The Con Torture Scandal and the Burning Question

As the tissue of deception continues to be ripped off the Con Torture and Rape Scandal, like the flesh off the backs of Afghan detainees beaten with steel cables.

And the sordid truth is slowly revealed.

Defence Minister Peter MacKay offered a dramatically different Tory narrative on the Afghan torture issue on Friday. This capped a week in which the government went from lampooning as Taliban "dupes" anyone who alleged prisoner abuse to claiming the government took such reports seriously from the start.

The Cons knew about the torture allegations but did nothing for over a year. Except deny it was happening.

I'm surprised more in the media haven't picked up on a story by the excellent CBC journalist Brian Stewart.

Who wonders why it took so long for Canada to notify the Red Cross about detainees it had handed over to Afghan jailers.

The Dutch were concerned enough to report immediately any handover to the local Red Cross officials. Britain acted within 24 hours. But Canada? In stark contrast it created what the whistle-blowing Colvin calls "a very peculiar six-step process."

It was peculiar especially in that it initiated a slow dance of bureaucrats that seemed almost designed to leave detainees in the maws of Afghan interrogators for weeks and even months at time before the Red Cross intervened.

And asks this extremely troubling question:

Was it just a case of bureaucratic hyper-caution, flowing possibly from the micro-managing style of the Harper government? Or was there something more sinister at play?

If you wanted to ensure your detainee was grilled to the hilt over days, weeks, or months, would this not be the kind of play-for-time system that you would devise?

Which screams out like a torture victim to be answered.

Because I suspect that when we find out who came up with this strange play-for-time scheme, and WHY. We will finally find out why the Cons are going to such extreme lengths to try to cover-up this scandal.

Do you understand what I mean? The e-mails are important to establish that the Cons were aware that torture was going on. But if they knew...and now we know they did... and they set up a scheme to allow the torturers enough time to torture, that would be a WAR CRIME.

And some people in this country could end in the Hague.

Enough of this criminal un-Canadian farce. We need a full public inquiry.

And we need it NOW...