Edmonton judge denies Omar Khadr eased bail conditions
Posted December 21, 2018 11:46 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
EDMONTON – An Edmonton judge has denied former Guantanamo Bay detainee Omar Khadr’s request for relaxed bail conditions and a Canadian passport.
Justice June Ross said there’s no evidence of hardship or that the conditions are needlessly onerous.
She said nothing has really changed since the last time Khadr asked for changes to his bail conditions and the restrictions he faces are reasonable.
Ross said her decision is not etched in stone and conditions could change in the future.
Khadr’s lawyer had argued that it wasn’t fair that his client’s life remains restricted by a stalled U.S. court process with no end in sight.
Khadr, 32, has been on bail since May 2015 pending appeal of his conviction by a U.S. military commission on alleged war crimes.
The appeal in the U.S. has stalled and Khadr has no idea of how long his bail conditions will last.
Khadr wanted to be able to travel to Toronto without the approval of his bail supervisor to visit his family more easily and to make court appearances related to a civil lawsuit he faces.
He also wanted unsupervised conversations with his sister and a Canadian passport so that he could make a pilgrimage to Mecca in Saudi Arabia.
