Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Welcome, General Watkin. It's nice to see you again after I think almost 30 years.
I take it that what you said a moment ago is correct, that international humanitarian law applies regardless, and whether they're prisoners of war or not is not really relevant in the application of law in this particular circumstance in terms of the prevention of torture. I'm assuming that's correct.
I'm going to try a little different tactic than Mr. Dosanjh and Mr. Bachand. In your presentation you indicate that in addition to being a legal advisor to the government in some of its various presentations--like the Governor General, etc.--you say you also superintend the administration of military justice in the Canadian Forces, and you also exercise command over all legal officers working in the office of the JAG, including those deployed to Afghanistan. You would have administrative and operational duties that I would assume would include the assurance that in the administration of military justice, if there were breaches of law, you would seek to have people prosecuted who had participated or done that.
In that context I want to refer you to an affidavit filed by Mr. Richard Colvin, a diplomat, to the Military Police Complaints Commission, specifically paragraphs 40 and following. He says he sent a number of memoranda, but he specifically intended that those memoranda reach the Provost Marshal in charge of the military police, and also the military and/or civilian legal advisors, which he calls LEGADs or JAGs, who are responsible for legal aspects of detainee management.
I also note that in the one report of Mr. Colvin's that has been made public, which was filed in the Federal Court, in the heading it says that it was to go to “NDHQ OTT ADM: For Vincent Rigby. Also please pass to JAG.”
This affidavit talks about the visits by Mr. Colvin to prisons and witnessing or getting first-hand reports of torture and seeing wounds on individuals that they described as resulting from ill treatment.
In these circumstances, had you been aware of this, do you see it as your responsibility as the person responsible for military justice--and I'm assuming the compliance with international law by the people who you are responsible for--to do something about that? Were you aware of this information and did you do anything about it?