A BoB short
Former child soldier Omar Khadr has been receiving more than a lesson in international politics while jailed at Guantanamo Prison, awaiting his return to Canada. He has also been studying a curriculum devised by 15 Edmonton academics, led by King’s University College English professor Arlette Zinck.
Now 25, Khadr receives lessons in physics, English and Canadian literature, and — his favourite — math, among other educational staples. He also watches episodes of “Little Mosque on the Prairie.”
The Toronto native’s formal schooling ended in grade eight, after he was taken to Afghanistan by his jihadist father, where he was eventually captured by U.S. troops and charged with throwing a hand-grenade that killed an American soldier.
Zinck, 49, began corresponding with him in 2008. She started delivering lessons to him long-distance in 2010, after he pleaded guilty and was sentenced to eight years. In April, in an unusual arrangement, she was allowed to start giving the lessons in person at Guantanamo.
“One of the more remarkable things about Omar is that he finds a way to stay positive and hopeful when many grown men would 
not,” she tells the Edmonton Journal. “The energy and determination he puts into his studies is impressive, especially in the exceptionally difficult circumstances.”
Khadr is chained to the floor during his lessons with Zinck. He is the only western prisoner still detained at the U.S. naval base in Cuba.
In addition to reading such Canadian classics as Who Has Seen the Wind by W.O. Mitchell and Obasan by Joy Kogawa, about the internment of Japanese-Canadians during the Second World War, he has studied the Canadian constitution and written an essay on the moral complexities of The Hunger Games.
His guilty plea was part of a deal in which the Canadian government said it would look “favourably” upon his transfer to a Canadian prison after one year. U.S. Defence Secretary Leon Panetta agreed to his release in April. His U.S. military lawyers say that Canada’s failure to uphold its end of the arrangement is hampering efforts to settle other cases.
“You made a deal,” says Lt.-Col. Jon Jackson. “Now honour the deal.”
– With files from Emily Olesen
To George Miller
“He is a convicted murderer/ terrorist.How is he not dangerous?”
If even the US government believed in the validity of its own charges against Khadr, he would have been sentenced to life in prison, if not the death penalty. The fact that they’ve been pushing a plea bargain, a reduced sentence in return for a guilty plea, and avoiding the appeal process, means they do not, with good reason.
The formal charge was fighting in a war while not being a member of a regular military or otherwise meeting the criteria for POW status under Geneva. Even if the charges are true, his actions were normal acts of war, not “murder, war crimes or terrorism” by any known definition. The US used his status to charge him under their own domestic law, applying it to a conflict in a foreign country where he resided. This was an unusual decision, made in unusual circumstances soon after 9/11, even apart from the requirements of the “child soldier” law which was ignored. There is no other similar case, although thousands of soldiers have been wounded or killed in the two recent wars alone and many thousands of combatants with the same status as Khadr (all of them in Afghanistan and most in Iraq) have been captured.
Khadr obviously fought in the war entirely as a result of his parents beliefs and their decision to raise their children mostly in/near Afghanistan, among the likes of Bin Laden. He accepted their beliefs at age 15 and joined a war in which others in his family and people he knew were involved, including his father who sent him on the mission that lead to his involvement in a fight with US troops and his capture two months later, and 10 years at Guantanamo, and counting. It doesn’t make sense to assume he was irrevocably committed to ideological beliefs at age 15 and no knowledgeable and objective person has said so.
To George Miller:
You’re right about the transfer agreement, but the government agreed with the US to “favourably consider” a transfer request. They knew the US would use it to help convince Khadr to plead guilty which they have been trying to do for years. They knew the request would come one year later, i.e. last fall. When they signed the agreement, well over a year ago, they knew everything they know now, about the case and Khadr and the law they say they are still thinking about. If they deny the transfer it will be based on nothing they didn’t know when they signed the agreement. How could that be justified? Toews’ office actually implied the agreement didn’t matter because he didn’t personally sign it. It was signed on behalf of Canada. Does he think he’s running his own private operation?
Diane 1976.Our agreement with the U.S. about Khasr is not written in stone.Our public safety is paramount above all else.He is a convicted murderer/ terrorist.How is he not dangerous?.
To George Miller,
The fact is that the Canadian government agreed with the US over a year ago to “favourably consider” a transfer request. Neither the facts of the case nor the law has changed since they made that agreement.
If they break the agreement it means they will have helped the US government hoodwink Khadr into confessing and giving up appeal rights, which kept the case away from their regular courts. Why would they make such an agreement and then break it? Just to be malevolent?
The only person with any knowledge who said Khadr might be dangerous was the psychiatrist hired for the prosecution team. Not surprisingly, the ones on the defense team didn’t agree, but neither has any other official with first hand knowledge of him. He has been under constant supervision in a prison for 10 years since he was 15.
The US did not have to offer him a plea bargain. If they thought he was dangerous all they had to do was deem him a security risk and their law would have allowed them to keep him in prison indefinitely, with or without a trial and regardless of the results, as they are doing with other prisoners at Gtmo.
Mary,
It’s most unlikely a school would pay for lessons for somebody who isn’t a student. Khadr’s Canadian lawyers are volunteers. Maybe his teacher is too. But the Harper Government has spent a fortune in taxpayer money on this case in futile court battles, for political reasons. Somebody estimated they had spent a million dollars some time ago. They may also have put Khadr in a good position to sue them for millions more.
The Supreme Court told the government the Gtmo trial was illegal in 2008 but they kept on fighting until it said the same thing in 2010, only louder. They ignored the advice of former PM’s, all the Opposition parties who were the majority in Parliament, court orders, and the advice of a host of legal and human rights groups. The recommendation was to request Khadr’s return and give him a fair trial here. Most Canadians also agreed. Even if the US refused, it would have meant Canada did what it could to meet its moral and legal obligations.
I can’t help but think about how much it would have meant to a struggling young law abiding Canadian who can’t afford university to have been given this opportunity for free university courses by this women instead.
I sincerely hope that no taxpayer money via the Kings University is being spent on this or her trips to Gitmo to personally cater to Khadr !!!
He’s a convicted terrorist against western values.He will always be a threat to Canada even if he received a university degree.Most suicide bombers are recruited off of a university campus.Big deal about a select few courses.He can rot in Gitmo for all we care.