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Guantanamo’s Forgotten: Omar Khadr

AloysiaB 16 November 2009, 02:44PM

AloysiaB

About the Author

Aloysia is a volunteer who works for Amnesty International's Counter Terror With Justice Campaign. She has campaigned for human rights for many years, especially through her work with young people, the homeless community, refugees and Indigenous people. Aloysia completed her Masters of Human Rights in 2008 and is beginning a doctorate this year.

This blog entry does not necessarily represent the position or opinion of Amnesty International Australia.

Detainee in Camp 4
© AP GraphicsBank

US attorney General Eric Holder has announced that not all Guantanamo detainees will be afforded federal court trials. Omar Khadr, detained as a child, is one of those who will instead be tried under the fatally flawed and internationally condemned military commissions process.

Omar Khadr was 15 years old when first detained by the U.S. military. Under international law, children caught up in armed conflict are considered victims, and therefore cannot be punished for their recruiters’ crimes. Despite this being enshrined in the Geneva Conventions and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the U.S. administration continues not only to illegally detain Omar Khadr, but now, subject him to an unfair military commissions system. This is a blatant violation of the international conventions that the US is party to.

The Canadian Government also has a lot to answer for. Prime Minister Steven Harper has ignored and sought to contravene judicial rulings calling on his government to repatriate the now, 23 year old, Mr Khadr.

Earlier this year the Canadian Federal Court found that the Government had a legal obligation to protect Mr Khadr considering that he had been held illegally under international law and US law. Justice O’Reilly noted that Mr Khadr’s rights had been violated since he was taken into custody as a minor and that he had been subject to 'torture and other ill-treatment'. The complicity of Canadian officials in relation to the ill-treatment, specifically sleep deprivation was also noted1.

"We thought that the incoming Obama administration signaled a new day with respect to these cases - a new respect for civil liberties, an abhorrence of torture, a respect for the time-honoured legal procedures and protections that are mandated by the constitution and enforced by the federal courts, "2

Barry Coburn, Omar's civilian lawyer has expressed his dismay that the young man would be tried under the military commissions system. After Eric Holder’s announcement, Mr Coburn commented that the decision was "devastating and shocking"3.

Why a Military Commission for Omar Khadr?

The ‘ill-treatment’ and abuse suffered by the young man, may signal the more pertinent reasons as to why the Canadian Government is pushing for Omar to go through a system rigged to obtain convictions. Under the UN Convention against Torture and other Cruel or Inhuman Treatment or Punishment, "torture" is defined as;

“any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession…”4

In July of 2008, tapes released by Omar’s legal team showed a crying and distressed teenager pleading to his Canadian interrogators for his release. The tapes go on to depict Omar despairingly pulling at his hair and displaying wounds to the interrogators. Numerous other allegations of torture and abuse have been exposed and confirmed in both prisons where he has been held, Guantanamo Bay and Bagram Airbase. Canadian officials, however, have "dismissed his claims of abuse on the flimsiest of pretexts," and commented that his allegations "did not ring true."5

Considering the evidence continuing to be released implicating the Canadian Government in the torture and ill-treatment of Omar Khadr, it is no wonder they are hoping he will just go away.

How disturbing that in 2009, we are still in a position where someone detained as a child may be illegally held, abused and tortured by the most politically powerful nation on earth.

References

  1. See “Omar Khadr - child detainee still at Guantanamo”

  2. CBC News; ‘Khadr to face U.S. military commission.’ at http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2009/11/13/omar-khadr-supreme-court-hearing.html

  3. The Canadian Press; “Shocking that Khadr will face military commission in U.S.: Lawyer” at http://www.google.com/hostednews/canadianpress/article/ALeqM5jLu1GBDEufTBLrbClqlob2RodQTA

  4. Article 1 of the UN Convention against Torture and other Cruel or Inhuman Treatment or Punishment

  5. See Andy Worthington: ““screwed up” and “abused”: Omar Khadr’s Canadian Interrogation”

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