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For nearly seven years, Canadian court rulings over the fate of former Guantanamo Bay detainee Omar Khadr have promptedspeculationover what, if anything, the latest legal wrangling means for relations between Canada and the U.S.

An Edmonton court ruling last week is proving no different.

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Khadr walked out of court in Edmonton last Monday a free man after a hearing that hinged in part on Canada’s prisoner transfer laws and a treaty with the U.S.

During the hearing — the last of Khadr’s attempts to get out from under bail conditions as he awaits a stalled appeal of his convictions by a U.S. military tribunal — lawyers for the federal government cautioned Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench Chief Justice Mary Moreau about altering the 32-year-old’s sentence.

In her March 25 decision, Moreau said she was not “terminating or shortening” Khadr’s sentence, which could breach the 2004 International Transfer of Offenders Act (ITOA) and the 1978 U.S.-Canada prisoner exchange treaty.