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For Immediate Release
September, 28 2011, 12:53pm EDT
Contact:
In Canada:
Matt Eisenbrandt, CCIJ, (604) 569-1778, meisenbrandt@ccij.ca
Djia Mambu, CCIJ, (613) 744-7667 x266, dmambu@ccij.ca
In U.S.:
Emily Whitfield, CCR, (212) 614-6449, press@ccrjustice.org
Human Rights Groups to Urge Torture Prosecution of George W. Bush in Anticipation of October 20 Visit to Surrey, B.C.
Canada should prosecute G.W. Bush for torture say CCR and CCIJ
VANCOUVER, BC
At a 10:30 a.m. news conference in Vancouver tomorrow, Canadian and U.S. human rights organizations will urge the Canadian Attorney General to open an investigation and prosecution of former U.S. President George W. Bush based on his individual and command responsibility under Canadian and international human rights law for torture of detainees in U.S. custody.
The groups will release a detailed and lengthy dossier setting forth the case against the former U.S. president, and a formal request that an investigation and prosecution be opened. More than 4,000 pages of supporting material setting forth the case against Bush will be submitted to the Attorney General by the groups.
The action is being undertaken by the U.S.-based Center for Constitutional Rights (www.ccrjustice.org) and the Canadian Centre for International Justice (www.ccij.ca). Earlier this year, Bush cancelled a planned trip to Switzerland following CCR's announcement that it would file criminal complaints in that country on behalf of two detainees who were tortured.
Bush is speaking at the Surrey Regional Economic Summit on October 20 at the invitation of Surrey Mayor Diane Watts, for a reported fee of $150,000. The call for his prosecution comes on the heels of former U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney's recent trip to Canada to promote his memoir at a $500-a-plate event. Despite calls for investigations of Cheney's role in torture, to date no action has been taken by the Canadian government to investigate or prosecute him.
WHAT:
News conference to announce a call for the torture prosecution of former U.S. President George W. Bush, who is travelling to Surrey, B.C. on October 20. (Note: This event will be conducted in English.)
WHEN: Thursday, 29 September 2011, 10:30 a.m.
WHERE: Library Square Conference Centre
350 West Georgia Street, Vancouver, BC
Alma VanDusen room
WHO: Matt Eisenbrandt,
Legal Director of the Canadian Centre for International Justice
Katherine Gallagher,
Senior Staff Attorney for the Center for Constitutional Rights
NOTE: Also on Sept. 29, representatives of CCR and CCIJ, joined by Lawyers Against the War, will participate in an evening panel discussion about Bush's responsibility for torture at UBC-Robson Square, 800 Robson Street, Room C180, from 6:30-8:30 p.m.
The Center for Constitutional Rights, in addition to filing the first cases representing men detained at Guantanamo has filed universal jurisdiction cases seeking accountability for torture by Bush administration officials in Germany, France and submitted expert opinions and other documentation to ongoing cases in Spain in collaboration with ECCHR. The Center for Constitutional Rights is dedicated to advancing and protecting the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Founded in 1966 by attorneys who represented civil rights movements in the South, CCR is a non-profit legal and educational organization committed to the creative use of law as a positive force for social change. Visitwww.ccrjustice.org. Follow @theCCR.
The Canadian Centre for International Justice works with survivors of genocide, torture and other atrocities to seek redress and bring perpetrators to justice. The CCIJ seeks to ensure that individuals present in Canada who are accused of responsibility for serious human rights violations are held accountable and their victims recognized, supported and compensated. For more information visit www.ccij.ca
The Center for Constitutional Rights is dedicated to advancing and protecting the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. CCR is committed to the creative use of law as a positive force for social change.
(212) 614-6464LATEST NEWS
Global Intellectuals Voice Solidarity With Palestine Action Hunger Strikers 'At Death's Door'
Angela Davis, Naomi Klein, Sally Rooney, Tariq Ali, and George Monbiot are among the signers of a statement of support for the proscribed anti-genocide protesters, who have refused food for over two months.
Jan 12, 2026
More than 50 international authors and academics signed a declaration published Monday in support of hunger-striking activists allegedly linked to the banned Palestine Action movement, who are at imminent risk of death after refusing to eat for more than two months.
The brief statement—“We oppose genocide, we support the Palestine Action prisoners”—was signed by prominent figures including historian Tariq Ali; novelist Sally Rooney; former Guantánamo Bay prisoner Moazzam Begg; journalists Owen Jones and George Monbiot; and professors Angela Davis, Judith Butler, Naomi Klein, and Ilan Pappé.
The declaration echoes the message on a placard held by Swedish climate campaigner Greta Thunberg when she was arrested last month in London protesting the imprisonment of people accused of being part of Palestine Action after the nonviolent direct action group was officially declared a terrorist organization in July by the UK government.
Since then, more than 2,000 people have been arrested for supporting Palestine Action, often while simply holding signs. Eight accused Palestine Action activists are awaiting trial for allegedly breaking into and damaging a British military base and a facility run by Israeli arms maker Elbit Systems. The defendants are facing at least 18 months behind bars before trial.
On November 2, a small group of imprisoned activists launched a hunger strike. Three people—Heba Muraisi, Kamran Ahmed, and Lewie Chiaramello—are still striking, despite imminent danger of death.
"She’s dying. She said it: ‘I’m dying,'" Francesca Nadin said of her friend Muraisi—who is on the 71st day of her strike—during a Monday interview with the Guardian.
Nadin said that the 31-year-old's body is "shutting down."
"I know mentally she’ll remain strong right to the last moment but she is dying," she added. "The government, by putting her in prison and denying her all her rights, they’re not just letting her die, they’re actively killing her.”
Ahmed, 28, has been refusing food for 64 days. Doctors have informed him that his heart muscles are shrinking and he is at risk of sudden cardiac arrest.
"He’s skinny. I describe him a bit like a piece of paper,” Shahmina Alam, Ahmed's sister, told Al Jazeera last week. "It feels like now every time you see him, it could be the last.”
Chiaramello, 22, has Type 1 diabetes and has been fasting every other day for 44 days.
A fourth person, Umar Khalid, has reportedly resumed his strike following a 13-day pause.
Despite her dire condition, Muraisi is “intent on carrying on until the demands are met," according to friend Amareen Afzal.
The strikers are demanding immediate bail, an end to censorship of their communications, a fair trial, lifting of the ban on Palestine Action, and closure of Elbit Systems' UK facilities.
"The hunger strikers’ demands seem reasonable to me," Monbiot wrote last week. "All these things, I believe, should be happening anyway. And they are of course negotiating positions. Whether all would need to be met for the strike to end cannot be known until the government engages. Its refusal to talk could condemn the strikers to death."
Standing in stark contrast with the US military's torturous force-feeding of hunger striking Guantánamo Bay prisoners during the Obama administration, the UK follows recommendations in the World Medical Association’s Declaration of Malta, which advises doctors not to force-feed prisoners who choose to hunger strike and understand the consequences of their actions.
"Forcible feeding is never ethically acceptable," the declaration states.
In 1981, UK authorities allowed 10 imprisoned Irish Republican Army members, including former Member of Parliament Bobby Sands, to starve themselves to death in Northern Ireland. Their deaths occurred after between 46 and 73 days of refusing food.
A group of former hunger strikers from Palestine, Ireland, and Guantánamo on Sunday issued an urgent appeal to the UK government to save the Palestine Action strikers' lives, and condemning the terrorist designation.
Critics said that the government would be to blame should any of the hunger strikers die.
“The UK is now perilously close to full descent into authoritarian rule," said professor Peter Hallward, who signed the intellectuals' declaration. "Ministers won’t even meet with hunger strikers, who are now at death’s door."
Hallward added that British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy, Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper, and Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood "seem perfectly ready to let this country’s most committed and courageous opponents of an ongoing genocide waste away and die."
Israel's US-backed war and siege on Gaza following the Hamas-led attack of October 7, 2023 has left more than 250,000 Palestinians dead, wounded, or missing in Gaza and most of the coastal strip in ruins. Around 2 million Gazans have been forcibly displaced, starved, or sickened.
Hundreds of Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces since the current cease-fire took effect three months ago. Israeli authorities are still blocking or strictly limiting the entry of critical supplies into Gaza, where 2-month-old infant Mohammed Abu Harbid over the weekend became at least the fourth Palestinian baby to freeze to death since November.
More than a dozen Palestinians—including at least five children—have been killed by Israeli attacks in Gaza in recent days.
Israel is facing a genocide case filed by South Africa at the International Court of Justice, the principal judicial body of the United Nations, where a panel of experts found last year that Israel was committing genocide. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant are also wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
On Monday, a court in Edinburgh held a hearing on a petition filed by human rights campaigner and former diplomat Craig Murray seeking to lift the ban on Palestine Action in Scotland, whose judiciary is independent from the rest of the UK.
“The impact of proscription of Palestine Action has been appalling," attorney Joanna Cherry told the court. "Scores of peaceful people of entirely good character have been arrested under the absurd pretence of terrorism.”
“We are dealing with human rights and liberties—some of the most fundamental in our society," Cherry added. "If people don’t have the right to express their views and assemble to express their views, they can’t really take part in civil society properly and adequately. It’s hard to imagine a more urgent situation.”
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House Democrats Who Want Stock Trading Ban 'Disappointed' by GOP Proposal
"Any bill that still allows members of Congress to own and trade stocks falls far short of what the American people want and deserve," said Reps. Pramila Jayapal, Seth Magaziner, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Jan 12, 2026
A trio of Democrats in the US House of Representatives leading the fight for a congressional stock trading ban ripped Republican leadership's proposal as an inadequate replacement in a Monday statement released ahead of a scheduled committee markup.
Politico reported last month that House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Administration Committee Chair Bryan Steil (R-Wis.) briefed GOP lawmakers on their plan for a bill that would ban members of Congress from buying new stocks but let them keep what they already have.
Steil introduced the Stop Insider Trading Act on Monday and announced a Wednesday markup. Backed by Johnson and other GOP leaders, the legislation would also apply to lawmakers' spouses and dependent children, and require public notice a week before any of them sell stock.
However, Reps. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), Seth Magaziner (D-RI), and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) argued in a joint statement that "any bill that still allows members of Congress to own and trade stocks falls far short of what the American people want and deserve."
"We are disappointed that the bill introduced by Republican leadership today fails to deliver the reform that is needed and instead protects the wealthiest members of Congress by allowing them to continue to hold and sell stock," said the original co-sponsors of the bipartisan Restore Trust in Congress Act.
House Republicans’ new legislation on Congressional stock trading falls far short of what the American people want and deserve. The House must move forward on our bipartisan consensus bill, the Restore Trust in Congress Act.My full statement with @magaziner.house.gov and @ocasio-cortez.house.gov:
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— Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal (@jayapal.house.gov) January 12, 2026 at 12:23 PM
The Democrats stressed that "while this bill prohibits members from buying new stocks, it does nothing to remove the conflict of interest that arises from owning or selling existing stocks. Members can still act on legislation, investigations, and briefings that directly influence the value of their stocks for personal benefit."
"The American public deserves to know that members of Congress are making decisions in the public interest, not in the interest of their own pocketbooks. The only way to restore Americans' trust is to ban members of Congress from owning and trading stocks," the trio continued.
"We hope that Speaker Johnson will find the courage to move the Restore Trust in Congress Act, a bipartisan consensus bill that has wide support from members of both parties and will end the practice of members of Congress owning and trading stocks once and for all," they concluded.
The Restore Trust in Congress Act would ban members of Congress, plus spouses and children, from trading individual stocks. It would give them 180 days to sell anything they hold and require divestment before newly elected lawmakers are sworn in.
When that bill was introduced in September, Jamie Neikrie, legislative director at the political reform group Issue One, said that "members of Congress have a responsibility to hold themselves to the highest ethical standards, and passing the Restore Trust in Congress Act is how Congress shows it's serious about restoring trust and integrity in government."
As Politico detailed Monday:
Johnson and GOP leaders have been searching for a legislative compromise to appease Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) and other rank-and-file House Republicans, who have for months been threatening to launch a discharge petition effort to circumvent leadership and force a floor vote on a full congressional stock trading ban.
Luna, in a promising sign for Johnson, said in an interview last week she supports the current legislation pending before the House Administration Committee because it would force a "disgorgement" period.
However, even if the new bill is able to get through the Republican-controlled House, it would face a GOP Senate majority so narrow that at least some Democratic support is required to advance most legislation to a final vote.
Last July, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) voted with all Democrats on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee to advance another bill that would bar federal politicians from holding or trading stocks. To win over Hawley, Democrats had to agree to a carveout for President Donald Trump. As Business Insider noted Monday, "It has yet to receive a floor vote."
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Backlash Builds Against Trump DOJ's 'Unprecedented' Investigation of US Federal Reserve Chairman
"If the Federal Reserve loses its independence, the stability of our markets and the broader economy will suffer."
Jan 12, 2026
The US Department of Justice's decision to open a criminal investigation into Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has ignited a major backlash that even has some Republican senators drawing a line in the sand.
Shortly after Powell released a video on Sunday accusing the Department of Justice (DOJ) of waging an "intimidation" campaign against him on behalf of President Donald Trump, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) blasted the administration, accusing them of trying to compromise the independence of America's central bank.
“If there were any remaining doubt whether advisers within the Trump administration are actively pushing to end the independence of the Federal Reserve, there should now be none,” said Tillis, who further vowed to "oppose the confirmation of any nominee for the Fed—including the upcoming Fed chair vacancy—until this legal matter is fully resolved."
On Monday, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) backed up Tillis' pledge to oppose any nominees for the Federal Reserve until the criminal probe of Powell, whose term as Fed chair is due to end in May, has been resolved.
Murkowski also revealed that she spoke with Powell and determined that "it’s clear the administration’s investigation is nothing more than an attempt at coercion" aimed at affecting his decisions on US monetary policy.
"The stakes are too high to look the other way," Murkowski emphasized. "If the Federal Reserve loses its independence, the stability of our markets and the broader economy will suffer."
Trump can only afford to lose the support of four Republican senators in a vote for a new Fed chair, which means Tillis and Murkowski's vows not to support any nominee until the case against Powell is resolved carry significant weight.
A bipartisan group of economists who have served under US presidents dating back to Ronald Reagan—including former Federal Reserve Chairs Alan Greenspan, Ben Bernanke, and Janet Yellin—released a joint statement on Monday denouncing what they described as an effort to strong-arm the Federal Reserve into doing the president's bidding.
"The reported criminal inquiry into Federal Reserve Chair Jay Powell is an unprecedented attempt to use prosecutorial attacks to undermine... independence," they wrote. "This is how monetary policy is made in emerging markets with weak institutions, with highly negative consequences for inflation and the functioning of their economies more broadly. It has no place in the United States, whose greatest strength is the rule of law, which is at the foundation of our economic success."
Trump, who nominated Powell to be Federal Reserve chairman in 2017, has been openly pressuring Powell for months to more aggressively cut interest rates in the face of a faltering jobs market.
Powell, however, has continued to take a more cautious approach, and has cited the price instability caused by Trump's tariffs as a reason to hold off on more aggressive rate cuts.
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