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| Sunday, 11 April 2004 |
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Mother, son of al-Qaeda-linked family arrive in Canada TORONTO, Saturday (AFP) Two members of a Canadian family who once lived in a compound run by Osama bin Laden and are accused of links to al-Qaeda, arrived in Toronto on Friday from Pakistan. Maha Elsamnah Khadr and her son Karim, 14, travelled to Canada on emergency passports so the boy, who was paralysed in a shootout with Pakistani troops, could have medical treatment. Another son, Abdurahman Khadr has admitted on Canadian television that the family knew bin Laden and that he and some of his siblings took part in al-Qaeda terror training camps in Afghanistan. Mahah Khadr took refuge from a media throng at the airport behind a white veil, while her son was taken through the terminal in a wheelchair. "I have no connections to al-Qaeda," she said before hurrying into a waiting car. Karim's father, Ahmed Said Khadr, a suspected al-Qaeda leader and Egyptian-born Canadian, was killed in the gunbattle with Pakistani troops. Abdurahman Khadr, who lives in Toronto, has been fighting to bring his brother and mother, who are both Canadian citizens, here, though his campaign has sparked some opposition from opposition politicians. Abdurahman Khadr was taken prisoner in Kabul in November 2001 as US forces hunted Taliban and al-Qaeda holdouts, months after the September 11 attacks. He said in an interview with CBC last month that worked as a CIA agent, spying on inmates at the US internment camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. He also admitted he was sent to Afghanistan by his father to become a member of al-Qaeda. "I was raised to become a suicide bomber. I was raised to become a bad person," he said. At one time, around 1996, the Khadr family lived in a large compound in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, where Abdurahman met bin Laden for the first time, he said. Another Khadr son, Omar, accused of killing a US soldier, is in jail at Guantanamo Bay. |
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