Home > US soldiers seek asylum in Canada
Two US soldiers pleading for asylum in Canada after walking out on their units over fierce objections to the Iraq war have appeared in a Toronto courtroom.
Jeremy Hinzman, 25, attended a technical pre-hearing at Canada’s Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) in Toronto on Wednesday, supported by another fugitive American soldier Brandon Hughey.
The IRB set a refugee status hearing for 20, 21 and 22 October for Hinzman, said board spokesman Charles Hawkins.
No court date has yet been set for Hughey, whose case was not heard on Wednesday. No testimony was taken at the hearing, a legal formality to map out the parameters of the case.
The controversy surrounding the two men has ignited controversy in the United States, and sympathy in Canada, especially among those who opposed the Iraq war.
Vietnam reflected
It has also revived memories of the "underground railroad" of activists which transported hundreds of US objectors to the country during the Vietnam war.
Hinzman, who like Hughey has a website to publicise his case, recently spoke at an anti-war rally at the US consulate in Toronto.
He served in Afghanistan with the 82nd Airborne but left the United States for Canada with his wife and son after learning the US army planned to send him to Iraq.
Military brass denied his request for conscientious objector status, prompting his asylum claim in Canada in January.
Prosecution and persecution
Both men argue they face prosecution tantamount to persecution in the US because of their strong political beliefs and should therefore be granted haven in Canada.
Hughey, 19, of the US Army 1st Cavalry Division, fled to Canada one day before his unit was deployed to Iraq. He said if he is returned home he will face jail and a dishonourable discharge from the armed forces.
He said on Wednesday that he was optimistic that Canada would permit him to stay.
"The essential key to the case is to prove that the war in Iraq is illegal under international law and represents a violation of human rights," he said.
War legality questioned
Hughey argued that as a US soldier, he was not bound to serve in Iraq as the war was "illegal" as it involved the invasion of a sovereign nation without the full backing of the United Nations.
He is currently living in St Catharines, southwest of Toronto, not far from the Niagara Falls region and the US border, and is hoping soon to get the legal go-ahead to work for a living.
A lawyer for the two men, Jeffry House said that though the IRB operates at arm’s length from the Canadian government, the case did have significant political overtones.
"I think there is an irreducible political component to the case," he said.
Canada refused US entreaties to send troops to join US President George Bush’s "coalition of the willing" in Iraq - a move that soured relations with its powerful southern neighbour.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/82045E8A-05AD-42FF-929A-A58740173248.htm
Forum posts
15 July 2004, 23:49
Friends,
These two young men and the wife of one, represent the best spirit of the Uniited States.
It is important to understand that the vast majority of Americans who abet in these crimes honestly believe that they are defending their country and advancing the cause of liberty in Iraq; this despite all empirical evidence to the contrary:
1. That there never was a more serious military threat to the US from Iraq than, say Liechtenstein or San Marino was well known PRIOR TO THE INVASION and PRIOR TO THE SENATE VOTE. This was verified to the administration well before they gave solemn promises to the contrary. They lied, and the lies were intentional and perverse.
2. That Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11/01 was also equally well known, though top officers of our administration continue to spread these lies. Indeed, while in all likelihood, Saddam and his coterie probably hated US leaders, they were survivors and probably would have halted this attack by forces that were also their sworn enemies if they could have.
3. Saddam did indeed lead a regime engaged in brutality. He was recruited as a young kid and trained as an assassin by official US agents and trained as an assassin to kill then President Kassem. The attack failed. Saddam, wounded, swam across a river to escape, was evacuated and further trained. His rise in the Baath, his accession to power and his brutality were supported by right wing elements of the US ’intelligence community’.
4. The Halabja massacre of the Kurdish civilians was ’proven’ at the time by our CIA to have been the work of the Persians; the line changed when Saddam became a convenient patsy. I don’t know who did it, but in either case they used chemical intermediates and technology supplied by the US (Israeli journalists exposed this over a decade ago). Donald Rumsfeld was in Baghdad at that very time reopening relations and encouraging the regime.
5. The long string of dictators, each more brutal than the last, whom US agents have foisted on the Iraqis is now to be added to with Allawi, a former US oil executive, Baathist, and CIA operative best known for such anti-terrorist and democratic actions as his organization bombing a crowded movie theater, and his assisting the turn-over of Iraqi national assets to Bush-crony corporations.
Those who dispute these well-documented empirical assertions, should support a truly independent international court investigation with powers to suppoena US and other officials and require testimony under oath. Meanwhile, even those in the military who are not honorable pacifists, who believe in some ’just war’ concepts, are morally required to refuse to abet further in the crime of illegal invasion and occupation — like the Heroes of Israel, the thousands of soldiers who refuse to force an occupation regime on the Palestinians while remaining in the military in the belief that they may be needed to defend their country against an actual attack.
These two boys must be supported in their heroic effort to save our country’s honor; all nations should welcome the thousands who hopefully will follow in their footsteps!
Zev Aelony, Minneapolis, MN USA