Khadr’s incriminating statements admissible, judge rules

U.S. NAVAL BASE GUANTANAMO, Cuba – The most damning prosecution evidence against Omar Khadr is admissible at his trial, and not the product of torture, the military judge in the Canadian-born terror suspect’s case ruled Monday.

The decision by army Col. Patrick Parrish, came a little more than an hour after Khadr – through his Pentagon-appointed defence lawyer – pleaded not guilty to the five war crimes charges he faces.

Parrish’s ruling comes as a major blow to Khadr, who claimed in a February 2008 affidavit that he faced abuse during interrogations following his capture at the end of a 2002 firefight with U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan.

The judge ruled that a video apparently showing Khadr making and planting landmines is admissible, rejecting the defence argument it was obtained based on information coerced from Khadr.

Among the charges Khadr faces is for the murder of Special Forces Sgt. First Class Chris Speer, who died in a grenade attack when Khadr was 15 years old. Khadr faces up to life in prison if convicted of the five charges he faces.

Khadr’s trial is expected to begin Tuesday with selection of U.S. military officers who’ll serve on the jury as commission "members."

In a video shown at the hearing Monday, Khadr was seen warning Guantanamo Bay guards trying to weigh him for the International Red Cross that "God will take . . . revenge" on the United States.

"I am here in prison, but there are millions of people outside," Khadr says in the May 2006 clip. "What’s happening to you is not for nothing."

Khadr, 23, alleged in a February 2008 affidavit that guards mistreated him during the weighing session, claiming they "pressed on my pressure points."

The clip appears to show the guards somewhat restrained as they push him toward the scale and point out that all his "brothers" – a reference to other detainees – had allowed themselves to be weighed without protest.

"Come on man, it’s not that bad," says a guard after Khadr claimed the treatment was a "very small example of what’s really going on" at the detention facility.

"We’re not doing this to hurt you, torture you," another guard’s voice is heard saying, amid explanations that his weight was simply needed for his health record and Red Cross review records.

Indeed, after Khadr had spent about 20 minutes resisting the guards, there came indications that he had been playing to the camera as he switched from the English he used to speak to the guards, to Arabic to speak with fellow detainees in nearby cells.

"May God reward him. The camera is with him," a detainee shouts in Arabic, which had been translated in subtitles.

Khadr was in court to watch the video after saying at his last hearing last month that he intended to boycott further sessions, saying he didn’t want to help the United States further its "political goals."

Khadr faced interrogations at the U.S. base in Bagram, Afghanistan, before being transferred to the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay in October 2002, where he remains.

His defence had contended that Khadr made self-incriminating statements to a series of officers after enduring interrogations that involved the use of coercive techniques.

"By the time he left Bagram, he was broken . . . by the actions of people in uniform . . . specifically Interrogator No. 1," said Lt. Col. Jon Jackson, Khadr’s Pentagon-appointed attorney, as he referred to Khadr’s chief Bagram interrogator – a soldier who was later convicted in a court martial for "maltreatment" of another detainee.

Jackson recalled that the interrogator had sought to frighten Khadr by making up a story of how an unco-operative Muslim detainee had been dispatched to a U.S. prison and raped there by other inmates.

"Once he said those words to Mr. Khadr, the well was poisoned, and the government can’t cleanse the well . . . by saying someone (else) came in and was nice to him," Jackson told the court.

"To him, when he was interrogated, all those faces were the same."

Jackson urged the judge to consider the "outcry" by the U.S. government if a U.S. soldier had been the victim of such a scenario.

"Tell the world that we actually stand for what we say we stand for," Jackson said to the judge.

But air force Capt. Chris Eason, one of the prosecutors, said Khadr had switched to speaking in detail about his alleged actions not because he had faced any tough interrogation, but after the United States presented him with a video U.S. forces had found that showed the Toronto native appearing to take part in a mine-making and laying operation.

Eason quoted from the earlier testimony of one of the interrogators, who said: "That’s when the floodgates opened."

Eason had argued statements in which Khadr speaks of tossing the hand grenade that fatally wounded a U.S. soldier, and other matters relating to his alleged terrorist background, should be admitted as evidence at trial.

"It’s truth that we can rely on," he said.