GUANTANAMO BAY, Cuba, July 12 (UPI) -- A Canadian on trial at a military commission in Guantanamo Bay told the court Monday he was boycotting the rest of the proceedings.
Canadian-born Omar Khadr, 23, allegedly has admitted to the FBI he threw a grenade that injured a U.S. soldier in 2002 in Afghanistan. He was 15 when he was first detained.
Khadr during his Monday appearance before the court told the judge he would like to defend himself, describing the military commission as a "sham," Canada's Globe and Mail newspaper reports.
Tribunal judge U.S. Army Col. Patrick Parrish refused his request and Khadr said he would boycott the rest of the proceedings, the newspaper adds.
Khadr protested the trial before the judge and said he would refuse any plea deal that would improve the image of the United States.
"I will not let the U.S. government use me to fulfill its goals -- I have been used too many times as a child," he was quoted as saying. "How can I ask for justice from a process that does not have it or offer it?"
The United Nations, which called for Khadr's release in May, said he has been in U.S. custody for the last seven years, spending much of the time in solitary confinement at the naval detention facility in Guantanamo Bay.
