Growing up Al Queda

Abdurahman Khadr explains his life.




Yesterday I took a look a the case of Omar Khadr;
the insuing coversation turned to his family. There some coversation about how complicated the entire thing was, and who did what when. 


Dtffs, a Florida Today reader who tries to make sure I stay honest, wisely put it this way;  "What a family! The story on older brother Abdurahman Khadr is murky. I read wiki twice and slowly. Was he "detained" or was he working for the CIA?"  "I think I'll wait for the movie version. Nothing at all simple about this one."


Dtffs is right there is nothing simple about this family.  At one time or another all three of of Ahmed Said Khadr's sons have been held on terrorism charges. 
Omar Khadr is now on trial at the Guantanamo  Detention Center,
charged with Murder and War Crimes he allegedly committed when he was fourteen.  This marks the first time since WWII a minor has stood trial for that charge..






The senior Khadr was killed on October 1993 in a raid by the Pakistani Army on a safe house in  South Waziristan, his son Abdulkareem  was shot in the spine and paralyzed from the waist down in the same raid. 

So what's it like being part of a family that moved to Canada to become citizens and then returned to Afghanistan and later flees to the hills... of Pakistan.

Here are some of the highlights from three interviews with Abdurahman conducted by correspondent Terence McKenna in January 2004



 
Just tell me a bit about what kind of man your father was, your memories of him growing up and what your relationship was like with him.

My father was the normal person that was studying in Canada and all. … And someone somewhere told him something about Islam and that what he was doing, which is living as a normal Muslim in Canada and feeding his family, was not good enough for Islam. … [That] made him think himself over and what he wanted to do with his life.

That's when I think he met someone at HCI [Human Concern International] and they got together and they decided he was a good person to go [to Afghanistan]. He volunteered or something. He went to Afghanistan. He started working. He was very committed to relief work, my father. He met lots of people. He raised a lot of funds. And he started working and doing projects


So what was your first impression of Osama bin Laden?


After the '95 Egyptian bombing in Islamabad, my father was arrested and there was the whole media thing that came out and the Canadian prime minister came to Pakistan and my mother and my brothers got to meet him.

Anyway, after my father was released, he came back to Canada. And when we were coming back from Canada, you know, I was looking through a magazine. I saw [bin Laden's] picture. And next thing I know, we're in Pakistan. My father's telling us we're going to a place and we're going to meet this person


How well did you get to know his family and his children?

His sons, again, they're normal children that, you know, want more. They love horses and their father had promised them that he would get them a horse if they memorized the Quran. So they were so anxious to finish memorizing it so they could get a horse, which shows you that they're normal children, too


Osama didn't want any American products around?

He was against any American products and I can tell you this. He was against using ice and he actually forbidded [sic] it on the people that lived around him. Anyhow the people smuggled it in but he had forbidded it.


How would you characterize the relationship between your father and Osama?


Between my father and Osama, I could say they're friends. They're old friends. My father is one of those really old people. It's like buddies, you know, you're having buddies from your school and stuff. So they're old friends. My father really respects Osama and Osama really respects my father.


How do you feel now about the choices your father made?


My father was a normal person and we should all understand that he was a normal person. When he went to Pakistan, he was with good intentions. He went to Pakistan to help the orphans. And he always had that part of him that was always working with orphans. Now that doesn't mean what else he does should be forgiven because he was helping orphans. But he was, you know, he went from Canada with good intentions.


Let's start from Sept. 11. Where were you? What do you recall? What went through your mind?


Well, that day I was in Jalalabad with my father. My father had left to go to Al Qaeda compound up north a little bit of Jalalabad. I was sitting at the office listening to the radio and I was looking for some music or something on the VOA, which is the Voice of America. And it came on, you know, when they started talking about it, I couldn't understand what's happening. I thought it was some kind of commercial or something, something was wrong. I couldn't understand it. You know, maybe I heard it but it didn't register. A little later, my father came back, an hour or two later, and he told me, you know, what happened. … It didn't register.

The next day we left [for] Kabul. When we left [for] Kabul we got to see on TV in Kabul. That's when instability period started in Kabul for all the Arabs that were living there and lots of Afghans, too. They were, you know, moving out of Kabul. So we started moving our stuff out of Kabul, too



Why did you come back [to Kabul] from Logar?

Because, first thing, I am a kid that likes to watch movies. I want the nightlife. In Logar there's no electricity,


Tell me where your mind was at.


My mind was always, the whole period that I was living with my family in Pakistan and Afghanistan, it was -- I wasn't comfortable with that living. I don't know why. It was just that I didn't get along very with the people that I was living with, which were Al Qaedas and you know, the Arabs that lived in Afghanistan. I was just not comfortable with those people. So twice I tried to run away from that life, from my family and to get back into Canada. But twice, these two times I tried they failed



[Editor's Note: Over the course of the next six weeks, Abdurahman says he was arrested and released several times. Finally, he is arrested again and put in an Afghan prison, where he is interrogated by Canadian and American officials.]


Why would the British come and see you?


Well this is after I was put in jail, you know. … I don't know, they told me, "Well there's no Canadian embassy so we are responsible for any Canadians here in Kabul under detention." …

Then they moved us from that jail to another jail which was the Afghani intelligence jails. There is a lot of them but the third intelligence directorate jail. They kept us there and that's where the Americans first interrogated me and then Canadians, the RCMP. They kept me there for a month and a half and then they moved us from there … to another jail.

The other jail is the second directorate jail. They kept us there for a month and a half and then they moved me into a house. Of course, while in the third directorate's jailhouse, when the Americans started interrogating me, that's when I realized that there is no way out of this except to, like, you know, tell them, you know, okay I'll cooperate with them because this is this was their only way. They said, you know, "You work with us or, you know what? We can keep you here, we can take you to Cuba, we can do anything with you. Right now, no one in the world cares about this." …



Why were you so willing to cooperate with them?
 
After all that had happened, you know, Sept. 11 and all, after we were put away in jail and stuff, I started registering stuff more as a normal person. Well, actually not a normal person -- a person totally against Al Qaeda. My mentality changed from an anti-American, anti-Northern Alliance to an anti-Al Qaeda in that period, in the period I got to jail. …


The training camps


Tell me a bit more about that in terms of the detail you gave them.

Okay, the first time I went to training I was 11-and-a-half years old. … My brother was 12 and we went to Khalden. We took the first course, which is the assault rifles course. We stayed in the course for two months and then we went back to Pakistan.

And then since like, I could say since '92 until 2003 I've been to Khalden like five times. I took an assault rifle course, explosive-making course, snipers, pistols, and … a course that includes all of these.


How did you like this camp experience?

Well again this comes back to the part where I was always the rebel. I got the most punishments in these camps. I am famous in these camps. If you ask anyone he'll know me. Anybody that seen me or didn't see me in the camps. I was always trouble. You know, not doing my homework, you know, running off, speaking to the Afghans. Being given punishment and not finishing off the punishment, you know. So I always had that rebelliousness in me. That was trouble for them because everybody in these camps are very strict. They're military camps you know. They didn't like me but because of my father they kept me.

What is your memory of the night President Clinton sent cruise missiles to attack the training camp after the African embassy bombings?

I noticed something in the sky. There was something that was like lightning and you know, flashing. So I just watched it and there was like, there was like three, four camps around the area. I was in Al Farooq, which was like second to the Americans, to hit it second. Jihad Wel was the one they thought Osama was in, so they started bombing it. They started bombing it, right away I ducked and I stayed on the floor, on the ground. And then they just started, you know, hitting all the camps and they hit our camp too. And you know, there were just explosives going around everywhere


In terms of the religious training that you got in Al Qaeda camps or around your father, how [did] they regard non-believers and the duty to fight and jihad?


In Islam, there is a saying by the prophet that there will always be a group of Muslims, very little, but these are going to be the group of Allah. These group are always going to fight for Islam. There's always going to be this group. They're going to be very little, very disgraced by people, everybody [will] try to kill them. But if you are with this group, this is the group that will go straight to [paradise]. This is the right group, if you're around that time, try to get to that group.


Did your father ever tell you, if you threaten this family or if you threaten this organization, you'll have to die?

My father always considered me the cancer in their body, and that's why he kicked me out of the house more than once. He said "you are like the cancer in this house. And I have to cut you out right now or you're going to infect the rest of the family." He always referred to me like this. This is what I told the people I worked with in the CIA too


Would you argue about [Al Qaeda attacks] with your father?


Oh yeah, I argued about it, about this and about Sept. 11. We talked about it a lot. So when I saw the video [of the Sept. 11 attacks], I was like looking at it and all and everybody was smiling, laughing. I was just looking at it, you know


Working for the CIA



Tell us about your first contact with the CIA.

The first contact with the CIA … it was the meeting where, you know, they started asking me questions. They told me that we know you've been talking to the British and you were very cooperative. And can you help us in this place, can you help us in that? I said well I've already told this to the British. I'll help you anyway. I just want to get out. …

What kind of information were you providing? What were you telling them about? …

When I was in the safe house, there was this tour. They called it Abdurahman tour. It was famous for that. I took like the people from the CIA, the FBI, the military. We'd go around in a car in Kabul and show them the houses of Al Qaeda people, the guesthouses, the safe houses, where houses were, you know. This was the guesthouse they used before, this was the guesthouse they used later. This is the safe house they used after Sept. 11, you know. Just show them the houses. So there was that tour. And otherwise, I just told them what I knew. …

 
Tell me about the agreement you signed with the CIA.

This was in July. I remember because it was July 4, right around that time. They brought me a paper, they had me sign it. … They said $5,000 bonus for you being very cooperative, and from now on just by, you know, working with us, just answering our questions, you get paid $3,000 a month, until you stop working for us. The paper said I would get paid until someone found out about this. Now the account was under my name. It was a CIA account somewhere. I don't know where. But the money went to my account. And whenever I want my money I can ask for it.


Guantanamo



Now when this idea came up of you going to Guantanamo, what did they tell you your mission would be in Guantanamo?

Well, it would be to spend time with people, you know, put [me] next to people that are not talking. Tell us about them, talk to them, find what they know and tell us what they know, you know. So just find information from people. …


Tell us about your trip to Guantanamo.

One day they brought me, they tied me up, they covered my face and everything. Locked my hands, my legs, my face, covered it up, put me in a car and we drove and drove and drove and they told me you're in Bagram now and they opened the door, they got me out of the car and they just dropped me on the ground.




But after 10 days [in Bagram] -- I mean, what must have been going through your mind at that point in time?

The worst part of these 10 days is the flight. Since they took us out from our rooms, washed us up and put us on the ground. There was points, you know, I just … in my heart I wished to God that one of these MPs would go crazy and then shoot me. Just get up and shoot me. I was so depressed. I was so sick of anything. You lose hope sometimes of everything, you know. You go to Allah, you just try everything around you and then you lose hope of everything. … I just wished for a bullet. … I was like, please God, do something but just take away my life, you know. It was a horrible experience. …



What's your impression of Guantanamo? Do a lot of people belong there? What's your impression of the inmates??

They asked me always this question. I told them in 100 percent there is 80 percent of people that went to Afghanistan, like people that can't do anything. They've had enough. If you put them back in their countries they won't do anything. That's in 80 percent.

Among those 80 percent there is almost 60 in those 80, 60 that are people that haven't done anything. People that worked in a project in Pakistan, an old man that his son brought him, you know, just to sell him for $5,000. Drug dealers, people that didn't have anything to do with Al Qaeda were put there for no reason but because someone brought them there or someone thought of getting thousands for them, whoever captured them that they were Al Qaeda.

 
If the Americans were paying large bounties, a large amount of money they would have ended up with a lot of innocent people there, don't you think?

Yes, a lot of innocent people. I told you the one story, I remember two, actually. One is the father that was brought by his own son. The son gave him a gun and took him up to an American base up there and took $5,000 for him. That's one story.

The second story is a drug user, a person that was sitting next to me, not worried about being in jail, not worried about what's going to happen to his family, not worried about what he's going to get. All he's worried about every time he asks the MPs to come around, asking them for a smoke, asking them for some hashish for you know, for marijuana, something like that, you know. Not even, he doesn't even know what he's doing here. Truly a drug addict, not Al Qaeda at all. …


As I said earlier these are just a few of the high lights of   Abdurahman Khadr's life, I skipped over quite a few questions and answers.  And I stopped at the time the CIA decided they needed him in Bosnia... I'll pick up the story  there tomorrow, this is enough for most Blog Readers fpr one night..  If it's not enough you can read the entire story now at  http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/khadr/interviews/khadr.html