Foreign Affairs Committee on May 31st, 2007

[Paul Meyer]

The key thing on matters relating to nuclear weapons and fissile material is that those states that possess these arms and material are all willing to participate in a negotiation toward some restriction. You can understand the lack of attraction if you had countries saying it would be fine if the rest agree to stop production but they would not participate in that negotiation. It's getting that formula whereby those countries are going to feel they have a stake in it and will participate. That is the challenge. In some cases it is very hard to read all the factors that may determine why a given state has taken the diplomatic posture it has. China is a case in point.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

In terms of Canada's role in technology transfer, maybe it's not the term you use, but on the idea of dual use and the fact that we have significant technology that we transfer to countries, do we have enough tools in our tool kit to track that? I mean that in terms of the technology of tracking, but also in terms of the governance model. I'm thinking, for instance, of arrangements with India and our looking at transferring our nuclear technology.

I'm not doing this in the political sense at all; it's a very straightforward question. Do we have enough in our governance and technological tool kits to actually track materials to ensure they are not going to be used for something else?

[Paul Meyer]

Broadly we do, but there's obviously room for improvement. I think it's happening at the two levels. It's what we do nationally in terms of export controls and ensuring that they continue to be comprehensive.

A few years back some changes were made that allowed catch-all provisions to enable us to be more effective in enforcing controls. But we're in a very interdependent world and we have to cooperate in the multilateral area. Canada has been a member of the Nuclear Suppliers Group there, and that group is mostly about ensuring that there are guidelines to prevent transfer of nuclear technology to states that haven't submitted themselves to the IAEA safeguards regime. That cooperation continues to be perfected--the exchange of information, etc.

I think we have a pretty satisfactory approach, while recognizing that you have to be constantly vigilant and searching for improvements.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Would you say there's more to be done in that area?

[Paul Meyer]

There's always room for improvement, but the basis is very solid.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you to our witness, Ambassador Meyer, for being with us today.

To the committee, we are going to move across the hall because our witness is not here yet. We're going to do some committee business first and then we will do the Haiti study with the individual who is coming before our committee.

Thank you again, Mr. Meyer.

Thank you to all.

We are adjourned.