Ontario lawyers call on PM to ask U.S. to return Omar Khadr

This is interesting because the Law Society is really just there to regulate lawyers and not to take a public stand on issues save as they directly impact on the legal profession. That doesn't speak to what is the right thing to do but rather who is the right person to say it ... .

Ontario lawyers call on PM to ask U.S. to return Omar Khadr

TORONTO - The group that oversees Ontario's lawyers is calling on Prime Minister Stephen Harper to ask the U.S. to return Omar Khadr to Canada.

Khadr, the only Canadian citizen being held in Guantanamo Bay, is due to stand trial Jan. 26 for war crimes.

The U.S. accuses him of throwing a hand grenade that killed an American army medic following a fierce four-hour firefight in Afghanistan in July 2002.

Derry Miller, treasurer of the Law Society of Upper Canada, says the group believes Khadr, now 22, should be returned to Canada and put on trial here.

In a Nov. 6 letter to Harper, Miller notes that U.S. president-elect Barack Obama is on the record as being opposed to the operation of the Guantanamo Bay prison.

Miller says the law society believes this makes it an opportune time to raise the issue with the U.S.

"The Law Society of Upper Canada regards adherence to the rule of law and due process as fundamental principles that are the right of every Canadian citizen, regardless of the character or circumstances of the citizen," Miller writes.

Khadr should be "returned to Canada, where he can be tried by a regularly constituted court affording all the judicial guarantees recognized" by the Geneva Conventions," the letter states.

Full story here: http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/081112/national/omar_khadr_harper