Headlines for 10 March 2010

New information about Canada's role in Afghanistan torture

In an interview with CBC news, Eillen Olexiuk, a Canadian diplomat with extensive experience in Afghanistan says she raised the possibility that detainees transferred from Canadian to Afghan custody were at risk of torture in 2005, but that her concerns were ignored.

In 2007, allegations of torture became prominent in the media, with reports of Afghan detainees being beaten, whipped, starved, frozen, choked and shocked. After the allegations arose, Stephen Harper's Conservative government signed a transfer agreement with Afghanistan in May 2007, which allowed Canadian officials to visit prisons. Despite the agreement, allegations of torture have continued.

The CBC reported on Monday that months before the allegations became public in 2007, Stephen Harper's government anticipated the accusations and began drafting a "contingency plan" to deal with them when they arose. Harper dismissed calls for a public inquiry this past Monday during question period.

Opposition parties are still tyring to get the Conservative government to release documents pertaining to the handling of Afghan detainees without heavily-blacked out sections.

Winnipeg police shoot and kill Eric Daniels

On Saturday, March 6th Winnipeg police officers shot Eric Daniels, who refused to drop the machete he was carrying.  He was rushed to the hospital, where he died later that night. The incident happened at the corner of Arlington and Sargent, when Daniels and another man got into a verbal dispute and police were called.

Daniels' girlfriend, Giselle Mckinnon, says that she doesn't believe he had to be shot during the confrontation with police.  After the shooting she wrote on her Facebook page that she would do everything she could to make police understand "this is our native land, not theirs.

"Stop killing our people. I witnessed this, now I will let the truth be out there and let Winnipeg know that he was gone down on the first shot." McKinnon says there was no need to shoot once Daniels was on the ground.

A mandatory inquiry will be held about the circumstances of the shooting. But Morris Swan-Shannacappo, head of the Southern Chiefs Organization, is calling for an independent investigation into the shooting.

International Women's Day

March 8, International Women's Day, saw hundreds of events and around the world where women took to the streets to demand justice. International Women's Day is an event that emerged from women's struggles for better working conditions and for the vote in the early 20th century.

The first Women's Day was honored in 1911, and over a million people marched in the streets.  Less than a week later, the 'Triangle Fire' in a New York City factory took the lives of more than 140 working women, most of them Italian and Jewish immigrants. The fire drew attention to working conditions in the United States that became a focus of subsequent International Women's Day events.

In Winnipeg, hundreds of women took to the streets on Saturday to demand urgent anti-poverty measures, the decriminalization of sex work, a national childcare program, an end to violence against women, justice and self-determination for First Nations women, access for women with disabilities, and justice for all. 

Three queer and trans folks arrested, brutalized in Guelph

Three members of the Fierce and Fabulous collective based out of Guelph, Ontario were arrested on Friday, March 6th for allegedly assaulting a campus peace officer outside of a drag show at the University of Guelph.  They were held overnight at the Guelph police station, and all were released with conditions not to associate with each other.

A report on Infoshop News writes that one of the arrested had their head slammed repeatedly onto the police cruiser.

The Fierce and Fabulous collective is organizing a radical queer convergence from June 10 to 13 in Guelph this summer.