SHARING INFORMATION WITH STATES THAT TORTURE and ill-treatment. The Committee against Torture has made critical statements on the use of diplomatic assurances, and has recalled that they are not sufficient to protect detainees in the context of cross border intelligence sharing. Most recently, in their follow-up report to the Committee against Torture, the Canadian Government reinforced that Canada neither promotes nor condones the use of torture or other unlawful methods of investigation, yet rejected the recommendation of the Committee to modify the Ministerial Directions to ensure consistency with the Convention against Torture.44 The Statement recalled that the Ministerial Direction had required that procedural safeguards must be in place in order for its agencies to use and share information: First, agencies must take all reasonable measures to reduce the risk that any action on their part might promote or condone the use of mistreatment. Second, they must have in place reasonable and appropriate measures to identify foreign entity information that is likely to have been derived from mistreatment, and must properly characterize this information in any further dissemination of it.45 Such advice does not exclude the possibility that Canadian agencies may use information tainted by torture, nor does the Direction exclude the possibility that information would be shared with another State which tortures a person in their custody. While both sets of guidelines share a fair number of weaknesses, the mere fact that guidelines have been agreed and published is proof that Canada and the UK recognise a duty of care for persons held overseas, and the challenges their executive agents face in using and sharing information with partner agencies overseas. This recognition, and the commitment to provide practical and transparent advice, is good practice that other States might share. CAT, Interim Report in follow-up to the review of Canada’s Sixth Report on the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, August 2013, CAT/C/CAN/CO/6/Add.1. 45 Ibid., at para.30. 44 33