issue. We turned over Afghani detainees knowing full well they could/would be tortured. That's illegal under our law. And it's part of why Harper was found in contempt. So we turned over Afghan citizens to the Afghan government. So what? Do you think we should have kept them for ourselves? For how long? How's that different than trading and vacationing in Cuba, and funding the same kind of torturing government? Quote
On Guard for Thee Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 So we turned over Afghan citizens to the Afghan government. So what? Do you think we should have kept them for ourselves? For how long? How's that different than trading and vacationing in Cuba, and funding the same kind of torturing government? So what? So this. Laws are laws. There is no law against going to Cuba if one chooses. There is a law against turning over prisoners to be subjected to torture. Quote
Shady Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 So what? So this. Laws are laws. There is no law against going to Cuba if one chooses. There is a law against turning over prisoners to be subjected to torture. I see, so helping to fund torture isn't a big deal for you. Quote
On Guard for Thee Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 I see, so helping to fund torture isn't a big deal for you. Apparently handing people into the hands of torturers isn't a big deal for you. Quote
bleeding heart Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 People are blasé about torture (or support and defend it, in some cases) based not at all on any serious considerations of the matter, but solely because powerful Western governments have committed themselves to it. The support is entirely a matter of servility, of sycophancy. Quote “There is a limit to how much we can constantly say no to the political masters in Washington. All we had was Afghanistan to wave. On every other file we were offside. Eventually we came onside on Haiti, so we got another arrow in our quiver." --Bill Graham, Former Canadian Foreign Minister, 2007
Army Guy Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 The topic is not about handing over people to be tortured, it's about sharing info that may lead to torture.... Prisoners handed over to Afghan Government ....it was never proven if any Prisoners that the Canadian Military handed over were in fact tortured, lots of stories but no proof .....Now Prisoners that we handed over to the US government well not so much, but that practice stop as soon as our government found out about gitmo, and we began handing them over to the Afghan government ,as it was to expensive to build and operate our own prison.... Quote We, the willing, led by the unknowing, are doing the impossible for the ungrateful. We have now done so much for so long with so little, we are now capable of doing anything with nothing.
eyeball Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 The topic is not about handing over people to be tortured, it's about sharing info that may lead to torture.... It's about our complicity in the commission of war crimes - something that Canadians should feel deeply ashamed of, especially when apologizing for it. It's disgusting. Quote A government without public oversight is like a nuclear plant without lead shielding.
Army Guy Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 Enlighten us.... eyeball what war crimes has the entire nation of Canada been complict in ? Quote We, the willing, led by the unknowing, are doing the impossible for the ungrateful. We have now done so much for so long with so little, we are now capable of doing anything with nothing.
bush_cheney2004 Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 Remarkable....the general appearance of complicity in such things seems to carry greater weight and domestic political liability than any specific cases of (alleged) prisoner torture. No wonder Arar got $10,000,000 so easily. Shame them into paying ! Quote Economics trumps Virtue.
eyeball Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 Enlighten us.... eyeball what war crimes has the entire nation of Canada been complict in ? The torture you yourself just said our allies committed. Do you need me to quote you or are you capable of scrolling four posts back up the thread yourself? Quote A government without public oversight is like a nuclear plant without lead shielding.
Army Guy Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 Are you saying we had proof that the US was torturing inmates, while we were handing them over.....Because what i've read is that is the very reason we stopped handing over prisoners to the US and started with the Afghanis.....And while those same prisoners said they had been tortured by Afghanis officals that story was proven false.....So i'll ask again what war crimes has the entire nation of Canada been complict in. Quote We, the willing, led by the unknowing, are doing the impossible for the ungrateful. We have now done so much for so long with so little, we are now capable of doing anything with nothing.
Big Guy Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 There has not been enough time that has elapsed for anything to do with this war to have been "proven". It took ten years for the disclosure of rule breaking in Somalia. The nature of war is a series of atrocities, usually on both sides. The intent is to destroy your enemy and if/when you are backed into a corner or feel that the end justifies the means then no "rules" apply. I have no doubt that in time there will be new disclosures of how individuals from all sides have broken the "rules". Quote Note - For those expecting a response from Big Guy: I generally do not read or respond to posts longer then 300 words nor to parsed comments.
eyeball Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 (edited) I'm not aware of any proof falsifying reports that prisoners handed over to Afghan officials weren't tortured and the persecution of Omar Khadr and the genocide in Timor also come to mind. Notice how the precedent has been expanded on. Yet as Canada has subtly endorses the use of torture by foreign governments, proponents of sharing the information gathered by torture must consider how such a policy impacts illiberal Asia. After all, regimes that are responsible for brutalizing their citizens can now comfortably make the case that they are torturing prisoners to secure a safe and prosperous Canada. http://thediplomat.com/2012/02/how-canada-is-complicit-in-torture/ I guess many countries are comforted by having Canada on side - we're like Hobbits or something, inoffensive and almost cute. There's no better way to put a moral shine on atrocity. Edited April 16, 2014 by eyeball Quote A government without public oversight is like a nuclear plant without lead shielding.
GostHacked Posted April 16, 2014 Report Posted April 16, 2014 The topic is not about handing over people to be tortured, it's about sharing info that may lead to torture.... Prisoners handed over to Afghan Government ....it was never proven if any Prisoners that the Canadian Military handed over were in fact tortured, lots of stories but no proof .....Now Prisoners that we handed over to the US government well not so much, but that practice stop as soon as our government found out about gitmo, and we began handing them over to the Afghan government ,as it was to expensive to build and operate our own prison.... So Canada cannot even trust the US in proper treatment of prisoners because of GITMO. Quote
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