<html>
<body>
<font size=4><b>Guantanamo inmate pleads guilty <br><br>
Canadian Omar Khadr admits to throwing grenade that killed US soldier in
Afghanistan when he was 15 years old.<br><br>
</b></font><font size=3>
<a href="http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2010/10/20101025142318598641.html" eudora="autourl">
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2010/10/20101025142318598641.html<br>
</a>Last Modified: 25 Oct 2010 16:01 GMT <br><br>
<br>
A Canadian prisoner in Guantanamo Bay has pleaded guilty to killing an
American soldier while he was a young teenager as part of a deal that
will allow him to avoid a war crimes trial.<br><br>
Omar Khadr on Monday pleaded guilty to five charges, including murder,
for throwing a grenade that killed a US soldier in Afghanistan in 2002.
He was just 15 at the time of the incident, which occurred during a
fierce firefight at an al-Qaeda compound in Afghanistan.<br><br>
Khadr, now 24, also admitted to planting improvised explosive devices and
receiving weapons training from al-Qaeda. His defence lawyers say that
because Khadr was a child when the offences occurred, he should not be
tried for war-crimes.<br><br>
The exact terms of the plea deal were not immediately disclosed, but
Khadr is due to be sentenced by a military jury in several days. The
sentence they impose is bound by the plea deal.<br><br>
Khadr would be allowed to trasfer back to his native Canada after serving
a year of his sentence as part of the deal, the military judge in charge
of the case said. <br><br>
<b>Trial criticised<br><br>
</b>The US has argued that Khadr, who was badly wounded during the
fighting, is a war criminal because he was not a regular solider. But his
case has long outraged opponants to Guantanamo, who say he was a child
soldier and was subjected to mistreatment while in US custody.<br><br>
John Terrett, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Washington DC, said that the
proceedings against Khadr are unprecedented. "In many ways
this whole thing has been a trial of firsts and onlys," he
said.<br><br>
"He's the only Canadian citizen in Guantanamo and he's the only
child soldier- He was arrested at the age of 15. He has pled guilty to
all five charges against, and it has become that this trial is coming to
a plea-bargain end."<br><br>
Khadr's defence team say he was pushed into fighting the US by his
father, said to be a close associate of Osama bin Laden. Human rights
defenders have criticised Barack Obama, the US president, for seeking to
prosecute Khadr.<br><br>
"It's particularly galling that a president who promised to restore
human rights is beginning the first trial here with a child soldier who
was abused for years in US custody and was taken to a war zone by his
dad," Jennifer Turner, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties
Union who is at Guantanamo to observe proceedings against Khadr,
said.<br><br>
Many of Obama's supporters have been angered by his failure to close
Guantanamo, despite promising to do so in his campaign and ordering the
government to do so as one of his first acts as president.<br><br>
Around 170 prisoners are still being held at Guantanamo. Congressional
opposition to its closure, and difficulty in finding countries to take
the men held there, has stalled Obama's plan to close the
prison.<br><br>
<br><br>
</font><x-sigsep><p></x-sigsep>
<font size=3 color="#FF0000">Freedom Archives<br>
522 Valencia Street<br>
San Francisco, CA 94110<br><br>
</font><font size=3 color="#008000">415 863-9977<br><br>
</font><font size=3 color="#0000FF">
<a href="http://www.freedomarchives.org/" eudora="autourl">
www.Freedomarchives.org</a></font><font size=3> </font></body>
</html>