Wife of Canadian 9/11 victim visits Guantanamo to look ‘evil’ killer ‘straight in the eye’

Ken Basnicki was meeting colleagues on the 106th floor of the North Tower of the World Trade Centre when al-Qaeda terrorists rammed a hijacked plane into the building on Sept. 11, 2001. Twelve years later, his wife Maureen, a former Air Canada flight attendant and now an outspoken activist for the rights of Canadian terror victims, visited the U.S. Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay this week to observe court proceedings against accused 9/11 planner Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, a.k.a. KSM, and four others, including Ramzi Binalshibh, a would-be hijacker who was refused a U.S. visa and instead allegedly helped coordinate the attacks from Germany. In an interview from Guantanamo, Ms. Basnicki told the National Post’s Stewart Bell what it was like to sit in the same room as those suspected of murdering her husband for their fanatical cause.

Q. Why did you want to go? 

A. I had an overwhelming desire to see things and judge for myself. I wanted to try to understand why these five men were so full of hate for innocent civilians that they were capable of killing so many people going about their daily life. I wanted to be a representative of another country other than America, because I’m constantly trying to remind both Americans and Canadians that it’s not just all about Americans. There were citizens from 92 countries that lost their lives that day.

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