Professors Attaran and Mendes Comment on Afghan Detainee Revelations
Comments from Common Law professors Amir Attaran and Errol Mendes are featured in an Ottawa Citizen article from December 10, 2009 addressing the revelation by Gen. Walter Natynczyk, chief of the defence staff, that a prisoner detained by Canadian troops had been abused by Afghan authorities.Prof. Attaran suggests that Defence Minister Peter MacKay should have known about the 2008 testimony of a Canadian general as well as the affidavit of a colonel, filed in 2007, which confirmed the incident. “These records are available to any first year law student,” he says, adding that the claim that the defence minister didn’t know is unacceptable.
Prof. Mendes notes that if the detainees handed to Afghan authorities were facing any risk of torture, Canada could be guilty of a war crime. “The law is clear,” he says. “Where there are substantial grounds for the risk of torture … there is an absolute obligation to stop the transfer.”
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