Canada and the United States: No Security without human rights - Open letter
The Honourable Stockwell Day
Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
Ottawa, Ontario
K1A 0P8
The Honourable Peter MacKay
Minister of Foreign Affairs
125 Sussex Drive
Ottawa, Ontario
K1A 0G2
20 February, 2007
(l-r) U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, Secretary of State Condoloeezza Rice and Vice President Dick Cheney listen to Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and U.S. President George W. Bush during a joint press conference in the East Room July 6, 2006 in Washington, DC.
Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Dear Ministers Day and MacKay,
Amnesty International is writing this open letter to you in advance of your February 23rd meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff.
We understand that you will be discussing a range of issues, several of which will undoubtedly touch upon national security concerns. Amnesty International recognizes the importance of Canada-U.S. cooperation on national security issues, and urges both governments to ensure that their practices in this area reflect their commitment to human rights. Ensuring national security while respecting human rights is not only a legal obligation of both governments, but is also indispensable for maintaining credibility and public confidence in national security policy. We urge you to use this opportunity to raise three serious human rights concerns associated with US counter-terrorism practice: Guantánamo Bay, the case of Maher Arar, and possible CIA flights through Canada.
Guantánamo
January 2007 marked the fifth anniversary of the establishment of the Guantánamo Bay detention centre. Amnesty International calls on you to press Secretary Rice and Secretary Chertoff to ensure that the U.S. government moves immediately to close Guantánamo Bay. Those held there should either be released or charged with recognizable criminal offences and tried in proceedings that meet international standards. Under no circumstances should they be returned or transferred to countries where they are likely to face further human rights violations.
Over the past five years 770 individuals have been detained at Guantánamo Bay; approximately 435 remain held there at the present time. They have been and continue to be subjected to many human rights violations including arbitrary and indefinite detention without charge or trial, unfair trials before military commissions, harsh prison conditions, as well as torture and ill-treatment. Those detained include a Canadian citizen, Omar Khadr, who has been held for more than 4 years. He was a minor when he was taken into custody and has never been treated in accordance with international standards that govern cases of juvenile detention.
Many governments have called on the U.S. government to close this detention facility, including Germany, the United Kingdom and Saudi Arabia. Both the previous and current UN Secretaries General have called for its closure, as have many UN human rights experts. Earlier this year, in an open letter to Prime Minister Harper (copy enclosed), six former Canadian foreign minister – Flora MacDonald, Joe Clark, Lloyd Axworthy, John Manley, Bill Graham and Pierre Pettigrew – urged the Canadian government to call for the closure of Guantánamo Bay. Yet Canada’s voice on this important and troubling human rights concern has remained notably quiet.
This meeting offers a tremendous chance to break that silence and make it clear that Canada does share the widely held view that Guantánamo Bay has become a human rights travesty and should be closed. Recent revisions to the military commissions effected by the Congress in the Military Commissions Act of 2006 are insufficient to raise the commissions to international standards. Canada should, therefore, specifically indicate that it is opposed to any military commission proceeding against Omar Khadr going ahead unless and until that process is comprehensively overhauled and guarantees a legal process that fully meets international standards.
Amnesty International also requests that Canada help the United States close down Guantánamo Bay by offering to resettle detainees who have been cleared of links to terrorism but who cannot be repatriated to their home countries for fear of persecution. We specifically request that Canada consider resettling a group of seventeen Uyghur detainees. At one point it appeared that these men risked being returned to China, where they would be at grave risk of serious human rights violations, including torture. Amnesty International and others expressed our opposition to any such deportation and it was forestalled. However, they remain detained despite the apparent U.S. view now that they do not pose a security threat.
Amnesty International has called on the U.S. government to release the seventeen Uyghur detainees unless they are to be charged and tried in accordance with international standards of fairness in a court that will not impose the death penalty. They should not be returned to any country where they could face further abuse. We have urged US authorities to intensify their efforts to find a timely and durable solution for these men. Such a solution should effectively address their protection needs and take into account their specific situations on a case-by-case basis.
We understand that the plight of these men was discussed when Prime Minister Harper met with Rebiya Kadeer, President of the World Uyghur Congress, and when she testified before a House of Commons Committee in December 2006.. We ask that you now inform Secretaries Rice and Chertoff that Canada is prepared to consider resettlement of this group of seventeen to Canada, so that they may safely begin the slow process of rebuilding their lives.
Maher Arar
Amnesty International has welcomed recent indications that the Canadian government is prepared to continue to press Maher Arar’s case with U.S. authorities This upcoming meeting provides an important opportunity to highlight three particular concerns.
First, US authorities have not yet provided an answer to an absolutely key concern in this case: why did they decide, in October 2002, to send Mr. Arar to Syria, where the risk he would be tortured was obvious? That is perhaps the most essential question about U.S. conduct in this case as the protection against torture, including rendition to torture, is an absolute and unequivocal human right and should have been scrupulously observed in October 2002, no matter what information US officials claim they possessed about Mr. Arar at the time. Amnesty International urges you to press Secretaries Rice and Chertoff on this point and make it clear that Canada expects a full explanation for that decision.
Second, Mr. Arar is currently pursuing an appeal of the February 2006 U.S. District Court decision which ruled that he could not proceed with a lawsuit against U.S. government officials for foreign relations and national security reasons. That appeal will be heard in the near future. Please make it clear to Secretary Rice and Secretary Chertoff that Canada has no foreign relations-related objections to the lawsuit going ahead and would not want any such considerations to obstruct the suit. Please stress that in the wake of the report from the Arar Inquiry, Canada has nothing to hide about the case, including in a U.S. courtroom. The U.S. government cannot be allowed to rely on sensitivities about its relationship with Canada in this appeal and Canada must make that absolutely clear.
Finally, it remains a concern that Mr. Arar’s name is still on the US watchlist. Minister Day, you have already been given full access to the information that US authorities possess with respect to Mr. Arar. You have indicated that there was nothing new in that information and that you were of the view that Mr. Arar’s name should be removed from the watchlist. There have been exchanges in the media about that, in reaction to Ambassador Wilkins’ assertion that it was inappropriate for the Canadian government to raise this concern with US authorities. It is of course not only appropriate, but in fact your responsibility to do so. This meeting offers an important opportunity to reiterate this concern at senior levels of the US government and insist that Mr. Arar’s name be removed from the watchlist without further delay.
There has been some speculation that US officials may be relying upon information that was obtained under torture from other individuals. Please do make it clear with your U.S. counterparts that Canada will not tolerate the possibility that, in Mr. Arar’s case or any other, U.S. officials may be relying upon information that may have been obtained under torture.
Extraordinary Rendition
Amnesty International has, over the past fifteen months, repeatedly raised concerns with both the current and previous Canadian governments about the possibility that Canadian airspace and Canadian airstrips have been used by CIA owned, leased or operated planes that may have been engaged in activities associated with extraordinary rendition.
We have urged Canadian officials to launch a thorough investigation to determine if that is the case. We have also called on the Canadian government to put in place a number of safeguards to minimize the risk that Canadian airspace and airstrips can be used for such activities in the future. I have attached our letter of April 5, 2006, which details those recommendations.
To date, the response from the Canadian government has been disappointing. In Europe, the European Parliament, the Council of Europe and individual governments have launched investigations, hearings and judicial inquiries. It is now clear that renditions involving such flights were in fact happening in Europe with the complicity of a number of states and despite various denials. The European Parliament has called for national parliaments to launch or pursue independent investigations.
Little has been done in Canada. We have been assured that the Canadian government is confident that the flights in question have all been lawful, without any details being provided as to what review was carried out and what legal standards were considered. It is time for answers, and it is time for the necessary safeguards to be put in place. Carl Levin, the Chairman of the US Senate’s Armed Services Committee has recently indicated that the Committee will investigate the CIA’s extraordinary rendition program. It would be ironic if the US moves forward with such a review while Canada continues to assert that there is nothing that needs to be investigated.
This meeting offers a valuable chance to move forward on both fronts. Amnesty International urges that you inform Secretary Rice and Secretary Chertoff that Canada will be launching a comprehensive review of these and any other suspicious flights, expects to have full cooperation from U.S. officials in the course of that review, and will be putting in place new policies and practices that will minimize the risk of Canadian airspace or airstrips being used in the course of extraordinary rendition. In a more general sense, it is vital that you make it clear that Canada very much wants to see the U.S. government firmly reject extraordinary rendition as a practice, explicitly ban it in U.S. law, and ensure full and impartial review of all past cases of extraordinary rendition.
Amnesty International hopes that with respect to these three issues and all other issues on your agenda with Secretaries Rice and Chertoff, you will ensure that human rights figure prominently in your discussions. In summary, we have specifically urged that you raise the following points:
Guantánamo Bay
- Call on the US government to close the Guantánamo Bay detention facility now and release all detainees if they are not promptly brought to trial in proceedings that meet international standards.
- Insist that Canadian citizen Omar Khadr not be brought before a military commission and that he be released from Guantánamo Bay unless he is promptly charged and tried in a manner that meets international fair trial standards.
- Offer to process for resettlement to Canada the group of seventeen Uyghur men currently held at Guantánamo Bay.
Maher Arar
- Demand that US officials provide a full explanation for the October 2002 decision to send Maher Arar to Syria.
- Make it clear that Canada has no objections to Maher Arar’s lawsuit proceeding in the US and does not want “foreign relations” considerations to be used by the US government to obstruct the suit.
- Press again for Maher Arar’s name to be removed from the US watchlist.
Extraordinary Rendition
- Call on US authorities to firmly reject extraordinary rendition as a practice, explicitly ban it in U.S. law, and ensure full and impartial review of all past cases of extraordinary rendition.
- Inform US authorities that Canada will be launching an independent review of allegations that CIA-operated flights may have made use of Canadian airspace or airstrips in the course of flights involved in extraordinary rendition.
We look forward to hearing the outcome.
Sincerely,
Alex Neve
Secretary General
Amnesty International Canada
(English branch)
André Paradis
Directeur Général
Amnistie Internationale
Section canadienne francophone