THE KHADR QUAGMIRE
Does he deserve millions?
It certainly seems that despite his life thus far — being raised in what was a death-worshipping cult, which is to say his jihadist Afghan-Canadian family, and then 13 years spent in custody in Guantanamo Bay and Canada — Omar Khadr is doing all right, Jack.
Since being released on bail two years ago, he lived for a time with his lawyer, Dennis Edney, and his wife Patricia, now has his own place in Edmonton, and is apparently planning to start nursing school in the fall.
He’s grown into a handsome, dimpled, articulate fellow of 30.
Last spring, he had surgery to repair a severely damaged shoulder — damaged, it must be noted, in a firefight in July 2002 with U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan when, at the age of 15, he threw a grenade that killed a combat medic, U.S. Army Sergeant First Class Christopher Speer, and blinded another soldier, Layne Morris, in one eye.
Khadr, too, was seriously wounded.
He pleaded guilty to five war crimes, including murder, in 2010 before a nowdiscredited U.S. military commission in Guantanamo Bay. The deal got him an additional eight years in prison and a transfer back to Canada.
Edney says Khadr pleaded guilty because it was his only ticket out of Guantanamo, and that he was coerced and abused.
Khadr himself, in a May 2015 interview with the Toronto Star’s Michelle Shephard, said he now doesn’t know if he threw the grenade that killed Speer, that he can’t be sure if the memories he has are accurate.
I point out that this is not so very different from the sort of answer you might get from anyone who has served time for murder.
In any case, soon, according to press reports, Khadr is going to be a rich man.
Ottawa is on the brink of giving him more than $10 million and, this being Canada, a heartfelt apology — the settlement of his $20-million civil lawsuit against the government.
The money, which will be shared with his lawyers, is for the role played by Canadian officials (from CSIS and what was then called DFAIT, the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, and is now Global Affairs Canada) in various interrogations of Khadr.
Canadian officials shared the fruits of these interviews with U.S. authorities.
And that, as the Supreme Court of Canada has repeatedly said, was a breach of Canada’s international human rights obligations and of Khadr’s Section 7 rights under the Charter.
He was then a youth, was given no access to a lawyer or to any other adult with his best interests in mind, and the Canadian government failed to protect him, a citizen (born in Toronto), albeit of particularly disreputable parents.
If it’s clear that no one emerges covered with glory from this saga — not the Americans, not Canada in its enabler role, not the military tribunal — that surely would include Khadr, who has admitted, depending upon your view of it, to murder (because of the legal limbo in which combat exists when there is no formal declaration of war) or to being a fighter who killed a U.S. soldier in action.
But still and all, he did return to Canada, serving out the remainder of his time in institutions in Ontario and Alberta before getting bail in 2015. He has plenty of supporters in this country and more of a shot at a fresh start than many of those who walk away from prison with nothing and absolutely no one in their corner.
Why isn’t that enough? Why can’t Khadr be content with what he has been given, and the rest of us with knowing that if he wasn’t always treated perfectly, he now enjoys freedom?
As a wise historian friend says, ours is a society increasingly reliant upon “social-progressive notions that seek to erase all images of injustice to individuals, no matter how long ago or in what context or circumstance ... Our society accepts that we allow all our ‘victims’ to become our ‘heroes’ because a certain strata of Canadians feel good, because Canada is proving that we are more just than everyone else on the planet.”
If nothing else, at the very least, it’s a brilliant victory for the Taliban, al-Qaida, ISIL and all the other extremists: A young jihadist is now a hero in Canada for killing an infidel — and look, he got a big payday and an apology to boot.
What’s next: Do we apologize to the Germans for winning what another friend calls “those two memorable misunderstandings”?
“We did win both. Tore down the fabric of their society, twice. Killed a lot of their young men. Became an occupying force. Really, really sorry about that.”
We can sign it as we always do, “Love, Canada.”
WHY ISN’T THAT ENOUGH? WHY CAN’T KHADR BE CONTENT WITH WHAT HE HAS BEEN GIVEN?