Omar Khadr deserves parole, now that he’s home
To the bitter end, Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s government seems determined to compound Canada’s shame in the Omar Khadr affair. The Americans were prepared to ship him home from Guantanamo Bay on April 13. He could have been back a month later. But Ottawa chose to take its sweet time, grudgingly repatriating him only on Saturday in one final shrug of indifference.
Most Canadians are repelled by the jihadist extremism that Khadr and his family embraced, and feel betrayed by them.
Even so, he is a Canadian citizen who was effectively abandoned by his own government in the near-hysteria that followed the 9/11 attacks. He was held and abused by American captors for a decade, most of it without trial. He was judged by a discredited military tribunal of vengeful enemies in what President Barack Obama once called a “legal black hole” that compromised core American values. And he was denied his rightful status as a child soldier under international law.
This case is an indictment not only of the Conservative government, but of its Liberal predecessors. Unlike other U.S. allies with detainees at Gitmo, Canada never forcefully objected to the abuse Khadr endured, lobbied for his return, criticized his lopsided prosecution or asked for leniency. No Canadian citizen should ever again be cut adrift as he was.
http://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorials/article/1264396--omar-khadr-deserves-parole-now-that-he-s-home
= new reply since forum marked as read
