WASHINGTON AND TORONTO
-- Ottawa won't seek the return of Omar Khadr, the only Canadian and last remaining westerner left in Guantanamo, Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon said yesterday after meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
While the new U.S. President Barrack Obama has pledged to shut down Guantanamo within a year and is urging other countries to help resettle some detainees, the Harper government hasn't budged from the position it maintained throughout the Bush years.
"As a matter of fact, I reiterated Canada's position on this," Mr. Cannon said. "What I have said on numerous occasions is that this individual is allegedly a murderer and [stands] accused of terrorism."
Mr. Obama has ordered a sweeping review of the controversial military tribunals set up to conduct terrorist trials. That review may result in those accused, including Mr. Khadr, being tried in federal courts or military courts, but many expect some sort of new special court will need to be created.
"Canada fully respects the process the American government has put forward and we will await the outcome of that process before anything takes place," Mr. Cannon said.
Opposition leaders in Canada and rights groups in both countries have demanded the Harper government seek Mr. Khadr's return, if only because he was a child soldier, 15 years ago when he was severely wounded in a firefight in Afghanistan where an American special forces soldier was killed. Ms. Clinton did not ask Canada to take Mr. Khadr back, Mr. Cannon said.
(In Madrid yesterday, Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos said his country was prepared to accept prisoners from Guantanamo Bay, Reuters reported. He made his comments after his first meeting with Ms. Clinton.)
Mr. Khadr's case was the source of new controversy yesterday, when the detainee's U.S. military defence lawyer claimed he has been banned by his boss from travelling to Guantanamo Bay to visit his client.
Lieutenant-Commander Bill Kuebler issued a statement to the press yesterday alleging that his boss - Pentagon chief defence lawyer Colonel Peter Masciola - prohibited him from getting on a flight to Guantanamo Bay. In effect, LCdr. Kuebler said in an interview, the move denies Mr. Khadr access to counsel.
The dispute appears to stem from a proposal LCdr. Kuebler says Col. Masciola made to have the military lawyers assigned to Guantanamo cases also represent detainees who end up charged in a U.S. federal court.
LCdr. Kuebler said he is concerned that Col. Masciola may have endorsed the notion that Mr. Khadr face further trial. Mr. Khadr's military lawyers have maintained that he should be subjected to rehabilitation, not a trial. LCdr. Kuebler argued that such an endorsement by the chief defence lawyer could constitute a conflict of interest.