Media argue for access to Khadr
Ban on interviewing convict violates charter, lawyer says
In barring journalists from interviewing Omar Khadr, a federal prison is violating the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, argued a lawyer representing the media at a judicial review Monday.
The warden at Bowden Institution, where Khadr, 28, is currently being held, ignored the public’s right to know, the freedom of the press or Khadr’s freedom of expression when she quashed interview requests made by the Toronto Star, CBC and White Pine Pictures, lawyer John Phillips told a federal court.
“These reasons (for denial) fail. They are utterly insufficient,” said Phillips. “In this entire set of reasons you will not see a single reference to charter rights.”
The hearing was prompted by a challenge filed by the media following two years of failed interview attempts. Corrections Canada told Star reporter Michelle Shephard that an on-camera interview at Bowden would require unprecedented security precautions, including a prison lockdown.
Justice Canada lawyer Sean Gaudet argued the warden’s decision took the charter into account, even if it wasn’t specifically mentioned. He said the court shouldn’t secondguess the warden’s judgment. “She is the person who is best situated to determine what is likely to endanger the security of the institution.”
Khadr has been in custody in Canada since 2012, when he was transferred from Guantanamo Bay after pleading guilty to war crimes committed in Afghanistan in 2002; he later said he only made the plea deal to be released from Guantanamo. His current sentence will conclude in 2018 but he is awaiting a parole hearing slated for this summer.
At Monday’s proceedings, Phillips said it’s crucial for the Canadian public to hear about Khadr’s experiences at Guantanamo prior to his release.
“This guy is going to be out and in the public . . . and we have a right to know who he is before that happens.”
The federal government, he added, has “openly and vociferously” condemned Khadr, making it even more pertinent to get the other side of the story. Phillips also pointed to government interference in blocking media access to Khadr. A Canadian Press request to interview Khadr while he was at Millhaven Institution was granted, only to be denied by the office of then-public safety minister Vic Toews within 90 minutes.
Gaudet argued that incident is “ancient history.”
“There is no evidence of political interference,” relating to the Bowden decision, he said.
He pointed to an op-ed by Khadr published in the Ottawa Citizen as evidence that Khadr is not incommunicado. But Phillips said the media has a right and duty to interview Khadr in person. The media “aren’t simply a recording device that plays back what Mr. Khadr wants to say,” Phillips told the court.
Justice Richard Mosley instructed both parties to read up on a U.K. case in which the BBC successfully fought a government ban on an interview with an incarcerated terror suspect.