– OMAR KHADR

 

* Omar Khadr, the son of Ahmed Said Khadr, was born on 09/19/1986 in Canada. He spent his childhood moving back and forth between Canada and Pakistan. Omar  Khadr was subsequently enrolled in a Madrassa (Islamic school) in Peshawar.  

From 1998 Omar  Khadr spent much of his time in the mountains of Afghanistan with Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters where he went shopping, did laundry and cooked meals for the militants, a group of men associated with Abu Laith al-Libi .  

In 07/2002, at the age of less then 16, Omar  Khadr was captured after a four hours battle in Afghanistan. Although wounded, Omar  Khadr was interrogated, harshly, in Bagram air base, North of Kabul, for a few weeks. One of the Bagram inmates who knew him in the detention center was Ruhal Ahmed from the Tipton Three, who gave a full testimony about Omar  Khadr’s interrogation in Bagram.

On 10/28/2002 Omar  Khadr was transferred to Guantanamo, where his brother Abdurahman Khadr was already detained, and became the youngest detainee there. Without precedence Canada refused, to interfere in his case despite him being a Canadian citizen, though in 03/2004 he was questioned by a Canadian intelligence officer.  On 02/07/2005 a law suit was filed in behalf of Omar Khader against USA government to explain the legal base of his detention in Guantanamo.

On 07/2005 Omar  Khadr went, along with other prisoners, through a hunger strike and was, eventually, fed by force. 

On 02/20/2006 a federal court in USA ruled that Omar  Khadr’s father, Ahmed Said Khadr, should pay approximately $94 million to the parents of Sgt Christopher Speer from Delta force that was killed by a grenade thrown by Omar  Khadr and $8 million to Layne Morris who lost one of his eyes in the fight. The verdict is only symbolic since Ahmed Said Khadr himself was killed earlier in Pakistan. 

On 05/08/2008 a military judge threatened to suspend the terror trial of Omar  Khadr unless the prison camp releases a detailed log of the Toronto-born captive’s treatment in detention.

An FBI agent said, on 01/20/2009, that Guantanamo detainee Omar  Khadr saw fellow Canadian citizen Maher Arar, whom Canada has cleared of terror links, at an Al Qaeda camp, according to Canadian media.

Radio-Canada reported that during a pre-trial hearing for Omar  Khadr, FBI Director Robert Fuller said Omar  Khadr recognized Maher Arar on photographs he was shown during an interrogation in 2002.

 

* Omar  Khadr was transferred from Guantanamo to Canada, on Saturday 09/29/2012, to finish his 8 years jail term in Canadian prison.

 

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