Ahmed Said Khadr
Ahmed Said Khadr was a Canadian aid worker who was a friendly acquaintance of Osama bin Laden.[1] Security officials have alleged he was a long term member of al Qaeda's leadership circle, and that he had been an "al Qaeda financier".[2]
In 1995 the fiance of his oldest daughter, Zaynab Khadr, was involved in a terrorist attack in Pakistan. He used a vehicle belonging to an orphanage Khadr managed in Afghanistan. Khadr claimed the fiance took the truck without his permission. Nevertheless Pakistani security official apprehended him, and held him for almost a year in extrajudicial detention in a torture prison.
Jean Chretien, Prime Minister of Canada was on an official visit to Pakistan when Khadr's wife Maha, accompanied by her young children, buttonholed Chretien, and asked Chretien to use his influence to get Khadr released. Khadr was soon released, and, in hindsight, critics of Chretien have asserted he never should have spoken to Pakistna's leader Benazir Bhutto about Khadr. Chretien has described asking Bhutto to either formally charge Khadr, and give him a fair trial, or to release him, if Pakistan did not have sufficient evidence to justify laying charges.
Following his release Human Concern International, the charity whose auspices Khadr worked, dropped all ties to him. Khadr then set up a charity of his own.
When the USA invaded Afghanistan the CIA ran a campaign encouraging Afghans and Pakistanis to hand over all foreigners in Afghanistan.
References
- ↑ . CBC News. http://pointdebasculecanada.ca/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1477-hci-and-ahmed-said-khadr-march-4-2003-cbc&catid=9&Itemid=103. Retrieved 2012-11.
- ↑ "Guantanamo detainee to be prosecuted over attacks on Canadian soldiers". Metro News. 2014-06-03. Archived from the original on 2014-07-03. https://web.archive.org/web/20140703004845/http://metronews.ca/news/world/1054400/guantanamo-detainee-to-be-prosecuted-over-attacks-on-canadian-soldiers/. Retrieved 2014-02. "Al Hadi, however, is alleged to have known the senior Khadr, who was killed by Pakistani forces in 2003, near the border of Afghanistan. The two men did not get along, according to a transcript of an interrogation of Abdullah Khadr by Canadian and U.S. authorities."
