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The first trial to be held at Guantanamo Bay since
Barack Obama became US president and promised to close the facility is
underway.

Canadian detainee Omar Khadr was 15 when he was captured by US troops in Afghanistan in 2002.

He is the youngest detainee at Guantanamo Bay and also the last Western prisoner.

The decision to go ahead with Khadr's trial makes the US the first
nation since World War II to try someone in a military tribunal for acts
they allegedly committed as a minor.

The executive director of the Centre on Law and Security at New York
University, Karen Greenberg, says the defence team will probably argue
that Khadr was coerced.

"Under international law he's a child soldier," he said.

"The idea of the child soldier is that they really are not making the
decisions that they make; that they are coerced into it, or brought up
into it, and that's what they will probably argue."

The United Nations has condemned the trial, saying it could set a dangerous precedent for child soldiers worldwide.

"Juvenile justice standards are clear. Children should not be tried
before military tribunals," The UN's special envoy for children in armed
conflict, Radhika Coomaraswamy, said in a statement.

Khadr is accused of throwing a grenade that killed a US soldier, and
he ... >>>