Ombudsman blasts Ottawa's 'inadequate' efforts to help injured Afghan military advisers

The country's military ombudsman says efforts by the Department of National Defence (DND) to get care and treatment for former language and cultural advisers who worked with Canadian soldiers during the Afghan war have been "inadequate or nonexistent."

Gregory Lick delivered that assessment in a recent letter to Defence Minister Bill Blair, who took over the portfolio in the summer.

A copy of the letter was obtained by CBC News, which first reported in 2019 on the plight of Afghan advisers — all of whom are all Canadian citizens of Afghan origin.

Many of the advisers did multiple tours during Canada's five-year combat mission in Kandahar and many returned home with multiple health issues, including post-traumatic stress disorder.

Because they were contract employees, the advisers were not eligible for the federal benefits available to soldiers — even though some of them spent more time on combat operations than many Canadian soldiers who served in-theater.

"The care for these former Language and Cultural Advisors is a moral obligation, and their well-being is a Government of Canada responsibility," Lick wrote in the Sept, 29 letter.

Without the advisers, he said, the army could not have fought the war.

"This is poised to become a shameful chapter in Canada's military history," he wrote.

Working with individual commanders and units, the Afghan advisers carried out some of the toughest and most dangerous assignments of the war — gathering intelligence on the Taliban, warning of attacks, eavesdropping on insurgent communications and providing commanders with insights into the local culture.

Following a CBC News report in the fall of 2019, DND helped the former advisers prepare applications for assistance to the Ontario Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB) — which is where injured federal employees are sent.

But the wounds suffered by the advisers in a war zone, Lick said, bear no resemblance to civilian workplace mishaps or bones broken at home.

"To date, their efforts to seek treatment and care for their mental and physical needs sustained while supporting our troops have been met with inaction," Lick wrote. "Both medical treatment and injury financial compensation have been inadequate or non-existent."

Last spring, the WSIB dismissed benefits claims made by more than a dozen former advisers. WSIB case workers overruled the assessments of psychiatrists and social workers.

Just as CBC News was about to publish a report on the rejected claims, the board agreed to take a second look at the cases.