Omar Khadr
Omar Khadr is a Canadian citizen. He was 15 when he was taken into custody by US soldiers in Afghanistan. He is now 23 and still has not been sentenced. He remains in Guantanamo and the Canadian government is not doing anything to help him (Omar Khadr is the only Western national remaining in Guantanamo, all the other Western governments put pressure on the US to release their citizens). All throughout his incarceration he has been subjected to mental and physical torture.
He is charged with killing an American soldier with a grenade. It is not even certain that he really did it - there are conflicting statements. One US soldier says there was another (adult) man alive at the time who could have thrown the grenade. So is that really the reason he has been kept in Guantanamo for so long? I think not. His family is supposed to have very close ties with Al-Qaeda and Osama Bin Laden. They may be hoping for valuable intelligence, but even if that is so, are they justified in doing this?
Amnesty International has long campaigned to have him released from Guantanamo and given a fair trial, but to no avail. The general public was made aware of Omar Khadr again quite recently. In July a video was released, which showed Omar Khadr being interrogated in Guantanamo. It was filmed with a hidden camera and the quality of picture isn’t good, but it’s enough to give a good idea of what is going on. You can see the video and read more details here. Another very chilling read is this - a testimony of a prisoner who shared a cell with Omar Khadr, but was released.
