The Globe and Mail, that gray lady of Canadian journalism that brands itself “Canada’s National Newspaper,” has a spiffy new look this week, and—it would seem—a new attitude as well. The paper launched a national controversy on Monday with allegations that Taliban detainees captured by Canadian soldiers are being sent to torture and a lack of due process at the hands of Afghan authorities. That prompted opposition calls for the resignation of Defence Minister Gordon O’Connor, who told the country on Monday that the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission would oversee transferred detainees to ensure they were not being mistreated. The Globe shot back Tuesday morning, leading with an admission from the AIHRC’s chief investigator in Kandahar that the agency doesn’t have the access or resources to monitor detainees handed over to Afghan authorities. Prime Minister Stephen Harper went on the defensive Tuesday, saying “what is disgraceful is to simply accept allegations of Taliban suspects at face value,” while O’Connor stressed that he has been in touch with Canadian military and diplomatic representatives and “they have not raised any issues.” Not to be outdone, the Globe hits back once again this morning, with news that Canadian officials themselves told the government in a report that detainees “faced the possibility of torture, abuse and extrajudicial killing” at the hands of Afghan authorities.

But despite three consecutive days of having its backside handed to it by the Globe, the government at least won a small victory yesterday on the Afghanistan issue, successfully teaming up with the NDP to defeat a non-binding Liberal parliamentary motion that would commit Canada to cycling out of the war zone in Kandahar at the end of its military commitment in 2009. That didn’t stop Thomas Walkom, writing in today’s Star, from asserting that a majority of MPs now want troops out of Afghanistan. Setting aside the NDP’s “short-term political strategy” that allowed the Conservatives to defeat the motion, Walkom writes that “the real significance of the past week is that the House of Commons no longer supports the Afghan mission. The troops maybe. But not the mission.” That may be one lesson to learn from all this, but for Prime Minister Harper and his cabinet collagues, this week’s fiasco over Afghanistan may lead to another lesson being learned: If there’s an edition of the Globe coming out tomorrow, it might be wise to shut up today.

Maisonneuve MediaScout
April 25, 2007