Public Safety Minister Vic Toews is leaving the door open for confessed al-Qaeda terrorist Omar Khadr to return to Canada.
Canadians imprisoned in the United States can apply to serve their prison term in Canada. Mr. Khadr’s lawyers said Monday that Washington and Ottawa had agreed to a plea deal that allows Mr. Khadr to apply to return to Canada after serving one more year in prison in Guantanamo. Any remaining sentence would be served in a Canadian prison.
But the Harper government is refusing to publicly acknowledge or confirm that a negotiated deal has been reached to repatriate Mr. Khadr, saying what's happening now is strictly between Mr. Khadr and the U.S. government.
On Monday afternoon, Mr. Toews noted he hasn’t said that he would block a request by Mr. Khadr to return and finish his jail term in a Canadian institution. He also said Mr. Khadr hadn’t applied to return home yet.
“I couldn’t speculate on whether he would apply. That’s his right to apply,” Mr. Toews said just before to an appearance at the Commons public safety committee in Ottawa.
“But there’s all kinds of issues related to that – whether the Americans would allow it, they have to consent of course. So I will leave it to Mr. Khadr to apply; that’s his right.”
Asked how he might thwart an effort by the young Canadian to return home, Mr. Toews noted he’d never said he would do so.
“I never said I would. I won’t speculate,” he said. “The act sets out the criteria I have to consider and those are the criteria I’d consider in every case.”
He declined to comment on whether Mr. Khadr might return home.
Now 24, Mr. Khadr was only 15 when he was gravely wounded by a U.S. air strike in Afghanistan. He has been in U.S. prisons ever since and on Monday morning pleaded guilty to all terrorism and murder charges against him at a military tribunal hearing in Guantanamo Bay .
