Canadian Authorities Torturing a Child!
To feel with our hearts the atrocities that
engender infamies, we have to sacrifice our lives until the very end.
-
Nadir Siguencia
Omar Khadr’s Untold Story
Canada
Should Let Media Interview Ex-Guantánamo Detainee
By THE
EDITORIAL BOARD AUG. 3, 2014
The Canadian government has denied a request from a
Toronto newspaper to conduct an on-camera interview with a former child soldier
and detainee at Guantánamo Bay, Omar Khadr. Mr. Khadr, a 27-year-old Canadian,
was captured in Afghanistan in 2002, when he was just 15, and accused of
throwing a grenade during a firefight that killed an American soldier.
Under a 2010 plea deal that ended his prosecution under Guantánamo’s grievously
flawed military commission system, Mr. Khadr admitted to throwing the grenade
and planting roadside bombs. In exchange, his sentence
was capped at eight years on top of eight years already served in one of the
world’s most infamous hellholes, and he was allowed, after bureaucratic delays,
to transfer from Guantánamo in Cuba to Canada, where he is still incarcerated.
The
Toronto Star thinks he should be allowed
to tell his side of the story and respond to questions from one of its
reporters, Michelle Shephard, who has been following his case for years.
The Canadian government, in a rebuff to press freedoms and the public’s right
to know, will not let him do so — a form of censorship that brings to mind the
way in which both the Bush and Obama administrations have quashed all civil
cases brought by victims of torture without allowing them to describe their
experiences in court or hold those responsible accountable.
Mr. Khadr was badly abused in custody. He was hooded and
handcuffed to his cell with his arms extended painfully above his head, according to testimony at a
pretrial hearing, and was included in the so-called frequent-flier program that
used sleep deprivation to get prisoners to talk. Incriminating statements
obtained by coercion were the main evidence against him; moreover,
before he pleaded guilty it was made clear that unless he did so he would
likely face life in prison. His treatment was hardly unique in the annals of
Guantánamo or Afghanistan’s Bagram Prison, where he was first taken, but his
history as a child soldier has given his case special resonance, and his treatment has drawn harsh condemnation from United
Nation officials, civil liberties and human rights groups and Canadian courts.
Whether
Mr. Khadr actually threw the fatal grenade may never be known. He has recanted
his admission of guilt, saying he tendered it only to
win release from Guantánamo and return to Canada. He has agreed to be interviewed
in prison, but officials have rebuffed Ms. Shephard’s repeated efforts to
arrange the taping on grounds, so far unexplained, that the interview could
cause “disruption” in the jail. The
Canadian media, including Ms. Shephard, suspect high-level government
interference. The Toronto Star and two other media outlets involved in the
issue filed a request for judicial review
last month in federal court. The Canadian government
should allow the interview and let Mr. Khadr, now an adult, share his
perspective on his ordeal. The public
has been kept waiting long enough.
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