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Mounties secretly ended probe into Canadian held by Taliban
Last year, while Canada's Department of Foreign Affairs publicly asserted it was trying to help a Canadian held for more than two years by the Taliban, it was privately telling the RCMP to stop investigating the crime.Beverley Giesbrecht, from Vancouver, was abducted in November 2008 while working in Pakistan after she converted to Islam and adopted the name Khadija Abdul Qahaar. In May 2011, the Department of Foreign Affairs revealed that it believed Giesbrecht had died in captivity sometime in 2010, but a spokesperson added that it was continuing "to pursue all appropriate channels" to find out what happened. Documents obtained through an access to information request, however, expose that months earlier the department not only thought Giesbrecht was dead, but had told the RCMP it did not need to investigate. Foreign Affairs wouldn't explain why it asked the RCMP to end its investigation. A department spokeswoman issued a written statement that, "as a matter of policy, DFAIT does not, and cannot, instruct the RCMP on any operational or investigative matter," adding that, "only the RCMP can make a decision to terminate an investigation." The RCMP issued a terse and confusing statement about its investigation. Although the RCMP's own documents show the investigation was concluded, media relations officer Sgt. Greg Cox wrote "the RCMP does not comment on ongoing investigations." Cox did not reply to further requests for information, leaving Giesbrecht's friends wondering why her kidnapping was a crime worth investigating, but her death in captivity was not. Posted by: ryuge 2012-04-20 |
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