Just plain wrong

The editorial board of the Ottawa Citizen has their facts completely and utterly wrong:

The Canadian military will now alert the International Committee of the Red Cross and an indigenous human rights group when it hands over Taliban prisoners to Afghan control. This is good.

...

The agreement to involve the Red Cross and human rights monitors was signed last week by the Canadian commander in Kandahar. The timing of the agreement will no doubt strike some as politically convenient, coinciding as it does with allegations that Canada itself has mistreated some prisoners, as well as reports of Canadian soldiers accidentally shooting civilians.

First of all, the CF has been informing the ICRC of detainee transfers since at least December 2005. The "new" agreement is with the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, not the International Committee of the Red Cross. In fact, the ICRC has praised Canada's performance on this front:

Last fall, the head of the International Red Cross said he was satisfied that Canadian troops in Afghanistan follow all the rules. Jakob Kellenberger said Canada is scrupulous about notifying the Red Cross when it takes prisoners and hands them over.

Furthermore, if the timing "strikes some as politically convenient," it's because they're not bothering to pay attention to the real timeline I outlined yesterday. This agreement has been in the works for almost a year, and the intent to pursue it was written into the original detainee transfer agreement almost a year and a half ago.

This isn't the subtle spin I rant about most of the time, it's just plain factually inaccurate. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

The Citizen owes both its readers and the Canadian Forces an apology and a public correction.

Update: I've informed the Citizen of their errors in a letter to the editor. We'll see if it gets published.

Upperdate: Well, the paper didn't publish my letter. Instead, readers got a tiny correction notice:

Canada recently agreed to alert an Afghan human rights group whenever Canadian soldiers hand over prisoners to the Afghan government, although the Canadian military already had been alerting the Red Cross. Incorrect information appeared in an editorial yesterday.

Weak, folks. Very weak.