Omar Khadr

Biography

Omar Ahmed Sayid Khadr (born September 19, 1986) is a Canadian who was detained at Guantanamo Bay as a minor and held there for 10 years. In a firefight during the United States invasion of Afghanistan on July 27, 2002, in the village of Ayub Kheyl, in which several Taliban fighters were killed, Khadr, not yet 16, was severely wounded. After being detained at Bagram, he was sent to Guantanamo Bay detention camps, in Cuba. During his detention, he was interrogated by Canadian as well as US intelligence officers. He was imprisoned for allegedly throwing a grenade during the firefight that resulted in the death of an American soldier. At the time, he was 15 years old and had been brought to Afghanistan by his father, who was affiliated with an extreme religious group. During the conflict, Khadr was badly wounded, and captured by Americans. On September 29, 2012, Khadr was repatriated to Canada to serve the remainder of his sentence in Canadian custody. He was initially assigned to a maximum-security prison but moved to a medium-security prison in 2014. Khadr was released on bail in May 2015 (pending an appeal of his U.S. conviction) after the Alberta Court of Appeal refused to block his release as had been requested by the Canadian government.