In 2002 Canada signed on to an ambitious bit of do-gooderism known as the "Optional protocol on the Rights of the Child".
The aim of this non-binding UN document was to divert "child soldiers" out of the regular stream of consequences that befall adults who are captured in the course of hostilities. Minors who became prisoners of war were to be reintegrated into civil society.
Canada was the first country to ratify the agreement, and one of its most vocal cheerleaders.
Also in 2002, Canadian teen Omar Khadr was captured after a fire-fight in Afghanistan, in the course of which an American serviceman died. Khadr, 14 or 15 years old at the time, was captured by US forces and eventually found his way to Gitmo.
Khadr's repatriation to Canada was resisted at every step by the Canadian government. The child soldier had morphed into an unrepentant terrorist in the view of Canadian authorities. Clearly the protocol on the rights of the child was intended to protect children raised by African savages, not children who were born in Canada.
The naive do-gooderism of well-meaning activists was more than offset by the vindictive racism of the Harper gang.
The Canadian child soldier is now 27 years old and still in prison, albeit in Canada finally. He has launched a legal action against the government for violating his rights.
This case throws into stark relief the hypocrisy of Canadian authorities who are always eager to preach to the rest of the world about doing the right thing, but then pretend those rules don't apply to Canada.
Get over yourselves, you sanctimonious twats! The same rules that apply to child soldiers born in Africa must apply to child soldiers born in Canada. You can not offer prescriptions to right the wrongs of the lesser developed nations, or just lesser peoples, and pretend that you are not subject to those same rules.
Canada's treatment of Omar Khadr has been one long and despicable exercise in hypocrisy and racism.
We need to give him another chance just to exonerate ourselves.
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