Richard Colvin (diplomat)

Richard Colvin is a Canadian diplomat who gained public attention as a witness in the Canadian Afghan detainee issue. He appeared before the Special Committee on the Canadian Mission in Afghanistan in late 2009 where he discussed a signed affidavit alleging that Afghan detainees turned over to Afghanistan prisons by Canadian soldiers were tortured. The events surrounding this issue, and the Conservative government's response to his testimony, were, according to many Members of Parliament, closely related to the widespread anti-prorogation protests.

Early life

Colvin was born in 1969 in a village near Coventry, Great Britain, where he lived until the age of 16, when his family migrated to Canada, settling near Waterdown, Ontario. His father was a marketing executive for farm machinery manufacturer Massey Ferguson. His uncle David Colvin worked for the British foreign service and ended up ambassador to Belgium. Colvin attended high school in Waterdown and studied international relations and Russian language at the University of Toronto, graduating with distinction.

He applied to join the foreign service straight out of school, but failed the exam, and obtained a job as reporter for the weekly newspaper USSR Business Reports in Moscow. After a year he returned to Canada, completing a masters of journalism at the University of Western Ontario in 1994, where he graduated at the top of his class. In 1992 he took the exam to enter the foreign service for a second time. This time he succeeded.

He married a Russian woman and took a job in Ottawa working on Canada-U.S. defence relations. In 2002, he moved to Ramallah in the Palestinian territories, where he served as head of a new political mission in the wake of Yasser Arafat's death. His marriage failed, and he returned to Canada in 2005, moving to Calgary. During a vacation in Whistler he was offered a job in Afghanistan.

As a witness in the Afghan detainee issue

See also: Canadian Afghan detainee issue, Timeline of the Canadian Afghan detainee issue, and 2010 Canada anti-prorogation protests

On October 6, 2009, the lawyer for Colvin (called to testify at a hearing into allegations of Afghan prison torture) said that the Conservative government was trying to keep her client silent. In a letter sent to the Canadian Department of Justice and obtained by CBC News, lawyer Lori Bokenfohr said the government invoked the national security order in response to Colvin's decision to co-operate with the Military Police Complaints Commission.

During his testimony in November 2009, Colvin said Canada did not monitor detainee conditions in Afghanistan and that detainees transferred by Canadians to Afghan prisons were likely tortured. "According to our information, the likelihood is that all the Afghans we handed over were tortured", Colvin said. "For interrogators in Kandahar, it was a standard operating procedure". Colvin worked in Kandahar for the Department of Foreign Affairs in 2006 before moving to Kabul, where he was second-in-command at the Canadian Embassy. He said his reports were ignored and he was eventually told to stop putting the reports in writing. However, Mr. Colvin’s testimony had been “…politely but steadily chipped away by evidence from a cast that includes three former Canadian ambassadors to Afghanistan and other senior officials from the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade who were on the Afghanistan file, a representative from the Correctional Service of Canada (who was in Kandahar and made 47 visits to prisons, most of them unannounced) and an array of generals” (Globe and Mail, C.Blatchford, 14 May 2010).

On the other hand in a ruling of June, 2010, the High Court of England and Wales [2010 EWHC 1445] gave Mr. Colvin's testimony considerable weight. Arguments that the High Court did not have benefit of the full Canadian testimony can be balanced against much other corollary evidence considered in the judgement. For example (paragraphs 74, 75) in 2008 the American State Department and the Foreign Affairs Committee of the British House of Commons both asserted that the risk of torture by Afghan "authorities" was real and well-known.

On December 30, 2009 Prime Minister Stephen Harper sought his second prorogation, which, according to his spokesperson, was to consult with Canadians about the economy. However, "...the move triggered immediate condemnation from opposition MPs who labelled the Conservative government's move an 'almost despotic' attempt to muzzle parliamentarians amid controversy over the Afghan detainees affair." This triggered a protest of thousands of citizens.

Apart from his witness duties

Richard Colvin currently serves as the First Secretary and Liaison Officer in the Intelligence division at the Canadian embassy to the United States of America.

See also

• 2010 Canada anti-prorogation protests
• Bagram torture and prisoner abuse
• Canadian Afghan detainee issue
• Canada's role in the invasion of Afghanistan
• Canadian Forces casualties in Afghanistan
• Criticism of the War on Terrorism
• International public opinion on the war in Afghanistan
• Opposition to the War in Afghanistan (2001–present)
• Protests against the invasion of Afghanistan
• Timeline of the Canadian Afghan detainee issue
• War in Afghanistan (2001–present)

External links

Videos

• Canada's pro-democracy movement (includes footage of Colvin) Produced by Jesse Freeston, January 29, 2010; Publisher: The Real News (duration: 10:36)