Dewar to pursue question of privilege

OTTAWA – The Harper government continues to obstruct the work of the House of Commons Committee on Afghanistan by refusing to relinquish documents and heavily censoring others.

“The government has taken every step imaginable to obstruct, intimidate and undermine the committee hearings into the detainee torture issue,” says New Democrat Foreign Affairs critic Paul Dewar (Ottawa-Centre). “I fully intend to pursue my question of privilege on the government’s behaviour.”

Dewar has raised a question of privilege in the House of Commons which asks the Speaker to rule on whether the government may be obstructing the ability of MPs to do their jobs.

The Afghanistan special committee requested uncensored copies of senior diplomat Richard Colvin’s reports, all memos sent to the Minister of Foreign Affairs concerning detainees from December 18, 2005 to the present, and all annual human rights reports by the Department of Foreign Affairs on Afghanistan.

Not only did the government miss the deadline by one week and allow certain witnesses to see the documents before the committee members did, documents released yesterday were heavily redacted and incomplete.

“Canadians have had enough of this government’s cover-up and that’s why the call for a public inquiry is gaining support every day,” said Dewar.