Khadr payout catches attention of U.S. media

WASHINGTON • The federal government payout to Omar Khadr has received meagre attention in the U.S. media — until now.

The Wall Street Journal published a scorching op-ed written by opposition MP Peter Kent that’s now gaining traction elsewhere. The former journalist penned a piece titled, A Terrorist’s Big Payday, Courtesy of Trudeau.

The item begins with a description of Khadr killing American army medic Christopher Speer when he was 15 and fighting alongside alQaida in Afghanistan.

It explains how Khadr won a court fight in Canada, was repatriated here, released on bail and then sued the Canadian government for $20 million.

The Conservative MP criticizes the Trudeau government for settling with Khadr, while the victim’s family got nothing.

By Monday afternoon it was the No. 1 story on the Fox News website. Google searches for Khadr’s name were up more than 700 per cent Monday in the U.S. from the previous day, according to Google Trends.

Last week, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the Khadr issue had not come up during meetings with U.S. state governors at a conference in Rhode Island.

He also said while he shares the concerns of Canadians who object to the settlement payment, it was the responsible thing to do.

“I can understand Canadians’ concerns about the settlement. In fact, I share those concerns about the money. That’s why we settled,” Trudeau said Thursday.

“If we had continued to fight this (lawsuit), not only would we have inevitably lost, but estimates range from $30- to $40-million that it would have ended up costing the government ... The measure of a society, a just society, is not whether we stand up for people’s rights when it’s easy or popular to do so. It’s whether we recognize rights when it’s difficult, when it’s unpopular.”