Omar is back

kraychik · October 3, 2012

Funny way you have of admitting you were wrong about the UN definition.

You're linking the optional protocol, not the actual core convention. It's alright, I know you don't recognise the difference. You're learning as you're going, I understand.

GostHacked · October 3, 2012

Still, it also deems it okay for persons over 16 to join a military, though it discourages governments from recruiting them.

[ed.: corr.]

I thought this is why entities like Air Cadets exist.

Black Dog · October 3, 2012

You're linking the optional protocol, not the actual core convention. It's alright, I know you don't recognise the difference. You're learning as you're going, I understand.

:lol:

First: The Convention on the Rights of the Child defines children as anyone under 18.

Second: Article 38.3 of the Convention only applies to the recruitment of children under 15 by State Parties.

Third: The optional protocol states the following in its preamble:

Convinced that an optional protocol to the Convention that raises the age of possible recruitment of persons into armed forces and their participation in hostilities will contribute effectively to the implementation of the principle that the best interests of the child are to be a primary consideration in all actions concerning children,

Finally: despite it's name, the Optional protocol has been fully ratified and stands enforceable as a treaty in its own right.

You are wrong.

Edited October 3, 2012 by Black Dog

bleeding heart · October 3, 2012

For me, it's always been about Omar as a Canadian anyway.

Anyone who thinks a fifteen year old is legally (and morally) as responsible as an adult....I have no issue with that stance, provided the person believes a fifteen year old should be awarded all the rights and priveleges of an adult, as well.

Otherwise, the argument is one that responsbilities are more improtant than rights--legally speaking--which is a statist view in the extreme, and somewhat fringe, actually, for a democratic system.

Edited October 3, 2012 by bleeding heart

eyeball · October 3, 2012

Like I said, even using the UN's definition of child soldier, Khadr wouldn't qualify because he was over the age of fifteen.

Please, for your own sake, read this.

Comprende?

kraychik · October 3, 2012

Second: Article 38.3 of the Convention only applies to the recruitment of children under 15 by State Parties.

It's debatable whether or not Khadr was serving the state of Afghanistan.

Finally: despite it's name, the Optional protocol has been fully ratified and stands enforceable as a treaty in its own right.
You are wrong.

Yeah? So which state extends these imaginary protections to Khadr? Afghanistan? Pakistan? This is cute, you're learning about this for the very first time, I can tell.

Moonlight Graham · October 3, 2012

Read the part in bold.

When is majority age attained in Canada, Pakistan, and Afghanistan? Answer: 18 years old.

Black Dog · October 3, 2012

It's debatable whether or not Khadr was serving the state of Afghanistan.

Precisely my point. Your suggestion that the Convention on the Rights of the Child defines child soldiers as someone under 15 applies only to state actors. In any case, the optional protocol expressly supersedes that.

Yeah? So which state extends these imaginary protections to Khadr? Afghanistan? Pakistan?

Presumably the responsibility for providing protections to child soldiers serving non-state actors falls to the prosecuting power if it is a signatory to the protocol. I can't be arsed to look it up at the moment as it's not really the point. The point: again, is you are wrong on the UN definition of child soldier. Q.E.D.

This is cute, you're learning about this for the very first time, I can tell.

I often wonder if you are like this in real life and, if so, how long you've been eating through a straw.

Edited October 3, 2012 by Black Dog

bleeding heart · October 3, 2012

Please, for your own sake, read this.

Comprende?

Thanks eyeball. The missive is a sane voice in an angry wilderness on this subject.

jacee · October 3, 2012

Where'd I do that?

You didn't. Sorry.

Thought I was responding to krapchik.

DogOnPorch · October 3, 2012

You didn't. Sorry.

Thought I was responding to krapchik.

np

jacee · October 3, 2012

Presumably the responsibility for providing protections to child soldiers serving non-state actors falls to the prosecuting power if it is a signatory.

And presumeably that's why the UN wrote to the US military commission to remind them of the US responsibility to child soldiers under the UN protocol.

The arguments about almost 16 ... under 15, etc, are irrelevant because the UN protocol applies according to the age at 'recruitment'.

Omar was 'trained' in Pakistan and was only 10 years old when his father took him to Afghanistan and put him in combat there.

Edited October 3, 2012 by jacee

eyeball · October 3, 2012

And presumeably that's why the UN wrote to the US military commission to remind them of the US responsibility to child soldiers under the UN protocol.

And why it's Canada's duty to investigate Omar's mother for the war crime of indoctrinating a child soldier.

October 3, 2012

DogOnPorch, on 03 October 2012 - 01:46 PM, said:
Can you provide some evidence that Omar was forced to go adventuring in outback with his father?

Yes. He was a minor child. No further proof needed.

So children are "forced" to do everything that they do?

In his words ...
Mr. Khadr said. “I have been used too many times when I was a child, and that's why I'm here – taking blame for things I didn't have a choice in doing, but was forced to do by elders.”

http://www.mapleleafweb.com/forums//index.php?showtopic=21596&view=findpost&p=837629

He wasn't talking about his father. His father holds no blame in his eyes. He defends his father. So if this is how Omar felt at the time, as if he were being given no choice by the elders in his life, why didn't his father protect him?

Omar has a lot of conflicting things to say; yet he always defends his father. That he was forced to be with his father is a contradiction to what he himself has said.

Argus · October 3, 2012

Good luck flinging that poo past the SC.

While I agree the SC won't take any interest in reality, the fact is MC was correct in all he wrote.

Argus · October 3, 2012

That works only in the West. Coming of age is a lot different in places like Waziristan. Girls can be married at ages we'd call way too young.

You're flogging a dead horse, Dog.

He was a young kid when brought overseas. The person he was at 15 is the culmination of his experiences over there with a bunch of terrorists and islamist nut jobs, including his father and older brothers.

Argus · October 3, 2012

Khadr was captured on July 27, 2002. His birthdate is September 19, 1986.

Now YOU'RE splitting hairs.

Argus · October 3, 2012

No he doesn't. Which is a bit ridiculous since the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child defines a child as: "every human being below the age of eighteen years unless under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier".

http://www2.ohchr.org/english/law/crc.htm

That\s BS. I don't mean you're wrong, but that definition is BS.

Argus · October 3, 2012

When is majority age attained in Canada, Pakistan, and Afghanistan? Answer: 18 years old.

Maybeso, but I don't regard a 17 year old as a child.

Black Dog · October 3, 2012

Now YOU'RE splitting hairs.

Just correcting an inaccuracy (okay, several).

DogOnPorch · October 4, 2012

You're flogging a dead horse, Dog.

He was a young kid when brought overseas. The person he was at 15 is the culmination of his experiences over there with a bunch of terrorists and islamist nut jobs, including his father and older brothers.

Oddly, Omar's dad started out with the best of intentions.

Signals.Cpl · October 4, 2012

On the contrary, it is well-understood that psychological effects and indoctrination are crucial aspects of the child-soldier phenomenon; that is, we rationally understand that a child under duress and indoctrination cannot be expected to make adult choices.

If I am understanding things correctly, some people on this forum are suggesting a 15 year old cannot make adult choices at all but magically at the age of 18 they suddenly can make "adult" decisions.

Now, if you wish to advocate for allowing all adult rights to fifteen-year-olds (buying and consuming alcohol, the right to vote, the right to make personal choices about getting married, going to school, and on and on) to correspond to their adult responsibilities...then you've got an argument.

So is your position that a 15 year old is too stupid to know the most basic of things? Like the difference between right and wrong. I personally do not think that there is much difference in the way a 15 year old thinks compared to how an 18 year old thinks. Please do tell me at what point in time a person becomes an adult? What day in a persons life is the day when their thinking suddenly changes? How is that a person cannot vote 1 day before they are 18 but suddenly they become capable and responsible when they turn 18? Is there a chemical or biological reaction that only occurs on the birthday?

jacee · October 4, 2012

If I am understanding things correctly, some people on this forum are suggesting a 15 year old cannot make adult choices at all but magically at the age of 18 they suddenly can make "adult" decisions.

So is your position that a 15 year old is too stupid to know the most basic of things? Like the difference between right and wrong. I personally do not think that there is much difference in the way a 15 year old thinks compared to how an 18 year old thinks. Please do tell me at what point in time a person becomes an adult? What day in a persons life is the day when their thinking suddenly changes? How is that a person cannot vote 1 day before they are 18 but suddenly they become capable and responsible when they turn 18? Is there a chemical or biological reaction that only occurs on the birthday?

It's the age of recruitment that defines child soldiers.

Omar was trained in Pakistan and put into combat in Afghanistan at 10 years of age.

I want to say that the age of who's trying to kill you wouldn't be high priority in a combat situation.

But it should have come up later that he was recruited as a young child.

eyeball · October 4, 2012

If I am understanding things correctly, some people on this forum are suggesting a 15 year old cannot make adult choices at all but magically at the age of 18 they suddenly can make "adult" decisions.

I'm sure there's some who can, but I'm not about to punish any who's choices were made for them at a far younger age. I'm going to cut them an enormous amount of slack actually.

Army Guy · October 4, 2012

Still,Omar Khadr’s ongoing legal saga has made history.
- He was the first adolescent charged with war crimes before a U.S. military tribunal since the Second World War.

- Of the 2,000 Americans and (150-plus Canadians) killed in Afghanistan, Mr. Khadr is the only captured enemy to have been charged with murder for a combat death.

The only thing this proves is that it is next to imposiable to prove anything that has happened on a battle field. There are no CSI teams, or investaigation teams that scour the battle field.....it is searched for intel then abandoned to the locals....

_______________________

http://www.talkleft....7/12/2278/68899

The unfairness of the rules will make a person so depressed that he will admit to any allegations or take a plea offer that will satisfy the U.S. government.”

Not sure what your piont is here the first statement says that the rules are so unfair they will will depress you into condessing to anything.....the statement below does not sound like it came from a depressed little boy to me, in fact he does not sound depressed at all....

...I will not willingly let the U.S. government use me to fulfill its goal,” Mr. Khadr said. “I have been used too many times when I was a child, and that's why I'm here – taking blame for things I didn't have a choice in doing, but was forced to do by elders.”

___________

He is still blaming others for his actions, which is BS....yes others did play a role in his life, but nobody , forced him into planting or making IED's or take part in that fire fight....it was all him...not mom, or dad....which will not be held accountable because this is Canada....and we don't have the policitcal will, or balls....So Omar it's all on you....He needs to step up and take responabilty for his actions....