The federal government has formally apologized to former Guantanamo Bay inmate Omar Khadr for any role Canadian officials may have played in his mistreatment while in U.S. military custody.
The apology, delivered in a terse statement from Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale and Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland, follows reports of a controversial $10.5-million settlement to a long-standing lawsuit over violations of Khadr's charter rights.
A source familiar with the arrangement says Khadr has already been paid, and that the payment was made in order to avoid efforts to enforce a massive U.S. court award against Khadr in Canadian court.
That challenge is coming from the widow of an American special forces soldier, Chris Speer, whom Khadr is alleged to have killed after a fierce firefight and bombardment by U.S. troops at a compound in Afghanistan in July 2002, and another U.S. soldier, Layne Morris, who was blinded in one eye in the same battle.
Khadr, now 30, has long claimed to have been tortured after American forces captured him, badly wounded, in the rubble of the bombarded compound.
He said he confessed only to be allowed to leave Guantanamo and return to Canada, because even an acquittal would not have guaranteed his freedom.
Supporters have also long insisted he should have been treated as a child soldier, since he was just 15 years old at the time of the battle.