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Former Guantanamo Bay prisoner Omar Khadr leaves court in Edmonton on March 25, 2019.JASON FRANSON/The Canadian Press

Next week, Canada’s infamous convicted war criminal – or child soldier, depending on your view – will take to a podium at Dalhousie University in Halifax and deliver a keynote address. It’s possible he’ll be among the wealthiest people in the room, thanks to a $10.5-million settlement he won from the federal government in 2017.

By the time he finishes his speech – the very act of which many will find offensive – he likely will be treated to a few accolades and a chorus of applause, after which he will return to his life as a property owner, a husband and a completely free man.

To many, the Omar Khadr story represents everything that is utterly wrong with Canada: A confessed war criminal, awarded millions of dollars of taxpayer money, will be welcomed into the bosom of academia where he can exercise the freedom to say whatever he wants. Other countries put terrorists to death; we give them university swag and a round of applause.

But there’s another way to look at his story, and it has little to do with whether one feels Mr. Khadr is genuinely a war criminal or a victim in his own right.

His saga has, after many years, demonstrated Canada’s extraordinary commitment to justice and freedom, which extends itself to all citizens, nearly regardless of circumstance, and is exceptional compared with most countries on Earth. While the system is certainly not perfect, its principles are nevertheless something we too often take for granted, particularly when we’re absorbed in peripheral issues such as whether Google conspired to whitewash Mr. Khadr’s history.

Mr. Khadr’s $10.5-million settlement is often cited as an example of the ultimate perversion of justice – a favourite cudgel with which the Conservative Opposition likes to attack the Liberal government. But in fact, it demonstrates precisely the opposite: that the state cannot arbitrarily deprive a Canadian citizen of his rights, whether he is an innocent bystander, a peaceful protester or accused of throwing a grenade that killed a U.S. soldier.

As we all well know by now, Mr. Khadr’s history is not as straightforward as the political propaganda suggests: that is, one of an unrepentant terrorist who finagled millions of dollars out of a weak Liberal government.

Rather, Mr. Khadr was a 15-year-old soldier under the thumb of a deranged father when he was captured by U.S. forces in Afghanistan and imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay. It was there that Mr. Khadr was subjected to torture, where he confessed to crimes under duress, and where he was betrayed by Canadian officials who were complicit in the violation of his rights, as determined by the Supreme Court of Canada.

It’s fair to argue that from a moral perspective, none of the above absolves Mr. Khadr of his role in the death of Sergeant Christopher Speer (Mr. Khadr has since wavered on whether he indeed threw the grenade, although that’s beside the point). But there is far less room to debate on Canada’s legal obligations to Mr. Khadr as a Canadian citizen who was held in detention abroad.

As the Supreme Court of Canada affirmed in 2008, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms may apply outside of Canada where activities violate Canada’s obligations under international law. The U.S. Supreme Court found that the process of Canadian officials passing information they gleaned from interviews with Mr. Khadr to the United States did indeed violate both U.S. domestic law and international law, which is why the Supreme Court of Canada could find the government in violation of Section 7 of the Charter, even outside of Canada.

Put more directly: Mr. Khadr was interrogated by a Canadian official who knew he was being sleep-deprived, who knew he didn’t have access to counsel and who knew the information collected would be passed on to U.S. prosecutors. All of that together, according to the Supreme Court in 2010, “offends the most basic Canadian standards about the treatment of detained youth suspects.”

Had Mr. Khadr been a citizen of any number of other countries, it’s likely his mistreatment at Guantanamo would have been of no significance. In that sense, it’s his good fortune – very belated good fortune – that he was born in a country where justice matters, and where compensation is possible if and when the state is found in violation of an individual’s rights.

Mr. Khadr’s keynote next week might also invite some protesters and perhaps some hostile coverage, but it is yet another example of the principles of Canadian freedom and justice in action. Indeed, so robust is our commitment to free speech that it protects the rights of those from whom many will be outraged to hear. One doesn’t have to actually like Mr. Khadr, or even sympathize with his plight, to recognize the principles his story exemplifies.

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