The federal government is dismissing another newspaper report about the continued abuse of prisoners in Afghanistan.
Montreal La Presse reported in Monday's edition that prisoners at a Kandahar jail are being abused -- including allegations that they're being hit with bricks, having their fingernails ripped out, being forced to stand without sleeping and being whipped with electric cables.
La Presse cites interviews with three unnamed prisoners and independent sources like a prison head and a spokesperson for the Afghan Human Rights Commission.
A in the Globe and Mail last spring prompted the Conservative government to announce a new agreement to monitor detainees.
During Monday's question period in the House of Commons, the opposition used its first opportunity to attack the government on the issue.
"Does the government even know how many allegations of torture there've been since the agreement came into force in May?" asked deputy Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff. "And why has the defence minister done nothing to ensure that the agreement is respected?"
Conservative House Leader Peter Van Loan dismissed the latest report as rehashing propaganda by the Taliban -- a group "whose major business is trampling the rights of Afghans."
"We do expect these kinds of allegations from the Taliban,'' said Van Loan.
"It is their standard operating procedure to engage in these kinds of accusations."
La Presse quotes an Afghan Human Rights Commission spokesperson saying about a third of prisoners are still being tortured by Afghanistan's secret service before they are taken to prison.
"The Canadians give us a sealed envelope with the names of the prisoners. The problem is that list never corresponds to the one compiled by the secret service," commission spokesperson Shamuldin Tanwir told La Presse.
The newspaper also quoted a senior official at the Sarpoza prison in Kandahar and said he did not want to be identified: "Yes. The detainees are tortured by the secret services before they're brought to us."
One detainee told La Presse that when he was captured, Canadian soldiers told him not to worry. He said they gave him a document guaranteeing there was no more torture of prisoners in Afghanistan.
"The people from the secret services ripped it up and tossed it in my face," the prisoner is quoted as saying.
"They beat me for 20 days."
Helena Guergis, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs and International Trade, said the government is taking all prisoner allegations "very seriously," despite the fact they're unsubstantiated.
"We have allegations again, nothing substantiated, from alleged Taliban terrorists. They are trained to follow this procedure, to make these allegations," Guergis told CTV's Mike Duffy Live on Monday.
She added that Canadian Ambassador to Afghanistan Arif Lalani called Afghan President Hamid Karzai's office about the latest allegations -- and that "those conversations are going on."
Guergis described the new agreement the Tory government put in place to monitor detainees as a substantially improved one that has the approval of Amnesty International.
"Amnesty International said the enhanced agreement was something they hoped was put in place in the beginning. It is an agreement that is by far better, and it is an agreement that allows us to have the contact that we do. We now have only four prisons where the detainees go that Canadians do pick up. We've had 11 visits in those prisons, and any time there's any allegations we follow up on them."
