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Re: gitmo detainees, the sense that I have is that it was the destination of choice for prisoners taken early in the war (I'm not sure that new prisoners continue to go there.) It was a wide swath (hearsay reports counted as information strong enough to warrant transportation there.) The prime purpose, of course, was to hold them, as alison mentioned, in a place where they would be under US control but not subject to US law. (Although the Supreme Court ruled that, regardless of their location, habeas corpus still applied -- another issue altogether.) Nowadays, Bagram has replaced Guantanamo as the destination for terror suspects from the Afghan war, to considerably less media scrutiny, but likely to no less mistreatment.
According to wikipedia, there were only two survivors of the apache rocket attack on the compound, and only Omar Khadr survived the following firefight, during which the alleged grenade attack occurred.
And you feel like they don't keep track because they don't keep track very well, and there's no incentive for them to do so. Moreover, the truth is that we don't see many media reports of casualties because "xx afghans were killed today" is neither unique nor gripping for a Western audience. This diminishes not only those lives that are lost, but obscures the true cost of a war of choice on the population we are meant to be helping, as well as the toll it takes on those we purportedly exalt as "defending our freedom."
Leaving aside the broader questions about Afghanistan, with respect to Omar Khadr, the reason we should care that he is Canadian is not that his situation is only worth caring about because of his citizenship, but rather that our government has an obligation to him as a citizen that is going unfulfilled. He remains the only citizen of a Western nation in Guantanamo. His legal status has been irresponsibly left up in the air by both Liberal and Conservative governments.
There are arguments made that his family is despicable and that he is merely a citizen of convenience and therefore we owe him no obligation. The former is assuredly true, but while people may like the latter to be true, Canadian tradition and law make no distinctions among forms of citizenship. It may be for Parliament to decide such a distinction is required or "ought to exist", but it does not exist and Omar Khadr is as much a citizen as you or me or Stephen Harper or Paul Martin and our obligation to him remains as it would for anyone else. That's the only issue here that relates to him being Canadian, that's our obligation to him, and that's where we have failed.
Not that I expect that to change -- he's an unsympathetic character and neither potential governing party would dare grant him what he is due for fear of looking weak on terrorism. So, here we are.
(I leave it to individuals to decide which of these two are "strong on terror":
(i) upholding one's principles and trusting one's values to be stronger than cowards who would have us change our way of life because of their violence; vs.
(ii) throwing our principles to the wind and alienating people who we need on our side because of groups who more often than not employ fanatical morons to perform their cowardly acts.)
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August 18, 2010 -- 7:18 AM
posted by alison
mini rant: I have to be in Edmonton on Friday, which should be an exciting thing. But instead, we have to be at a meeting at 9am, and we're driving up, only for the day... to be back in Calgary in the evening too. I do NOT want to have to do this. I made plans for the weekend. ... plans that involve being awake enough to do stuff on Friday evening after work. grr
August 17, 2010 -- 5:42 PM
posted by edo
August 16, 2010 -- 2:20 PM
posted by Par
So, what I am gathering here is that any time the Americans get into a confrontation with someone in Afghanistan, the someone either: escapes, is killed or brought to gitmo. I know the Canadians in Afghanistan recently got into trouble (at least in the media) for handing over prisoners to Afghani police, because they knew they were going to torture them. Do Americans also hand over prisoners to local authorities? Or does everyone "lucky" enough to survive get a trip half way around the planet to Cuba?
Re: gitmo detainees, the sense that I have is that it was the destination of choice for prisoners taken early in the war (I'm not sure that new prisoners continue to go there.) It was a wide swath (hearsay reports counted as information strong enough to warrant transportation there.) The prime purpose, of course, was to hold them, as alison mentioned, in a place where they would be under US control but not subject to US law. (Although the Supreme Court ruled that, regardless of their location, habeas corpus still applied -- another issue altogether.) Nowadays, Bagram has replaced Guantanamo as the destination for terror suspects from the Afghan war, to considerably less media scrutiny, but likely to no less mistreatment.
Does anyone know if there were any other survivors along with Khadr? or did everyone else in the house die? If there were survivors, did they also end up in gitmo and because they are most likely Afghani and not Canadian, remain un-noticed by western or pososibly all media?
If the Americans typically don"t take prisoners, what might the death toll be? Why do I feel like they don't keep track?
According to wikipedia, there were only two survivors of the apache rocket attack on the compound, and only Omar Khadr survived the following firefight, during which the alleged grenade attack occurred.
And you feel like they don't keep track because they don't keep track very well, and there's no incentive for them to do so. Moreover, the truth is that we don't see many media reports of casualties because "xx afghans were killed today" is neither unique nor gripping for a Western audience. This diminishes not only those lives that are lost, but obscures the true cost of a war of choice on the population we are meant to be helping, as well as the toll it takes on those we purportedly exalt as "defending our freedom."
Leaving aside the broader questions about Afghanistan, with respect to Omar Khadr, the reason we should care that he is Canadian is not that his situation is only worth caring about because of his citizenship, but rather that our government has an obligation to him as a citizen that is going unfulfilled. He remains the only citizen of a Western nation in Guantanamo. His legal status has been irresponsibly left up in the air by both Liberal and Conservative governments.
There are arguments made that his family is despicable and that he is merely a citizen of convenience and therefore we owe him no obligation. The former is assuredly true, but while people may like the latter to be true, Canadian tradition and law make no distinctions among forms of citizenship. It may be for Parliament to decide such a distinction is required or "ought to exist", but it does not exist and Omar Khadr is as much a citizen as you or me or Stephen Harper or Paul Martin and our obligation to him remains as it would for anyone else. That's the only issue here that relates to him being Canadian, that's our obligation to him, and that's where we have failed.
Not that I expect that to change -- he's an unsympathetic character and neither potential governing party would dare grant him what he is due for fear of looking weak on terrorism. So, here we are.
(I leave it to individuals to decide which of these two are "strong on terror":
(i) upholding one's principles and trusting one's values to be stronger than cowards who would have us change our way of life because of their violence; vs.
(ii) throwing our principles to the wind and alienating people who we need on our side because of groups who more often than not employ fanatical morons to perform their cowardly acts.)
August 14, 2010 -- 3:28 PM
posted by Al
Pretty good sense of humor, he started off the audit by asking what the meaning of life was, so I said 42.
But yes big price to get standards.
August 14, 2010 -- 2:20 PM
posted by alison
nice Albert!
Perhaps the ISO folks have a sense of humour? That'd be nice. They're so serious about everything else. Their standards sure are pricey... 130 Swiss Francs for only part of one. blech.
August 14, 2010 -- 2:11 PM
posted by Al
42 was the answer I gave during a audit by the ISO organization. Apparently it was accepted as an answer.
August 14, 2010 -- 12:15 AM
posted by jsesE
So, what I am gathering here is that any time the Americans get into a confrontation with someone in Afghanistan, the someone either: escapes, is killed or brought to gitmo. I know the Canadians in Afghanistan recently got into trouble (at least in the media) for handing over prisoners to Afghani police, because they knew they were going to torture them. Do Americans also hand over prisoners to local authorities? Or does everyone "lucky" enough to survive get a trip half way around the planet to Cuba?
Does anyone know if there were any other survivors along with Khadr? or did everyone else in the house die? If there were survivors, did they also end up in gitmo and because they are most likely Afghani and not Canadian, remain un-noticed by western or pososibly all media?
If the Americans typically don"t take prisoners, what might the death toll be? Why do I feel like they don't keep track?
I never seem to have any answers, just questions, other than, you know 42. Sorry about that.
August 13, 2010 -- 6:37 PM
posted by alison
uh... what Albert said. The US doesn't typically take prisoners. What prisoners they took, well... it only makes "sense" to send them somewhere under US control that isn't technically US soil so that they can get away with all kinds of awful things they couldn't otherwise ordinarily get away with... like waterboarding.
And I totally agree with you two, Jesse and Jess. The fact that he's Canadian shouldn't make a hill of beans of difference in my sympathies, and it really doesn't. Every child soldier has a heart-rending story to tell, and is a horrible example of the terrors of warfare, regardless of their nation of origin. BUT it matters a whole lot when it comes to issues of diplomacy. If Khadr, a CHILD SOLDIER, isn't treated with any deference by our ALLIES, the US government, what chance does an adult have? There's already a large amount of hand-wringing going on (as there was when his nationality was first discovered) that the treatment of this Canadian-born child [victim of warfare and coercion etc.] bore too much resemblance to the treatment (also in contravention to the Geneva Convention) of the other adult Afghan-born, willing soldiers that were taken prisoner. Our two nations have treaties of extradition and fair treatment (if I remember correctly) for citizens caught committing crimes against the other nation (think along the lines of car accidents or drug possession), and neither ought to be resorting to torture. BUT the US has, in recent years, gone away from this, and a lot of it stems from the same time period as Khadr's capture. (For practicality's sake, where it matters to you and me and the kid down the street: if you're in the states and you end up under suspicion of a crime, the cops do not have to read you your Miranda rights. In fact, you don't have any rights, because you are not a citizen of their country. Habeas corpus doesn't even come into effect the same way.)
That he was taken prisoner at all might be a combination of misguided justice and pity. Pity in the sense that whatever soldiers found him didn't have the nerve to kill a child, and misguided justice in the sense that they thought they might be able to either extract information or make an example of him. ... which I don't think worked out so well in either case. What would a 15 year old know about the inner workings of the Afghan military movement? And what kind of news of Guantanamo Bay ever made its way back to the Afghan people? The fact that he speaks English, however, was likely a driving factor in his imprisonment.
August 13, 2010 -- 5:05 PM
posted by Al
The American military needed a "neutral" place to put all prisoners of their "war".
So yes to circumvent Geneva convention issues and to allow for a holding area technically on American soil without running into human rights issue (it is not part of any state so technically no DA to get on your ass for torture) they send all afghanis to Gutanomo.
August 13, 2010 -- 12:07 PM
posted by Jess
I forgot that he was 15 at the time.....
Your second question is what interests me most. I hate it when news covers the deaths of "peacekeepers" or "protesters" or other non-native causalities like they are somehow of more interest, more newsworthy, or more tragic than all the Afghani, Palestinian, or whoever causalities. I resent that I am supposed to identify/sympathize more with a person because they happen to share my nationality, despite the fact that, as Jesse put it, I haven't met these people any more than I've met the other fatalities.
It seems based on an idea of nationalism that just doesn't strike a chord with me. I appreciate many many things about being Canadian, and I feel lucky to have been born here, but this is an objective assessment about political organization, legal equality, free health care, and a ridiculously high standard of living (globally speaking), not an emotional appeal to my pride or a sense of entitlement. If the things I appreciate about being Canadian are just a stroke of luck based on history and birth (birth-luck, not birth-right), shouldn't I be interested in everyone's right to those same things, not just the people who have been equally lucky?
And... while I'm up here on this soapbox, I'm not at all convinced that the way to ensure some of those freedoms are available to the people of other countries is to be just the most recent of a long string of "liberators." Historically speaking, western interference in other regions has usually resulted in a much less "free"/"enlightened" culture for those regions, despite our best intentions (religious or political). I have faith in the ability of all cultures to figure things out for themselves and I believe that they'd get there faster without our "help."
Of course, what Afghanistan is really about is suppressing the organization of a Saudi Arabian man who was protesting the US-backed and deeply unpopular leader of his own country. A leader western powers want because he sells us oil. The humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan existed for a long time before the planes.
None of this is a new opinion, of course, but it bears repeating.
I am curious to know if anyone has any idea about Jesse's third question. Or is Guantanamo the default destination for all captured Afghanis?
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