CALL to ACTION: Amnesty International Issues Open Letter to Canadian Government for Independent Review of G8/G20 Police

Hilary Home
Amnesty International

Dear Prime Minister Harper and Premier McGuinty,

 

We are writing on behalf of the more than 80,000 members of Amnesty International across Canada to urge that you work together to launch an independent review of the security measures adopted and the range of police actions taken in association with the G20 Summit in Toronto.  This letter highlights many of the crucial issues that we believe need to be examined in that independent review. 

We first called for such a review in a Closing Communiqué issued at the end of Amnesty International Canada (English branch)’s Annual General Meeting on June 27th.  The meeting was held in Toronto, with some 200 members from across the country in attendance.  Amnesty International members took part in the People First demonstration on June 26th and witnessed many other demonstrations and some instances of arrest and other confrontation between police and demonstrators over the course of the weekend. We have also reviewed many of the growing number of media accounts, individual testimonies and monitoring reports describing police tactics, patterns of arrest, conditions of detention, and acts of vandalism and other violence, including the Preliminary Report of Observations issued by the Canadian Civil Liberties Association on June 29th. 

Amnesty's Open Letter to Prime Minister Harper and Premier McGuinty | Preliminary Report of Observations issued by the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (29 June 2010)