Now that James Loney is so much in the news for his return from war-torn Iraq, it seems timely to also raise the issue of another man who barely escaped from Iraq with his life. Joshua Key is an American war resistor who fled the United States to seek asylum in Canada with his wife and four children rather than return to the war in Iraq.
Their story is here and here.
Josh and his wife, Brandi, made a big impact on me when I met them last year. The sacrifices they made and the lengths to which they went so that Josh wouldn't have to kill anyone else were great and long. Their courage to stand by each other and for a belief very apparent.
Josh appeared before the Immigration and Refugee Board hearing Thursday and they will deliberate his case over the next few weeks. If they send him back to the United States, he could face a firing squad, long imprisonment or, what he says would be worse than anything, being sent back to kill innocent people in Iraq again.
Privately, Josh told me he would kill himself rather than shoot another woman or child. I believe him. I believe that Josh and Brandi will go back underground in Canada if he is denied refugee status and that the 27 year olds will raise their four children as fugitives until they are caught.
He said there are not really any soldiers in Iraq. There are non-uniformed civilians fighting a guerilla war. Only desperate people trying to hang onto some thread of what they were.
To find out more about the war resistors in Canada, visit their website.