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The following is excerpted from The Star's article Omar Khadr back in Canada:
In the pre-dawn darkness Saturday, Guantanamo guards unlocked Omar Khadr’s cell for the last time, driving him along the rolling hills away from the prison camp, across the bay that divides the U.S. base and onto a small landing strip for the flight that would carry the Canadian from the prison where he had spent almost half his life to the country where he was born.
Khadr had been anticipating the flight since Wednesday, when he was told he would soon be leaving Guantanamo.
Uncertain weather had delayed the departure until 4:30 a.m., when, in military parlance, his flight was finally “wheels up.”
The 26-year-old landed at the Trenton military air base three hours and 40 minutes later, and American officials formally transferred Khadr into Canada’s care, bringing to an end U.S. involvement in the decade-long case.
(…)
Managers with Corrections Canada, not front-line prison guards, took custody of Khadr at Trenton and whisked him to Millhaven. Once the Toronto-born prisoner arrived, he was allowed to speak by phone with his Toronto lawyers.
“He is finding it hard to believe he is really back but is very happy to be home,” lawyer John Norris said. “He is also anxious about having to learn a whole new world in a Canadian prison, but we know he can do that.”
Norris said he was surprised, but not disappointed, that Khadr would first have to undergo an assessment in Millhaven to determine the best facility to serve his sentence.
“We are hopeful they will see he’s not a management problem and that he has tremendous potential,” Norris said. “We like the idea of the assessment based on someone who actually sits down and talks to Omar and gets to know him as opposed to an assessment based on the caricature the government has propagated.”
A Canadian government source told the Star earlier this year that the Ste-Anne-des-Plaines maximum-security facility, near Montreal, was a strong possibility to host Khadr. The prison’s Special Handling Unit, nicknamed “the SHU,” houses the majority of Canada’s prisoners convicted of terrorism offences.
Ottawa lawyer Paul Champ, who helped to advocate Khadr’s cause at the Supreme Court of Canada in 2008, told the CBC that Khadr will be very focused now on trying to regain “a normal life” after being imprisoned “in the most notorious prison in the world.”
“He’s got a lot to get over,” Champ said, adding much would depend on whether “Canada steps up and assists in rehabilitation and counselling.”
Further Reading
Omar Khadr, Oh Canada
Edited by Janice Williamson
In Omar Khadr, Oh Canada, over thirty contributors analyze Khadr's background, his incarceration, the actions of Canadian authorities, and the implications raised by his legal case. This multi-genre book includes essays, articles, poems, a play, extended excerpts from the documentary film You Don't Like the Truth, and other texts produced by distinguished contributors such as Sherene Razack, General Roméo Dallaire, Charles Foran, Kim Echlin, Judith Thompson, Audrey Macklin, Shadia Drury, George Elliott Clarke, Maher Arar, Rick Salutin, and Sheema Khan. While they sometimes disagree on issues such as radical Islam and Canadian multiculturalism, they all write from the conviction that Khadr's treatment has been shamefully unjust and shaped by post 9/11 Islamophobia that continues to distort the views of many Canadians.
Meet the author
Shadows of Afghanistan panel
LitFest – Edmonton's Nonfiction Festival
Saturday, October 20, 2012 – 19:00
More info
To learn more about Omar Khadr, Oh Canada or to order online, click here.
For media inquiries, contact MQUP Publicist Jacqui Davis.
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