Canadian FM Apologizes for Torture List

Canadian foreign minister Maxime Bernier has apologized for the inclusion of the US and Israel on a list of countries in which prisoners risk being subjected to torture, the BBC reports. The list, part of a torture awareness guide for diplomats, cited US interrogation techniques and referred to its Guantanamo Bay facility. Both countries denounced their placement on the list.

"We find it offensive for us to be on the same list with countries like Iran and China,” bristled the US ambassador to Canada. Bernier claims the document was not a statement of official foreign policy: "It contains a list that wrongly includes some of our closest allies. I have directed that the manual be reviewed and rewritten.” (More Canada stories.)