Standing up for Canada
Peter McKay is supposed to be hobnobbing with Condi Rice this weekend - do you think this family's case is likely to come up? Or will he be too busy trying to get to first base?

Canadian boy caught in Texas detention

Aircraft's chance landing in U.S. calamitous event for 9-year-old, his Iranian parents

Feb 16, 2007 04:30 AM

Michelle Shephard
Rick Westhead
Toronto Star Staff Reporters

A 9-year-old Canadian boy is in a Texas detention centre after his flight to Toronto made an unscheduled stop and U.S. officials detained his family.

Now the boy's Iranian parents are pleading with Canadian officials to help secure the family's release from the immigration holding facility, which has come under fire for allegedly detaining children in sub-standard conditions.

"All the time he is asking me, `Why am I wearing the uniform? Why I am here?'" the boy's mother said, as she sobbed during a telephone interview from the detention facility yesterday.

"We didn't do nothing. My child is innocent."

The parents, who have no status in Canada, asked that their names not be published out of fear of eventually being returned to Iran, where they say they were previously imprisoned and suffered physical and sexual abuse.