Stephen Harper Will Speak "Respectfully" About China's Human Rights Record

As Prime Minister Harper flies into the human rights wasteland of  China an awful lot of Canadians are mystified.

We don’t know anymore where we stand, especially when it comes to human rights.

Our government has -

• Abandoned the principle of real respect for human rights.

• Turned a blind eye to torture and abuse.

• Muzzled legitimate inquiry by government bodies, including the Military Police Complaints Commission.

• Covered up improper and inappropriate behaviour by our military.

• Stonewalled our Parliament.

• Betrayed the Canadian people.

• And generally lied all over the place.

When Canadians look at Stephen Harper, what do we see? A flesh and blood human being with emotions, sensibilities and compassion?

Or do we see instead, a robotic leader, programmed for expediency?

Perhaps he’s something in between.

A creature of opportunism certainly.

Someone who – from time to time – raises a moistened finger on high, to detect the direction of the prevailing wind and then proceeds to smile upon those who might bolster him, or suck the life out of those who might oppose or criticise.

Examples of this kind of behaviour are legion.

Here’s one from way back when.

Members of the Progressive Conservative Party went to bed one night hoping for pleasant dreams; they woke next morning and discovered they were about to live through a nightmare.

Overnight, Reform/Alliance leader Harper had seduced Peter MacKay, ( son of Elmer ), into a betrayal of the  P.C. Party. Just as the father had acted as the secretive midwife in the birthing of Brian Mulroney as Prime Minister, so the son became the willing nursemaid to Mr. Harper – Prime Minister-to-be.

If a few values, ethics and some honour had to be sacrificed, these were the fellows to do it…but only if they could benefit personally and they both did. Carnal union was what counted.

If the Liberals under Chretien and Martin were slovenly -

- the New Conservatives under Harper and Mackay are slatternly.

The performance of His Highness Harper and various Court Jesters (including MacKay the Younger), reached a fever pitch just recently, with the attempted assassination of Richard Colvin, victim of a thousand Conservative cuts.

We all remember Richard Colvin (Don’t We?).

He was the upstanding, upright, loyal and competent public servant, who was to have appeared before Canada’s Military Police Complaints Commission (MPCC) earlier this year. The Commission had called on anyone with information on the treatment of Afghan prisoners, to come forward.

The Commission already knew of detainees being mistreated even while in Canadian custody.

Mr. Colvin responded, and did so quietly. He submitted a sealed affidavit to the MPCC outlining his concerns about the transfer of Afghan detainees from Canadian custody into the hands of the Afghan Secret Police.

The affidavit asserted that Mr. Colvin had knowledge of possible improprieties and possible Canadian complicity in the torture of Afghan prisoners.

To the government’s horror, the MPCC managed to have the affidavit unsealed and began to undertake an investigation.

The Jesters and their Head Clown then moved in quickly to castrate the MPCC – there’s no other term for it. (It was a slow and painful process).

Colvin had to be trashed.

Stage Two –

The case of Mr. Colvin was re-worked into the shape of a political football. It was snatched from the Judicial body – the MPCC – and handed off to a toothless, uninformed, partisan committee of politicians.

True, documents and emails were given to the committee. But these items were so heavily censored as to be worthless.

It was an exercise in which the government employed bullshit, bafflegab and censorship to confuse the M.P.’s – and the tools of character assassination and mendacity to confuse the Canadian public.

The government, having emasculated the Military Police Complaints Commission and undermined the parliamentary committee, then used senior members of the Canadian Armed Forces and the Canadian Diplomatic Corps to dismember a loyal, competent, discreet but courageous public servant by means of jingoistic rhetoric and nationalist grandstanding.

This nonsense has been ongoing for about 3 years now – the government frantically pushing and pulling simultaneously.

How ignorant we are as a nation!

In the process, it has become crystal clear to anyone with a half-pint-sized brain, that our stand on torture has been and continues to be more in the American or perhaps even the Chinese tradition than in our own.

Set one’s conscience aside and forge ahead. (So much for the esteemed Dalai Lama).

The voices calling for a full, public judicial Inquiry into Canadian complicity in torture, have been muted by the propaganda onslaught and the principles involved have been obscured by a torrent of indecipherable and contradictory gobbledegook.

None of this is about criticising the Canadian Armed Forces, although that’s what Harper and Company want people to believe. (Shades of George Bush).

But lets get real here.  It’s really about whether we have an interest in upholding real Canadian values, which include respect for the rule of law, both domestic and international.

And lets not forget the history because future generations won’t.

Our war in Afghanistan was the result of an illegal invasion by the U.S. and Britain. It involved the planning and waging of an aggressive war…the very charge that was faced by those German officials, who claimed they “didn’t know”, or were “only following orders.”

Our government knew back when they took office, that the Afghan Secret Police engaged in torture. Harper knew. Foreign Affairs Minister MacKay knew. General Hillier knew. Defence Minister Cannon knew. Other top officials in Ottawa also knew and tried to hide the truth. They were complicit.

That’s a war crime.

In the end of course, chickens will come home to roost and murder will out.

feeling each other up

But in the meantime…Harper’s off-handed attitude to torture will go down well in China. (In any case, Harper and President Hu have made a cosy kinda deal).

Harper will speak “respectfully” to the Chinese on the issue of human rights, as long as they don’t mention the “T”-word

Neither of these people is in a position to lecture anyone on the subject.

As for the rest of us?-Here’s My Take.

Mr. Colvin’s testimony revealing Canadian government complicity in torture, has provided this country with an amazing opportunity.

Canada can once again be a leader by having a full judicial and public Inquiry into this entire business.

Richard Colvin is no rogue or renegade. He holds one of the most senior positions at Canada’s  embassy in Washington D.C. – appointed by the very people who are now trying to crush him.
We should be proud of him.

He has nothing to gain from being truthful, except the wrath of those who may have known about and been complicit in torture…not just of so-called Taliban, but also of innocent civilians who were never given the benefit of any complete investigation by those who arrested them and turned them over to the Afghan Secret Police.

It all goes back to a very high military level.

From the get-go, it was always a “scumbag body-count” operation – and those are words right out of General Rick Hillier’s mouth.

Do We Need A Public Inquiry??

You Bet We Do!!