RSS FeedWikileaks considered a “threat” by US Army
WikiLeaks logo (via Wikipedia)
WikiLeaks, the whistle-blowing website that provides confidential and sensitive documents for free to the media, human rights groups and the public, has been deemed a threat by the US Army.
WikiLeaks has been responsible in the past for providing a copy of the Standard Operating Procedures for Camp Delta, the contents of Sarah Palin’s Yahoo account, and a membership list of the far-right British National Party which got at least one police officer dismissed, among many other significant stories.
A 2008 document recently posted there, entitled U.S. Intelligence planned to destroy WikiLeaks, states,
The possibility that current employees or moles within DoD or elsewhere in the U.S. government are providing
sensitive or classified information to Wikileaks.org cannot be ruled out.
Plans included trying to shut down the website using a variety of techniques, including exposing their sources to embarrass and intimidate them, and even litigation.
Considering that this document was considered “secret,” and presumably came from someone who had access to confidential files, the concerns may be valid. But the appropriateness of the response by the military towards a media channel providing a significant and overwhelmingly positive contribution to issues of public interest is also suspect.
The editors of WikiLeaks note that 2 years have passed without any exposure of their sources, indicating that this response may also be particularly ineffectual. They also point to inaccuracies regarding the editorial control of the site.
Even if the Army was able to shut down WikiLeaks, they concede that the problem is not limited to a single site,
Web sites similar to Wikileaks.org will continue to proliferate and will continue to represent a potential force protection, counterintelligence, OPSEC, and INFOSEC threat to the US Army for the foreseeable future.
Although security interests are pressing and substantial, when a democratic government administration is known to participate in systematic abuses of human rights and widespread violations of international norms, the balance of favour should continue to support sites like WikiLeaks.
Could lawyers provide material support to terrorist organizations?
Interesting post at Persuasive Authorities on the implications of Holder v. The Humanitarian Law Project and Al-Haramain v. Bush,
These two cases raise some serious issues for lawyers and law professors who provide legal opinion, advice, representation or education to suspected groups even when it is completely unrelated to terrorist violence.
Also see related post by Prof. Fadel of UofT at Foreign Policy,
At issue is the constitutionality of the United States government’s interpretation of a 1996 law criminalizing, with a maximum penalty of 15 years in prison, the provision of “material support” to foreign terrorist organizations. This provision is the government’s most used law in prosecuting those suspected of terrorism, largely because of the law’s breadth, and because it does not require the government to prove that the defendant intended to further the violent aims of the terrorist group. Especially troubling from the perspective of the foreign policy community is that it also prohibits providing “training,” “personnel,” “expert advice or assistance,” or “service” to such a group, even when such services are completely unrelated to terrorist violence.
IRB Under Review
Nicholas Keung of the Toronto Star says,
The issue of state protection has become more contentious following a string of recent federal court challenges – involving refugee claimants from Turkey, Kenya, Mexico, St. Vincent and, in Sterbyci’s case, Albania – that question assessments made by the Immigration and Refugee Board and enforcement officials…
TO PROVE ONE’S CASE, the refugee board suggests, claimants must demonstrate that the “state apparatus” of protection has collapsed, that people in similar situations are also not getting protection, or explain how they sought government help without success.
Refugee lawyers Luyt and Boulakia argue those guidelines and country-condition reports are selectively applied, and the recent federal court decisions would seem to support that.
… state protection cannot be automatically assumed in a democratic country.
Queen’s University immigration law professor Sharryn Aiken said it is only a partial victory for these refugee claimants, because their cases have only been referred back for redetermination; they still face removal from Canada.
However, it underlines the need in Canada for a refugee appeal division, a body with the authority to not only revisit evidence, but reverse wrong decisions, she said.
“Bleeding hearts in law school”
On Friday, Kory Teneycke, a former top adviser to PM Stephen Harper, was interviewed on CTV’s Power Play about the Khadr decision:
Here’s a transcript of the best parts:
Aside from showcasing the Harper government’s ideological approach to human rights, Teneycke’s dialogue serves to remind us of the importance of the Charter with respect to individual rights. As eloquently stated by then-Chief Justice Dickson, the Charter safeguards minorities from the “tyranny of the majority” (R. v. Big M Drug Mart Ltd., [1985] S.C.J. No. 17 at para. 96).
I personally hope that most Canadians would prefer to see an alleged terrorist brought before our functional justice system, rather than lower our justice system to a terrorist-like level of disregard for human rights. But even if the Harper government, and the majority of Canadians, wouldn’t care to see Khadr treated as a human being, there is still Charter-based justification for the judiciary (and the “bleeding hearts in law school”) to seek protection of his fundamental rights.
Responses to Prime Minister of Canada v. Omar Khadr
The anticipated ruling by the SCC in Prime Minister of Canada v. Omar Khadr was released today, and already there is criticism of the decision that ruled that although Khadr’s s. 7 rights were violated, the court could not order the Prime Minister to seek his return.
One of Khadr’s lawyers, Nathan Whitling, said,
He has never had a whole lot of hope in terms of the Canadian government, in any event.
One of Khadr’s other counsel, Dennis Edney, stated,
I will say that the court has the belief that … the Canadian government has a moral conscience and will do the right thing. I will tell him, ‘And that’s what we have to pray and hope.’
Alex Neve of Amnesty International, an intervenor in the case, stated,
It is not open to the Canadian government to just yawn and not take that seriously now. There has to be an effective response that demonstrates that this government is prepared to stand up for rights of Canadians and is prepared to take seriously judgments of the Supreme Court of Canada, even if the court did not feel inclined to say specifically what the Canadian government has to do here.
In a decision with so much responsibility shifted to the political arena, it’s no surprise that politicians are weighing in as well. Michael Ignatieff, leader of the opposition, said of the government,
The only thing it can’t do is to do nothing because the court clearly said that the rights of a Canadian citizen have been violated.
But some of the strongest critiques have come from academia, specifically the The David Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights at the University of Toronto.
In a press release sent to this site Diana Juricevic, Director of the International Human Rights Program at UofT Faculty of Law, stated,
We are very disappointed with the decision. Remedies have to be meaningful in order for Charter rights to be taken seriously. The Supreme Court of Canada has failed Khadr. They have left the decision on what the appropriate remedy is to the Canadian government, which breached Khadr’s fundamental human rights in the first place.
Cheryl Milne, Executive Director of the David Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights, said,
One hopes that the strong pronouncement by the unanimous Court that Canada has violated Omar Khadr’s rights and that the impact of that violation continues unless the government acts, will carry sufficient weight with the Prime Minister to persuade him to do the morally and legally right thing– seek Omar’s repatriation.
And finally, Professor Audrey Macklin, who acted as co-counsel in the case, expressed her frustrations,
The Supreme Court of Canada has spoken clearly, definitively and unanimously on the past and ongoing present violation of Omar Khadr’s rights by the Canadian government. It has pointed to a request for repatriation as an appropriate remedy for the violation of those rights. It now falls to the Prime Minister to do what the Supreme Court of Canada encourages but does not force him to do. If the word of the Supreme Court of Canada that the government has violated Khadr’s Charter rights and should seek repatriation is not enough to motivate this government to act, then I am not sure what is enough to motivate this government to do the right thing.
The Life and Times of Ivan C. Rand
From Volume III, Issue II of Amicus Curiae, Western Law’s Student Paper
Canada was a different place before Trudeaumania swept the nation, and the man we know as Ivan Rand, founding Dean of this law school and former Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada, was a product of his times. It would be easy to dismiss Dean Rand as an intolerant bigot, but as William Kaplan explained to an audience at Western Law on Nov. 11, [2009,] Rand was complicated character.
“Canadian judicial biography has been, with a few exceptions, mostly uncritical and largely celebratory, written by unabashed admirers,” Kaplan writes in his new book, Canadian Maverick – The Life and Times of Ivan C. Rand. “To my great surprise, this book turned out to be different.”
Ivan Rand was born and raised in the Maritimes and graduated from Harvard Law in 1912. It was his exposure to the American Bill of Rights that, according to Kaplan, differentiated Rand from other Canadian lawyers. And it’s Justice Rand’s decisions as a Justice of the Supreme Court that make his legal legacy so difficult to reconcile with his private views, which have been largely hidden until now.
By 1951, the court in Noble v. Alley assessed a restrictive covenant against selling property in the Grand Bend area to Jews, blacks, or those with “coloured race or blood.” It was Justice Rand who interrupted oral submissions by the respondent saying,“If Albert Einstein and Arthur Rubinstein purchased cottages there, the property values would increase, and the association should be honoured to have them as neighbours.”
Despite his position on restrictive covenants in this case, he was a member of two restrictive clubs that excluded Jews. He defended the right of Communists to hold elected positions, and famously opposed the internment of Japanese citizens, all the while refusing to meet his sister’s Acadian husband for 30 years because of his background.
“It’s this hypocrisy – because he did know better – that ultimately leads me to conclude: first-rate mind, third rate temperament,” said Kaplan, noting that the most influential judges are rarely collegial consensus builders. “Not such a bad combination.”
What, if anything, changed during his lifetime?
Kaplan suggests that Rand’s exposure to Jews in the Palestine Mandate may have led him to develop a more favourable impression of Jews. Rand was impressed by the largely secular, often highly educated and industrious, and was sometimes even disdainful of the religious establishment of the Holy Land. He believed that rational law could resolve all human conflict, and was a social engineer at heart.
Robert Mackay, one of Rand’s colleagues at Western who would eventually succeed him as Dean, recalls Rand’s rants against Jews and people with ethnic names that ended with a vowel: “Rand would declare he had enough of them.”
Yet he continued to donate to Hebrew University in Jerusalem for the rest of his life. A forest in Israel was named after him, and he would tour the country receiving awards.
So what is Rand’s legacy for this school?
Kaplan tellingly notes, “Almost all of his great civil libertarian decisions reversed the actions of state authorities in Quebec.” Mackay explained, “Rand had to decide who he hated more – the French-Canadian Roman Catholics, or Jehovah’s Witnesses.”
Rand believed that ethics could not be taught – either you had them or you didn’t. Western is now known as a pioneer in legal ethics education.
The Ivan Rand window in the Moot Court Room looms menacingly above all those who dare try their hand at advocacy. Rand himself believed that mock trials courts were entertaining, but not educational. He preferred his old 1909 Harvard law texts for the students.
Rand felt that women were good as solicitors but did not have the fortitude for criminal law, a notion that would not bode well for our classes in which women outnumber men , the legal aid clinic, or our struggling criminal law program.
Dean Rand defied utilitarian economics by taking surplus budgets and returning them to the university, much to the chagrin of his staff. He abandoned the administration of the law school only months after its opening to attend to a coal crisis in Cape Breton.
Yet the students loved him.
The Rand formula, where workers pay union dues irrespective of membership, is still one of the hallmark characteristics of Canadian labour law. One of Rand’s recommendations (which was never adopted) was that unions be recognized as legal entities that could sue and be sued [directly, and not through agents]. Another was abolishing picketing altogether.
Overall, Kaplan describes Rand’s own hand at labour relations as nothing less than “disastrous,” with nearly every stakeholder and political party expressing strong criticism. “Reforming labour law,” Kaplan said, “is best done incrementally.”
As our own Dean Holloway acknowledges, “it’s difficult to write fairly about Ivan Rand… What emerges is a picture of a principled man, who thought deeply about the best way to enhance the standards of this profession.”
Kaplan suggests that what makes Rand impressive is his ability to draw bright lines between his public and private life, especially when on the Court. And for a man whose vision in many ways may have been ahead of his time, perhaps that is the most we can ask for.
Bin Laden Busted Out of Jail by Westerners
It’s probably not what you think. This story comes to you from Liberia.
Ratzon’s Rules
The bizarre story Goel Ratzon, an Israeli man who allegedly fathered up to 89 children through 39 women is gathering up a media storm after his arrest this week.
Ratzon apparently lived with the women in substandard conditions, imposing strict controls and rules on them. His followers seem to have believed he was a messiah or saviour.
Read some of Razton’s Rules below, and the fines he imposed for their violations.
1 No women shall marry nor shall any woman attack another, either verbally or physically.
Fine: 2,000 shekels into the family kitty
2 No woman shall question another about her whereabouts.
Fine: 100 shekels
3 No conversation is permitted in rooms other than the living room. It is forbidden to talk nonsense.
Fine: 200 shekels
4 No woman shall sit idle when there are dishes to be washed, cleaning to be done, children to look after etc.
Fine: 2,000 shekels
5 Any two women caught fighting will be punished equally.
Fine: 2,000 shekels
6 It is absolutely forbidden to question Ratzon on his whereabouts or intention.
Fine: 400 shekels
7 It is permissible to ask to accompany him; but refusal is to be accepted without appeal.
Fine: 300 shekels
8 No woman shall interrupt Ratzon or intervene in matters not concerning her.
Fine: 500 shekels
9 All orders are to be obeyed immediately.
Fine: 300 shekels
10 No woman shall work while a man of over 12 years of age is in the house.
Fine 3,000 shekels
Stop crying “terrorism” every time we’re attacked
William Saletan over at Slate thinks there’s a distinction between terrorist attacks and casualties of war.
So why is this distinction even important?
…if we can’t tell the difference anymore—if we need lessons in the meaning of terrorism from the father of a suicide bomber—then it’s time to remind ourselves what we’re fighting for.
He points to the definition in American law,
According to the U.S. Code (Title 22, Chapter 38, Section 2656f), “the term ‘terrorism’ means premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents.” That’s the definition we apply to other countries when we designate them as state sponsors of terrorism.
So how do you apply this to the facts, or to incidents of violence? Saleton explains,
The Sept. 11 attacks, which used planes full of civilians to hit the World Trade Center, fit this definition. So did the attempt to blow up Northwest Flight 253 on Christmas Day. So did the Taliban’s 2008 bombing of a hotel in Islamabad, Pakistan.
The Afghan base bombing doesn’t fit the pattern. The CIA personnel who died in the attack were combatants. In interviews with multiple newspapers and wire services—for example, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here—U.S. intelligence officials have confirmed that the personnel at the Afghan base were closely engaged in selecting drone targets in Pakistan and orchestrating special-operations attacks on the Taliban-allied Haqqani network. In the Afghan theater, the CIA is becoming a paramilitary agency. It runs our drone war in Pakistan, and the Afghan base struck on Dec. 30 is “a targeting center for Predator strikes and other operations inside Pakistan.”
Canadian Troops Bear Greater Brunt than Americans, Afghans
David McCandless, a visual data journalist, provides the breakdown of soldier casualties in Afghanistan in The Guardian.
Canadians have suffered a disproportionately high number. In fact more than any other NATO party, or even the Afghan army:
Canadian forces are actually suffering the most. They’re mostly deployed in the southern Kandahar, which adjoins the province of Helmand, where the bulk of British troops are posted. Both are Taliban strongholds.
And, if wounded soldiers are factored in, a shocking picture emerges.
Info is beautiful 07 Photograph: Public Domain
This is probably why the Canadian government is not releasing its figures for wounded soldiers (It took a leak to the Canadian Press news agency to get the figures). (Important: these figures include all wounded, not just seriously wounded. The Canadian figures for 2009 are estimates. As ever you can check my figures and sources in this Google spreadsheet.)
All armies in Afghanistan
How do all these figures stack up compared to the other coalition forces taking part in NATO operations in Afghanistan?
Info is beautiful 08 Photograph: Public Domain
In a barely recorded statistic, the Afghan army and police force has suffered a shocking 4800 fatalities since 2006.
Looking at these figures, I became curious about the private security contractors active in Afghanistan.
The War on the Rule of Law
Olivia Ward of the Toronto Star says that history will judge the architects of the “War on Terror.”
As the second decade of a broken century limps into view, some in the United States and abroad are doing the math and demanding an accounting. They reject the argument that the horrific 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington excuse the shredding of the rule of law that came with the “war on terror.”
…
So the dilemma remains: can a country that has allowed the rule of law to be flouted continue as a credible democracy, setting an example to ordinary citizens and claiming the moral high ground in the international community?
“The fact that a huge slough of people were engaged in torture and conspiracy to torture, with impunity, says something about the rule of law in this country,” laments Michael Ratner of the Center for Constitutional Rights. “If we think we need to torture someone for any reason we’ll do that. What does that say to any police precinct?”
Or to America: “I’m very pessimistic on what I considered an emerging sense of fundamental rights,” he says. “In some ways civilization has been set back at least 100 years.”
Female Ski Jumpers Refused Leave to Appeal
In what must feel like a complete let down only two months before the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver, the Supreme Court of Canada has refused a leave of appeal by a group of female ski jumpers who are demanding for equality with hopes that they too will be allowed to compete alongside their male counterparts in February. The SCC did not release any reasons for their decision.
The women’s lawyer, called the decision a case of “textbook discrimination.”
The trials and tribulations began when the women launched a complaint with the Canadian Human Rights Commission. When that failed, they pursued a court action.
The IOC voted not to include women’s ski jumping at the 2010 Winter Olympics because the sport didn’t meet the necessary criteria for inclusion. The IOC requires that a sport must have contested at least two world championships before it can become an Olympic event. There are also rules dictating how far in advance a sport can be added to the Olympic program.
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