Canada’s High Court Weighs Guantanamo Detainee Case
Canada’s Supreme Court weighed arguments Wednesday from lawyers seeking intelligence documents for the defense of a Canadian terror suspect held at the US Guantanamo Bay prison since he was 15.
Lawyers for Omar Khadr, who is now 21, say they need the documents to make their case at the terror suspect’s US military trial in Guantanamo, but the Canadian government refuses to release them in the name of national security.
Canadian intelligence officials interviewed Khadr at the US naval base in the southeastern tip of Cuba in 2003 and passed on information about him to US authorities.
Government attorney Robert Frater said Khadr, the only Canadian held at Guantanamo, had no right to documents detailing those conversations, nor to any other related documents since Canada was not involved in the prosecution.
“Canada is a stranger to the prosecution,” Frater told the court.
“In the absence of a Canadian prosecution alleging that he was involved in such actions against Canadian troops, he has no right, no right to any information about what we know about what he may have done,” he said.
“Those are national defense or national security matters, and the highest level of protection is accorded to that,” Frater said.
Frater said that by asking the high court to consider his case, Khadr’s lawyers are “asking a Canadian court to interfere in an American process.”
He also warned that foreign governments might hesitate to share sensitive information with Canada in the future if the court rules against the government.
“We don’t want to be the disclosure person for the world,” he said.
Khadr’s Canadian attorney Nathan Whitling, however, said Khadr would not be able to properly defend himself in US legal proceedings if the Canadian government does not convey to his defense team all that they know in the case.
“We’re seeking everything that’s behind the black curtain,” Whitling told the court as Khadr’s family watched patiently from the front rows, his young niece toying with her pink dress.
Failing to do so would render the US trial “unfair,” he said.
Khadr was detained by the US military in Afghanistan in July 2002. He was among hundreds of people sent to Guantanamo in the wake of the attacks of September 11, 2001.
US authorities accuse him of building explosives and killing a US Army medic during his arrest. His military commission trial is expected to begin this summer.
Human rights groups called for his repatriation, noting that Khadr was a minor when he was detained.
“Omar Khadr is the only child of modern history being accused of war crimes,” Roch Tasse, of the International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group, told a news conference.
In the heavily redacted affidavit Khadr tells of brutal treatment after his capture, when he was taken, severely wounded, to a military camp in Bagram, Afghanistan, and later to Guantanamo.
“On some occasions, the interrogators brought barking dogs into the interrogation room while my head was covered with a bag,” Khadr said.
He told of rape threats, being shackled to the floor for six hours at a time, being deprived of a toilet and dragged across a floor drenched in urine and pine oil.
“I did not want to expose myself to any more harm, so I always just told interrogators what I thought they wanted to hear,” the affidavit quotes Khadr as saying.
He was visited “on numerous occasions” in 2003 by individuals claiming to be from the Canadian government, but the visitors interrogated and threatened him, rather than trying to help him, he said.
Following the last of these visits, he was placed in solitary isolation for a month in a cell kept cold as “a refrigerator,” Khadr said.
His legal team accuses Ottawa of “complicity” in the US process and questions the entire legal basis of the Guantanamo trial proceedings.
“Rather than acting to protect the basic human rights of its young citizen, the Crown chose to take advantage of his vulnerability,” Whitling said in court documents.
© 2008 Agence France Presse
Frater said that by asking the high court to consider his case, Khadr’s lawyers are “asking a Canadian court to interfere in an American process.”
Canadian intelligence officials interviewed Khadr at the US naval base in the southeastern tip of Cuba in 2003 and passed on information about him to US authorities.
Sounds like the government of Canada has already gotten itself involved in an American process. There’s no claiming clean hands, at this late date.
Given that the prosecution and the court are certified as members of a war criminal organization, the idea of a fair trial is preposterous.
Also, he is accused of acts of self defense against armed foreign invaders. That is not a crime.
This so-called US process should not be governed according to what dip-shits Bush-Cheney cabala say, but INTERNATIONAL LAW, and with whole abidance to the UN’s charter.
Canada should not be excused from handing over all of the documentary information it has; withholding evidence usually is not permissable, and, while not being a law expert, I believe it’s treated as a crime, particularly when the evidence is deliberately withheld, which clearly is the case in this story of Omar Khadr.
If I’m at all mistaken in the above, then it’s still going to remain my judgement call. It’s then the laws that should be corrected; instead of complicitly obstructing and denying JUSTICE.
But the RCMP is very much about an organisation that commits gangsterism, so it’s not surprising to see that the federal govt also likes to do the same.
The Associated Press
The British military admitted Thursday that some of its troops tortured nine detained Iraqis, including one who died in custody.
The Bushwater Virus spreads…
“Omar Khadr is the only child of modern history being accused of war crimes,”
While the war criminals, Bush, Cheney and the rest, remain untouched in DC, …. and while Madame Pelosy and the dems give them a free pass, because they too are complicit… and while the American Sheeple follow ClintonObama. Nice.
The lead article misses some of the dirty little details:
SCC reserves decision on Omar Khadr case
Canada’s top court will wait until a later date to rule on the Omar Khadr case. It reserved judgment on the former child soldier’s case after hearing arguments Wednesday from his lawyers and the federal government.
Justice Department lawyers went before the court, arguing for a reversal of a lower court decision that would see Ottawa forced to disclose confidential documents relating to Khadr’s case. …
Edney said 99 per cent of the documents his team has received from the Canadian government have been blacked out.
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20080326/khadr_SCC_080326/20080326?hub=Canada
Top court reserves judgment on release of Khadr transcripts
Canada ‘took advantage’ of Khadr at Guantanamo Bay, lawyer says
Khadr’s lawyers argued he’s entitled to the material because Canadian officials violated the Charter of Rights when they interviewed him at Guantanamo. They also hope the transcripts will provide evidence that Ottawa knew a Canadian citizen was being tortured and did nothing about it.
“We’re saying that Canada has an obligation to provide those documents, and that obligation arises because it went to Guantanamo Bay when it was well known that this is a place beyond the rule of law. It took advantage of Omar Khadr,” Edney said. …
In an affidavit filed with a U.S. military court, Khadr alleges U.S. military interrogators in Afghanistan threatened him with rape and treated him harshly, forcing him to make false and self-incriminating statements.
He also claims that Canadian diplomats and intelligence officers who later questioned him at Guantanamo refused to help him.
Instead, he says in the affidavit, they questioned him about his late father, Ahmed Said Khadr, who’s been accused of being a founding member and financier of al-Qaeda. …
He says he ripped off his shirt and showed the Canadians his injuries. He also says he told them he had lied to his American interrogators and told them whatever they wanted to hear because he was scared and wanted them to stop torturing him.
Khadr says they accused him of lying, and passed information from their interviews to U.S. officials.
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2008/03/26/khadr-lawyers.html
Canada has it’s lips plastered a little too firmly to George Bush’s rear-end to make me happy. We’ll see what goes on here.
Steve’s lips have been well employed in that fashion even before he entered Federal politics.
Now that I have read all the comments, it is easy to tell who the Canadians are - by the details not in Michel Comte’s article. They are all in the CBC and CTV links any way.
One aspect, which has been in the news recently not brought up is the reason why the US doesn’t want this focused on the fact that Omar Khadr, as a child soldier at the time of his recruitment (as well as his service) was a victim rather than a perp. Though American soldiers are of age at the time they serve, they are often still in high school at the time they are recruited - defined not so much as the promotion of a military career in schools but the actual enlistment which takes place on school premises.
Wish that Disclosure episodes were still on line because there were a couple of videos there on recruitment - one being about the US Military actually putting out video games in an attempt to lure gamers.
Speaking of blacked out documents, does anyone besides me notice that all of Avi’s stuff on the CBC has been recently deleted! There are probably other online videos and shows as well that are gone. And it is the stuff which tends to be topical time and time again.
*Avi Lewis is Naomi Klein’s husband. Put “Frontline USA” in a youtube search and you get Avi’s new show.
This week is about the role of war in the US election - seems that, in one American territory, you are allowed to serve but not to vote in American elections. Seems also that the recruiters are not completely honest with those they are trying to recruit:
Frontline USA - War’s impact - 22 Mar 08 - Part 1
http://youtube.com/watch?v=hi7s_M4vkTY
RE: - He told of rape threats, being shackled to the floor for six hours at a time, being deprived of a toilet and dragged across a floor drenched in urine and pine oil.
One thing that doesn’t get mentioned is that, according to Omar Khadr’s mother, one reason for moving the family out of Canada and into a compound with Osama Bin Laden is that she feared that the Canadian school system would turn her sons gay. The emotional abuse that goes with rape is that, no matter how horrendous and terrifying the experience was, you are told that you asked for it and that subconsciously you even wanted it. What would add to the fear of rape for Omar Khadr is the fear that his mother would not want him back.
And speaking of the ultimate coercion, one could argue that Omar Khadr could have ran away rather than serve - but he was not in Canada where he could have talked a friend into letting him sleep on the couch if he were to run away from his parents. There was no law that he could turn to if he did not wish to comply with what his father wanted.
And then there is all the American Bullshit. They said that he threw a grenade which killed a medic (which creates the impression that he threw it at a hospital or ambulance when you first hear it) - rather than at people who were shooting at him and trying to kill him. And now it seems he did not shoot the grenade and that his back was facing them when they shot him - Rambo he was not!
And then the US made the smart move of saying that, despite all this horrible stuff they are accusing Khadr of, they did not want the Death Penalty. Traditionally, the Canadian government only intervenes when a citizen is facing the death penalty (though they haven’t done that much lately).
There is not enough regular press coverage of these events in Canada for Canadians to realise en mass, the extent of their government’s complicity in fulfilling the Cheney agenda.
Sure there is Raven.
Ok, a bit too sardonic but Harper has been pro Bush before he entered federal politics and would be trying to implement Bush’s agenda even if Bush did not exist.
One needs to watch the news each night to get it as it dribbles out and during the summer people don’t get as much news. Agree with you that I wish the dribbles were more pronounced - coming out in small drops makes it easier for the Bush centred media to neutralize the information and Harper’s role in it.
As long as things come out in dribbles, Canadians en mass can be come convinced that what they thought they knew about Harper was just fearmongering/swiftboating from his opponents.