Afghan detainees: After Colvin's testimony

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Event Date:	Event Title:	Event Description:
11/18/2009	Colvin testifies	Former diplomat Richard Colvin testifies before a House of Commons committee. He says that all detainees transferred by Canadians to Afghan prisons were likely tortured by Afghan officials and many of the prisoners were innocent. (CBC photo)
11/19/2009	Calls for inquiry dismissed	All three opposition parties demand a public inquiry into Colvin's torture allegations. The government dismisses the calls. "There has not been a single, solitary proven allegation of abuse involving a transferred Taliban prisoner by Canadian forces," Defence Minister Peter MacKay says in the House of Commons.
11/23/2009	Detainee transfers halted 3 times in '09: feds	A government Web site states that prisoner transfers were halted three times in 2009 over concerns about prisoner treatment and access to prison facilities. CBC News also reports that Canadian officials delayed reporting prisoner transfers to Red Cross monitors between 2002 and 2006.
11/25/2009	Hillier testifies	Former Chief of Defence Staff Rick Hillier, Lt.-Gen. Michel Gauthier and Maj.-Gen. David Fraser testify before the Commons committee and question the credibility of Colvin's testimony. Hillier calls the allegations "ludicrous." (Reuters photo)
11/26/2009	David Mulroney testifies	In testimony before the Commons committee, David Mulroney, the government's former senior adviser on Afghanistan, denies that he tried to muzzle Colvin. Mulroney says he was aware of problems within the Afghan prison system, but had no evidence that detainees being handed over by Canadian soldiers to Afghan officials were being tortured.
11/27/2009	Concerns known in 2006: MacKay	Defence Minister Peter MacKay admits the government was aware of abuse concerns in early 2006, attributing these allegations to the government's eventual re-negotiation of prisoner transfer agreement.
12/02/2009	Documents released	Forty-one censored copies of documents are released by the government to the Afghanistan committee. At the same meeting Linda Garwood-Filbert, a Corrections Canada official who worked on prison reform in Afghanistan, denies seeing evidence of prisoner torture or abuse over numerous visits. (CBC photo)
12/03/2009	Quick transfers wanted: commanders	CBC News reports that Canada's top two commanders in Afghanistan in spring 2006 told investigators the government pressured them to transfer detainees to Afghan authorities faster than they felt was appropriate.
12/04/2009	MPCC loses court appeal	The Military Police Complaints Commission loses a federal court appeal of an earlier ruling restricting its investigation to allegations surrounding military police conduct. The MPCC had wanted to expand to broader issues concerning the treatment and handling of detainees.
12/08/2009	Ex-diplomats criticize government	A group of 25 former ambassadors release an open letter that criticizes the government's treatment of Colvin. The letter says that the former diplomat was "unfairly subjected to personal attacks" as a result of his testimony.
12/08/2009	Natynczyk testifies	Chief of Defence Staff Walt Natynczyk testifies at the Commons committee looking into the detainee issue. He denies reports that a suspected Taliban fighter abused by Afghan police in 2006 had earlier been detained by Canadian troops. (Canadian Press photo)
12/09/2009	Natynczyk corrects testimony	Natynczyk corrects committee testimony from the day before, saying he'd become aware of a document on the morning of Dec. 9 that described how a detainee in Canadian military custody was transferred and subsequently abused.
12/10/2009	Commons demands documents	The House of Commons passes a motion calling on the government to produce uncensored versions of all documents relevant to the detainee controversy.
12/11/2009	Day defends government	International Trade Minister Stockwell Day defends his government's decision not to release critical documents, saying certain information related to the controversy has to be kept secret to protect lives.
12/21/2009	Investigation results revealed	A Canadian Forces press release reveals numerous investigations into allegations of Afghan detainee mistreatment between 2005 and 2009. All allegations were reported to be unfounded, save one incident in 2008 which remained under investigation.
12/28/2009	Military orders investigation	The Canadian military orders a formal investigation into how a critical report on the beating of an Afghan prisoner transferred into Afghan police custody in June 2006 remained buried at National Defence headquarters.
12/30/2009	Parliament prorogued	Governor General Michaelle Jean prorogues Parliament at the request of Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Critics accuse the government of trying to avoid the detainee controversy. (Canadian Press photo)
01/27/2010	Colvin settles legal fee dispute	Colvin concludes a prolonged dispute with the government over the cost of his personal lawyer. The government agrees to pay for his ongoing legal representation because he remains a Canadian diplomat.
02/03/2010	Committee resumes without government members	Opposition members of the Commons committee looking into the Afghan detainee controversy meet, despite the fact that Parliament is prorogued. They continue calling witnesses, even though government members do not attend.
03/05/2010	Iacobucci to review documents	The government announces that retired Supreme Court Justice Frank Iacobucci will review Afghan detainee documents to consider the security implications of their full release. The terms of reference for his work are released a week later. (CP photo)
03/07/2010	PM defends CSIS after interrogation story	The Canadian Press reports that Canadian Security Intelligence Service officers worked with military police in Afghanistan as interrogators of captured Taliban fighters. The next day, the prime minister defends the role of Canada's spy service in the questioning of Afghan prisoners, saying the agency respects its "international obligations at all times."
03/08/2010	'Contingency plan' memo	Internal government memos obtained by CBC News confirm that Canadian authorities began formulating a contigency plan for dealing with accusations of torture of prisoners in Afghan custody as early as March 2007 — months before such allegations first came up in the media. During the next question period, Harper downplayed the revelations.
03/10/2010	Diplomat raised concerns in 2005	Eileen Olexiuk, a former Canadian diplomat, tells CBC News she raised concerns over the risk of prisoner torture in 2005, but her fears were ignored by Paul Martin's Liberal government. Her concerns eventually were reflected in the amended transfer agreement in 2007.
03/11/2010	Canada wanted Afghan army to keep detainees	Internal Canadian government memos are revealed that say NATO allies lobbied Afghan's president for a separate legal framework to handle prisoners captured around Kandahar in late 2006 but those efforts went "nowhere".
03/15/2010	NDP tabling torture prevention bill	NDP human rights critic Wayne Marston says he is tabling a private member's bill in the House of Commons, the Prevention of Torture Act, that aims to prevent any government complicity in torture.
03/25/2010	Detainee documents tabled	In the House of Commons, the federal government tables 2,500 pages of redacted documents related to the Afghan detainee controversy. Thousands more pages of documents are released in the days that follow. The presentation sparks immediate outrage from opposition MPs, who want documents released without the heavily blacked-out sections.
04/13/2010	Colvin testifies at MPCC	Colvin testifies before the civilian-run Military Police Complaints Commission. He says Canadian officials didn't want to deal with the "high risk" of detainees being abused and tortured in Afghan custody when he was working in the country in 2006 and 2007.
04/27/2010	Speaker's ruling	House Speaker Peter Milliken rules that the government's refusal to produce uncensored documents related to the treatment of Afghan detainees constitutes a breach of parliamentary privilege.