{"id":4137,"date":"2008-07-16T14:52:21","date_gmt":"2008-07-16T13:52:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=4137"},"modified":"2008-07-16T14:52:21","modified_gmt":"2008-07-16T13:52:21","slug":"us-soldier-who-deserted-over-iraq-is-deported","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/war-terrorism\/us-soldier-who-deserted-over-iraq-is-deported\/","title":{"rendered":"US soldier who deserted over Iraq is deported"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a name=\"&amp;lid={contentTypeByline}{guardian.co.uk}&amp;lpos={contentTypeByline}{2}\" href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/\"><span style=\"color: #005689;\">guardian.co.uk<\/span><\/a>\u00a0| Canada yesterday deported to the US the first American army deserter fleeing the Iraq war across the US-Canadian border.<\/p>\n<p>Robin Long, 25, faces a possible court martial and jail, and even redeployment to Iraq.<\/p>\n<p>He joined the army in 2003, after the invasion of Iraq, but became troubled by the war.<\/p>\n<p>In 2005 he fled to Canada and applied for refugee status, because the US army wanted him to participate in what he called an &#8220;illegal war of aggression in Iraq.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>On Monday, the Federal court of Canada Justice Anne Mactavish ruled that Long could not provide clear evidence that he would suffer irreparable harm if returned to the US.<\/p>\n<p>The Canada border services agency confirmed Long&#8217;s removal, but declined to give other details, citing privacy laws. Long&#8217;s refugee claim had already been rejected and he could not appeal this latest court ruling.<\/p>\n<p>Some 200 other US soldiers are in Canada, counting on its history of welcoming 50,000 Americans fleeing the Vietnam draft.<\/p>\n<p>Last month, Canada&#8217;s parliament urged the government to allow war resisters to remain.<\/p>\n<p>However, opponents of granting refugee status to deserters argue that, unlike during the Vietnam war, the United States does not now have a military draft and members of its military are volunteers who know the potential risks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>guardian.co.uk\u00a0| Canada yesterday deported to the US the first American army deserter fleeing the Iraq war across the US-Canadian border. Robin Long, 25, faces a possible court martial and jail, and even redeployment to Iraq. He joined the army in 2003, after the invasion of Iraq, but became troubled by the war. In 2005 he [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[38],"class_list":{"0":"post-4137","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-war-terrorism","7":"tag-iraq"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4137"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4137\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}