Defence Minister Gordon O'Connor says an investigation is underway into allegations that prisoners were abused while in the custody of Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan.

O'Connor said Tuesday that the information uncovered during those investigations will be made public.

But the defence minister stressed that the probes haven't concluded yet that the allegations are warranted.

If the complaints are indeed substantiated, corrective action will be taken, O'Connor pledged.

University of Ottawa law professor Amir Attaran lodged a complaint in a letter sent to the Military Police Complaints Commission last week.

Attaran alleges that at least one, and as many as three, Afghan detainees "taken captive by the Canadian Forces appears to have been beaten while detained and interrogated by them."

The accusations are based on documents that Attaran obtained under the Access to Information Act.

"I discovered that on a single day last year (in April), a single interrogator working for the Canadian military brought three men to Kandahar Airfield," Attaran told Canada AM on Tuesday.

"All three of them had a similar set of injuries to their face, to their head and the most seriously injured man had his eyes swollen, cuts on his eyebrows, a slash across his forehead and a cut on his cheek."

Attaran said it seems the men never received proper medical attention before being handed off to the Afghans, never to be seen again.

He criticized the Canadian military for not having a mechanism in place to monitor what happens to released detainees.

"(It's) shocking because the Afghan government has acknowledged that torture is quite common in their custody," said Attaran. "We are handing detainees to known torturers and we are not apparently bothered enough to investigate what happens to them."

Commission chairman Peter Tinsley has notified by letter Chief of Defence Staff Gen. Rick Hillier and Capt. Steve Moore, who heads the military police, about the allegations.

"The complaint suggests various failings by the military police members involved relative to safeguarding the well-being of the persons in custody, and, more particularly, in respect of their failure to investigate the causes of various injuries which may have been sustained while in (Canadian Forces) as opposed to military police custody,'' Tinsley wrote on Jan. 30, reports the Toronto Star.

The three Afghans were captured near Dukah by a small group of Canadian soldiers.

One of the detainees was seen observing the soldiers but escaped, only to be captured the next day. In a field report, the soldiers described him as "non-compliant."

Another is described as being "extremely belligerent" and "it took four personnel to subdue him."

In the most serious instance, it was said that only "appropriate force" was used and that the suspect was an alleged bomb maker.

A military log says the detainee's injuries included bruises and cuts to his face, arm, back and chest. Some of the injuries were reportedly inflicted while the detainee's hands were tied behind his back.

With files from The Canadian Press