"This story scared me very much and made me cry," the burly Mr. Khadr, now 24, said in an unsworn statement read by his lawyer to the panel on Friday.
Joshua Claus, a former U.S. army interrogator, convicted of assault in connection with the beating death of an Afghan detainee at the U.S. detention centre in Bagram, Afghanistan, boasted under oath that he told young detainees a horrific tale of an Afghan boy gang-raped to death by "four big black guys" to persuade them to confess.
Mr. Khadr's military lawyer, Lt.-Col. Jon Jackson, had urged the military panel to ``send him back to Canada, there is no good in him staying here, send him home.”
Maha Elsamnah, Omar Khadr’s mother, was reluctant to say anything publicly because she had not yet heard from her son’s legal team following the verdict.
“We don’t know anything yet from the lawyers. All we hear is from the media. We cannot comment on anything until we hear from the lawyers,” Ms. Elsamnah said in Toronto Sunday.
“We’re praying for [a call from the lawyers] because this is our lifeline,” she added.
“I hope whatever he gets he is comfortable [with] it,” Ms. Elsamnah said.
With a report from Joe Friesen
