One hundred and fifty-five countries, including Canada and the United States, are party to the United Nations Convention Against Torture (CAT). Those countries have committed to investigating, prosecuting and punishing torturers. (See also Accountability for U.S. Torture: France; Accountability for U.S. Torture: Spain; Accountability for U.S. Torture: Germany; and Accountability for U.S. Torture: Switzerland; Katherine Gallagher, Universal Jurisdiction in Practice: Efforts to Hold Donald Rumsfeld and Other High-level United States Officials Accountable for Torture, Journal of International Criminal Justice (2009)).

In an effort to ensure accountability for torturers and hold the U.S to its obligations under CAT, in 2011 the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and the Canadian Centre for International Justice (CCJI) lodged a detailed indictment against former U.S president George W. Bush with the attorney General of Canada, on behalf of four torture victims who had been detained by the U.S. This action is brought under the principle of universal jurisdiction.

CCR urged the attorney general to open a criminal investigation against Bush, who was scheduled to visit Surrey, British Columbia, for his role in authorizing and overseeing his administration’s wide ranging and well-documented use of torture. These methods included, but were not limited to water boarding, sleep deprivation, physical violence, and solitary confinement. As Canada failed to initiate proceedings against Bush, four torture victims lodged a private prosecution against Bush, while he was present in Canada, on October 20, 2011. Canadian officials moved to immediately close the case against Bush.

On November 2012, a petition was lodged with the Committee Against Torture against Canada for its failure to uphold its treaty obligations to investigate and prosecute Bush while he was in Canada. Over the next two years, CCR, on behalf of the torture victims, and Canada, submitted briefs addressing both admissibility of the petition (standing of the victims, exhaustion of domestic remedies) and the merits (Canada’s failure to investigate and prosecute Bush following claims and evidence of a credible case for torture being brought). The case is currently pending before the Committee.