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LEGAL UPDATE
Hinzman can remain in Canada while his lawyer appeals the board's decision. Hinzman was not allowed to offer evidence of illegal conduct by the US military in Iraq and Afghanistan at the hearing on his refugee claim. It is unclear how this ruling will affect the status of several dozen other US deserters who are currently seeking exile status in Canada. Iraq war resisters have won broad political support among many Canadians which could, possibly, prompt a change in Canada's immigration policies. |
Purple
Heart Winner Flees to Canada LEXINGTON, Ky. (Feb. 1) - Rather than face another tour of
duty in Iraq, a Lexington soldier who won a purple heart after
he was wounded by a roadside bomb has deserted to Canada. When Anderson's holiday leave in Lexington ended three weeks ago, he didn't return to his Army unit, the 1st Armored Division in Germany. Instead, he fled to Canada, where he is hoping the Canadian government will provide refuge for him and a small number of U.S. military deserters who want to avoid the war. "I started to think ... what's it really for? I was willing to die for my country. I thought I was going over there to defend my country. But that's not what I was doing," Anderson said by telephone from Toronto Monday. The Army could not confirm if Anderson has been classified as a deserter. A spokeswoman said a soldier must be absent without leave for 30 consecutive days to be considered a deserter. A spokesman for the 1st Armored Division in Germany did not return a call seeking comment. When Anderson came home from Iraq last July, Anita Anderson said her son seemed fine, but was deeply changed when he returned home on leave again at Christmas. "He paced the floor constantly, never once slept through the night," Anita Anderson said of her son. "He would get up in the middle of the night and go out walking. He was having nightmares; he was depressed; he couldn't even watch a movie." Anderson might be allowed to stay in Canada, but never be able to return home again to see his parents or his 4-year-old daughter without risking arrest. His daughter now lives with her mother. Anderson joined the U.S. Army in January 2003 to get money for college and to serve his country. He went to Iraq a year later with the Army's 1st Armored Division. Over the next seven months, mostly in Baghdad, he was in the thick of the fight against insurgents. An incident last April changed his views concerning the fighting. Anderson was with a group of soldiers helping to defend an Iraqi police station that was under fire. Suddenly, a car swerved into the area, refusing to stop. Soldiers are expected to open fire when that happens where any stranger is a potential enemy and any vehicle might contain a bomb. But Anderson never pulled the trigger of his M-16. "This car kept coming, and the other guys were yelling, 'Why don't you shoot, why don't you shoot?' But I felt the car posed no threat. Then, the window of the car rolled down, and it was just an Iraqi family," Anderson said. "I said, 'Look it's just innocent people.' But they kept telling me, 'The next time, you open fire. We don't care."' A few days later Anderson was wounded by a roadside bomb. He received the Purple Heart. But he says the incident at the police station, not his wounds, convinced him that the war was wrong. He said he felt he was being forced to possibly gun down innocent Iraqis. "There are no weapons of mass destruction. Innocent people are being killed every day. It's a war about money -- to keep money in rich people's pockets. There is no way I can believe in that. I still believe in my country, but I can no longer be a part of the Army or that war," Anderson said. An spokeswoman said the military counts desertions by fiscal year. There have been 2,594 desertions since October of 2003, said Lt. Col. Pamela Hart. The military reported 3,680 desertions in fiscal year 2003, from October 2002 - before the Iraq war began - to the end of September 2003. Anderson is one of about a dozen or so who have fled to Canada and sought the assistance of Toronto attorney Jeffry House, who is representing them. House, a Vietnam draft dodger, is hoping to persuade Canadian officials to let them stay. |
Canada's Immigration and Refugee Board announced
on March 25 that it had denied Army deserter Jeremy Hintzman's
claim for refugee status on grounds that he would face unlawful
persecution if he was required to return to the US military.
Its ruling specifically found that Hinzman "would be afforded
the full protection of a fair and independent military and civilian
process in the U.S."