LETTERS...WE GET LETTERS

Rights groups will adopt U.S. war dodger (Colin Perkel, Canadian Press, May 22nd, 2005)

Prominent human-rights group Amnesty International has declared that it will adopt a young American war dodger as a "prisoner of conscience" if Canada deports him to the United States and he ends up in jail.

Amnesty says it considers Jeremy Hinzman a legitimate conscientious objector to the war in Iraq, even though Canadian immigration authorities have decided otherwise.

Hinzman, 26, fled to Canada in search of asylum just days before his Airborne Division unit was deployed to Iraq to fight in a war he considered illegal under international law, one in which he feared he would be forced to commit atrocities.

His refugee claim was rejected in March by the Immigration and Refugee Board, and now Hinzman, who has filed a Federal Court challenge to the ruling in hopes of staving off deportation, faces a court-martial in the U.S. and up to five years in jail.

"Accordingly, should he be imprisoned upon his return to the United States, Amnesty International would consider him to be a prisoner of conscience," the group said in a statement.

The designation is important, at least symbolically, because it will raise awareness of the issue and put public pressure on American authorities, said Gloria Nafziger, a refugee co-ordinator with Amnesty's Canadian section.

"People would write letters to the U.S. government asking that he be released and stating their objection to his imprisonment," Nafziger said.

Perhaps the government could write back and say it is the tens of thousands of U.S. soldiers who dream of coming home but do the duty they took an oath to do who are the real prisoners of conscience.