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From Matthew Behrens, from the Campaign to Stop Secret Trials in Canada
Date: Fri, 23 Jun 2006 09:24:01 -0400 From: TASC <tasc@web.ca> Please share with folks that our concerns are being heard and they are stressed about this in Ottawa (though not acting fast enough, which means more phone calls and letters are required!). WIthin hours of our post going out saying that there had been no doctor's visit and the letters started coming in, guess who suddenly shows up at Kingston on Wednesday morning? A doctor. After a full month of waiting for one. We do get through, especially on this issue. peace Matthew
SO REMEMBER: write EARLY and write OFTEN!
- If you get no reply, write (phone, fax, e-mail) inquiry as to why.
- If you get any sort of reply (even if it smells like a form-letter), respond quickly thanking them for the reply but firmly persisting with any points left unanswered (see a sample follow-up letter below)
- ask your friends, families, co-workers and colleagues to write as well.
- then write some more (postcards to the Secret Trial detainees from your summer destinations, perhaps?)
- remember, KEEP THE PRESSURE UP!
Original urgent call for action
Please forward far and wide
Support Canada's Secret Trial Detainees, Three of Whom Have Been on Hunger Strike For Over a Month at Guantanamo Bay North in Kingston, Ontario
Three Detainees Report Being Very Weak, Suffering From Breathing Problems, Chest Pains. No Doctor has seen them yet. Media Access Remains Blocked (Why haven't the media been seeking to bring down the iron curtain that surrounds the detainees?)
June 22, 2006
THE HUNGER STRIKE
Mahmoud Jaballah and Mohammad Mahjoub have been on hunger strike since May 23, with Hassan Almrei hunger striking an additional ten days. Mahjoub (held since June, 2000), Jaballah (held seven months in 1999, and since August, 2001) and Almrei (held since October 2001) are feeling not only the effects of the hunger strike, but are also sweltering in a retrofitted classroom portable which has no air conditioning. Two nights ago, Mr. Jaballah was removed from his cell at 2 am with breathing problems, and did not see a nurse until almost six hours later.
Two simple demands remain at the core of the hunger strike. 1. The men want access to a canteen (which holds snack foods), much as they had access to at Metro West Detention Centre. The government claims concerns over who would handle the detainees' money have prevented them from setting this up. The men have put forward a half dozen workable solutions, but the federal government refuses to budge. Because their daily meals do not provide enough food, the men need the canteen to stave off hunger pangs.
2. Proper phone access. At Metro West, the men could dial out and speak with anyone they chose to from early morning until early evening. Currently, the men are allowed three 20 minute calls per day. However, they must put in a written request an hour before each call is made. If, for example, they call their lawyer, and are informed s/he won't be back for ten minutes, they cannot call ten minutes later. They must put in another phone request, wait an hour, and then hope the lawyer will be there. The limited phone access sharply curtails their ability to maintain contact with their families as well.
Representatives of the Canadian Border Services Agency, which runs Guantanamo North, have assured campaign members that the men's health is their top priority (even though they are trying to deport them to torture). But to allow human beings to go over a month without nutrition is simply heartless. For the federal government to refuse to fix these simple problems, especially after the light that was shone on security certificates over the past month with the Supreme Court hearings, is shameful. Please write and call the appropriate ministers and bureaucrats below and express in polite but strong terms that these men's lives are in danger and they need a solution now.
Media Blackout
The federal government has ordered that the men not have ANY access to the media for the indefinite future. Contact your media representatives and demand that they take action to break through the iron curtain blockade that's been drawn up around the new facility.
WHAT YOU CAN DO:
Letters are urgently needed to the following individuals. Feel free to change the sample letters by adding something that personalizes it for you, but please remain respectful and polite, as our efforts ultimately reflect on the detainees.
2. Write and Call Stockwell Day, Minister responsible for the Canadian Border Services Agency (which runs the KIHC), (see sample letter below) Stockwell Day, MP, House of Commons, Ottawa, ON K1A 0A6 Phone: (613) 995-1702 Fax: (613) 995.1154 Email: day.s@parl.gc.ca communications@psepc.gc.ca
2. Claudette Deschenes (see sample letter below) VP, Enforcement, CBSA claudette.deschenes@cbsa-asfc.gc.ca Phone (613) 952-2531 Fax (613) 952-2622
3. Write a support card to the detainees (let us know at tasc@web.ca if you have so we can monitor if mail is getting through): Mohammad Mahjoub, Mahmoud Jaballah, and Hassan Almrei can be reached:
Kingston Immigration Holding Centre c/o CSC RHQ Ontario Region 440 King Street West PO Box 1174 Kingston, Ontario K7L 4Y8
4. Join the National Day to Close Guantanamo North on Monday, June 26 (International Day Against Torture). Consider organizing a vigil in your community at the office of an MP, CSIS, RCMP, or federal building. in Toronto, there will be a noon-hour vigil at the Federal Court, 361 University Ave.
Sample letter to Canadian Border Services Agency
Send e-mail to Claudette Deschenes, see above for phone and fax #s. Claudette Deschenes VP, Enforcement, Canadian Border Services Agency
Dear Ms. Deschenes,
I am writing to support the demands of the detainees currently on hunger strike over one month under your watch. As you must know, the men were promised superior conditions to those they faced at the Metro West Detention Centre, but those promises have yet to become a reality.
As you may recall, the previous government forced two of the detainees, Mohammad Mahjoub and Hassan Almrei, to hunger strike dangerously long periods last fall (79 and 73 days, respectively) before any action was taken to meet what were, then as now, reasonable requests. Already the detainees are experiencing ill health and weakness, and the lack of long-promised air conditioning is not helping.
I'm asking that you take the steps necessary to meet the very reasonable demands of these gentlemen so that the health-threatening hunger strike which they have undertaken may be brought to an end. I am also asking that you drop the ban on media access which has been imposed on these men. Denying media access may be the policy of the Harper government, but such partisanship has no place in the running of the KIHC.
The requests of Mssrs. Jaballah, Mahjoub, and Almrei are eminently reasonable. The refusal to fix the issues of the canteen and phone access is an embarrassment. Both the detainees and their loved ones have been through years of pain and distress. The least you can do is accommodate these demands so that they are not forced to experience even more stress and hardship.
I look forward to the immediate resolution of this problem.
Name, address
Sample letter to Minister responsible
Send e-mail to Stockwell Day and to communications, see also contact details above (phone, fax, mail).
Stockwell Day, MP Minister Responsible for the Canadian Border Services Agency
Dear Mr. Day,
I am writing to demand that you intervene immediately to meet the reasonable demands of Canada's secret trial detainees who have been on hunger strike over one month at the Kingston Immigration Holding Centre. As you may recall, the previous government forced two of the detainees, Mohammad Mahjoub and Hassan Almrei, to hunger strike dangerously long periods last fall (79 and 73 days, respectively) before any action was taken to meet what were, then as now, reasonable requests. Already the detainees are experiencing ill health and weakness.
People do not forgo food unless there are good reasons to do so, and these men obviously have cause to go to these extreme lengths to get you to negotiate with them in good faith.
As if this were not enough, the men are also being denied access to media to discuss their very legitimate complaints.
Your agency has claimed the new facility will present better conditions for the detainees, yet this is simply not the case. I again urge you to intervene immediately and take steps necessary to prevent a further deterioration in the health of the detainees and, by extension, that of their loved ones, whose stress during this time remains extremely high.
I look forward to your immediate action to resolve this crisis.
Name, address
A sample reply from the Canadian Border Services Agency
On Thu, 22 Jun 2006, Deschenes, Claudette wrote: > Dear X > Thank you for your letter concerning the conditions of detention at the Kingston Immigration Holding Centre (KIHC). > > Although privacy legislation prevents me from discussing the particulars of a case without prior permission from the person > involved, I can give you some general information about detention conditions at the KIHC. > > I would first like to point out that persons in the KIHC are detained, because they were identified as risks to our national > security and as such, are inadmissible to Canada. The Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) is nonetheless concerned about > the health and safety of all detainees under its care and discourages hunger strikes as a way to solve issues. > > Please be assured that operational detention policies were developed to comply with both the CBSA's national detention > standards as well as all international obligations with respect to detention conditions. The Red Cross, an independent and > respected organization, monitors the CBSA's holding centres based on these standards and obligations. > > Detainee complaints are taken seriously and KIHC management is committed to addressing issues as they arise. Redress > procedures are in place at the KIHC for both informal and formal complaints so that issues can be brought to the appropriate > level for resolution in the CSBA. > > KIHC management is committed to working with the detained population to review its operational > policies and address reasonable requests. As the detainees in the KIHC are under removal order, > they also have the option to leave Canada at anytime. > > Thank you again for bringing your concerns to my attention. > > Sincerely, > > Original signed by > Claudette Deschênes > Vice President > Enforcement Branch
Follow-up message back to CSBA Kingston
[Friday June 23] Dear Claudette Deschênes,
Thank you for your prompt response to my letter; I regret to have to point out however that your message did not in fact reply to my concerns.
If the CBSA is really interested in preventing hunger strikes, surely the simplest way to achieve this end would be to return to the telephone usage levels previously enjoyed at Metro Detention facilities, and allow access to canteens for purchasing items desired. Neither of these reasonable requests implies any substantive security risk, and both can be easily granted at your instruction. Please note that a response in principle to the issues I raise in no way involves a breach of "confidentiality", so please do not hide behind that pretext for inaction and non-responses.
Interestingly, you seem to have no compunction about commenting on the determination that these men pose a security risk to Canada, even though the supposed "evidence" for these allegations is secret and has never been tested in an open court procedure. And even if there were evidence to convict them of some crime, the treatment they and their families currently endure is measurably worse than the conditions under which convicted criminals are routinely held in this country.
It must also be pointed out that the "option to leave Canada at any time" which you claim these detained men have, is in fact no realistic option at all, since they would leave behind family members in this country and would themselves face documented risks of torture and execution in their home countries. In the face of these certainties (as confirmed by the UN Committee on Torture), it seems ingenuous at best for you to suggest that "removal" (i.e. deportation) as an "option" for them. You have the option of acting to resolve this situation, and of responding substantively to the issues I and other Canadians have raised. The detained men have few real options left, other than continuing their hunger strikes until their reasonable requests are met.
Will you act soon to resolve this situation? I look forward to your substantive response and prompt humanitarian action. Sincerely,
More information
Campaign to Stop Secret Trials in Canada, PO Box 73620, 509 St. Clair Ave. West, Toronto, ON M6C 1C0, email
