Ottawa admits injustice of Khadr’s case, lawyer says
ANDREWS AIR FORCE BASE, MARYLAND, U.S.A. – The chief military lawyer for Omar Khadr says the Conservative government has acknowledged the United States is unlawfully prosecuting the young Canadian for war crimes.
In a letter to Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier, U.S. Navy Lieutenant-Commander Bill Kuebler says written statements the minister made last week about Mr. Khadr’s detention show the government agrees with the defence’s core arguments for dismissal of the case.
“That the U.S. Department of Defence has elected to proceed despite this reality places your government in an awkward position and has created the conditions for a grave injustice to be done to Mr. Khadr,” Lt-Cmdr. Kuebler writes in a letter obtained exclusively by Canwest News Service.
Mr. Bernier made the statements in a parliamentary response to questions on Mr. Khadr. He said the government has no intention of seeking his repatriation until at least the completion of a trial and any appeals — which could take several more years.
But Lt.-Cmdr. Kuebler notes Mr. Bernier went on to be in “apparent agreement” with the defence team’s position Mr. Khadr, who was 15 at the time U.S. forces seized him on an Afghan battlefield in 2002, was a child soldier as defined under international law.
This is significant, Lt-Cmdr. Kuebler says, because it lies at the heart of a defence motion arguing the U.S. war crimes commission in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, is no place for Mr. Khadr’s prosecution since its rules contain no provisions for dealing with minors.
If the military judge hearing the case grants the motion, Lt-Cmdr. Kuebler calls on the Canadian government to “speedily make arrangements for Mr. Khadr’s transfer from Guantanamo Bay.”
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