The Conservative Party of Canada, made up of racists and bigots, is firing up its equally racist base over the apology and compensation offered to Omar Khadr for the torture and illegal imprisonment he suffered for a decade at the hands of the Americans at Guantanamo Bay.
Omar Khadr’s long hard struggle for justice is about to end. The Canadian government will offer an official apology and $10.5 million in compensation for what he suffered for 10 years at Bagram and Guantanamo Bay at the hands of his American captors.
Five Yemeni prisoners held at the notorious US torture camp at Guantanamo Bay were finally released on November 14. According to a Pentagon announcement, the five were flown to the United Arab Emirates (UAE). None of the five Yemenis was ever charged with a crime.
Omar Khadr has finally won freedom, thanks to the dogged determination of his lawyers Dennis Edney and Nate Whittling. It wasn’t easy; the Harper regime fought them tooth and nail but the courts finally sided with Omar Khadr.
After spending 13 years in various prisons including 10 years at the notorious torture chamber at Guantanamo Bay undergoing torture, Omar Khadr walked out as a free man on bail. His lawyer Dennis Edney is largely credited with securing his release despite the determined efforts of the Harper regime to prevent Khadr's release. Justice has triumphed over meanness and hatred. Most Canadians are not bigots, only a small minority are.
The slow wheels of justice have finally turned granting bail to Omar Khadr, the wrongfully convicted Canadian citizen who was captured in Eastern Afghanistan in July 2002. Barely 15 and badly wounded, he miraculously survived two gaping wounds when bullets pierced his body completely. He was endlessly tortured and confessions extracted thus were used in a military court to convict him.
Khadr was 15 when captured in Afghanistan. Under the Child Soldiers’ Protection convention, he should have been treated as a child soldier and provided help to rehabilitate. Instead, the Americans branded him an enemy combatant and tortured him for more than 10 years.
It is not only distressing but disgusting that the Canadian government refuses to stand up for one of its own citizens.
Canadian citizen Omar Khadr, now nearly 26 years old, was supposed to have returned to Canada from Guantanamo Bay at the end of October under a deal brokered between the US and Canadian governments.
Canadian-born Omar Khadr, child prisoner-turned adult, may soon be coming home from Guantanamo.
Tortured endlessly, deprived of sleep for 21 days, attacked by dogs and threatened with rape, Omar Khadr, now 24, was handed one last piece of vigilante justice: guilty plea to all charges because confessions extracted under torture
Nicholson, however, refused to ask Washington to return Khadr to his country of birth, Canada, despite the Supreme Court ruling that Ottawa had violated his Charter rights...
Jawad’s release came following a US federal judge’s ruling on July 30, after a war crimes case against him was dismissed for lack of evidence and concerns about his age...
The minority Conservative government of Canada appears determined to deny Omar Khadr his Charter Rights even in the face of several court rulings, the latest of which was handed down on April 23. Justice James O’Reilly of the Federal Court issued a clear ruling ordering Canada to seek Khadr’s repatriation from Guantanamo Bay where he has languished since October 2002.
While the February 19 visit of US President Barack Obama to Ottawa led to official chest-thumping about the importance of Canada because it was the first country he graced with his presence since becoming president, it also mobilized various groups to press for Omar Khadr’s return from Guantanamo Bay.
The trial of Canadian citizen Omar Khadr that was due to begin at the notorious detention center at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba on November 10 was postponed until January 26, 2009. Guantanamo has come to symbolize the worst of American attitude toward the rule of law.
The US supreme court verdict on June 12 that detainees at Guantanamo Bay are entitled to habeas corpus (the right to be free from illegal detention and, if held without charge, to challenge it in a civilian court) was welcome to human-rights activists and lawyers, but so far appears to have left the US government unmoved.
