Obama revives Guantanamo Bay tribunals

U.S. President Barack Obama confirmed Friday he will reinstate a controversial military tribunal system for some of the Guantanamo Bay detainees, but it's still not clear whether it will affect Canadian Omar Khadr.

Obama announced the decision in a three-paragraph White House statement, saying new protections he has added to the tribunals will ensure a legitimate forum to prosecute terror suspects.

"This is the best way to protect our country while upholding our deeply held values," said Obama in the statement.

The tribunal system was set up by former U.S. president George W. Bush after the military began arresting individuals on the battlefields of Afghanistan in late 2001 and detaining them at the U.s. military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. It has faced repeated challenges from human rights and legal organizations because it denied defendants many of the rights they would be granted in a civilian courtroom.

Obama said the system has only successfully prosecuted three detainees in more than seven years but that immediate rule changes governing the trials will begin to bring them in line with the rule of law.

Ban on evidence obtained by torture

For now, the military trials will remain on hold, as they have been since the beginning of his administration, while Obama makes the necessary legal changes. The revised system is expected to try fewer than 20 of the 241 detainees now being held at Guantanamo.

The changes include:

• Restrictions on hearsay evidence that can be used in court against the detainees.
• A ban on all evidence obtained through cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. This would include statements given by detainees who were subjected to waterboarding, a form of simulated drowning.
• Giving detainees greater leeway in choosing their own military counsel.
• Protecting detainees who refuse to testify from legal sanctions or other court prejudices.

The restrictions on evidence almost certainly will result in only a fraction of detainees going to trial. The rest of the detainees would either be released, transferred to other nations or tried by civilian prosecutors in U.S. federal courts, an official said.

Officials at Guantanamo Bay released one detainee to his relatives in France Friday.

Lakhdar Boumediene was arrested along with five other Algerians in 2001 in Bosnia on suspicion of being involved in a bomb plot against the U.S. embassy in Sarajevo. He arrived in Guantanamo in January 2002.

Won't change Khadr case: government

The Canadian government says Obama's decision won't affect how it handles Khadr's case.

"Our position has not changed," Deepak Obhrai, parliamentary secretary to the minister of foreign affairs, said Friday during question period.

"We will respect Obama's decision to allow the process to run through."

He was responding to Liberal foreign affairs critic Bob Rae, who asked whether federal officials have had any new talks with American officials on the matter.

"It is our responsibility to repatriate a Canadian citizen to face Canadian justice," said Rae.

Obhrai repeated the government's stance that Khadr is facing serious charges in the U.S.

Khadr has been at the U.S. military prison in Cuba for more than six years — since he was 15 — waiting for trial on charges of throwing a hand grenade that killed a U.S. army medic during a firefight in Afghanistan in 2002.

The Conservative government has launched an appeal to a Federal Court ruling that said Canada must press for Khadr's return.