First of all, yes, I do believe that the Canadian government should update its petition. There should be, as I indicated earlier, a statement at the highest levels of the government, a Canadian petition to support and become proactive in the diplomatic and political engagements in pursuing negotiations toward the elimination of nuclear weapons.
The Canadian government's position, of course, irrespective of who has been in power all through the years, has been to oppose nuclear weapons, but we do this in an ambivalent way, which you hinted at in your question. On the one hand, we supported the year 2000 review of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which declared an unequivocal undertaking of the total elimination of nuclear weapons via a program of 13 steps. Canada, of course, signed on to that. At the same time, we're manifesting support for a continuation of NATO's position, which is to call nuclear weapons essential, the supreme guarantee of security, and to have tactical nuclear weapons stationed in the five European countries that I mentioned. This is absolutely incompatible, incoherent. I believe that the ambivalence in Canadian policy should be cleared up and that now is the time to move ahead.
The chairman made reference earlier to the report that this committee did in 1999, which is an outstanding report. It led to Canada's getting NATO to review its policies. Well, they did review their policies, but they repeated them. Now, I think, there is less opposition within the non-nuclear ranks of NATO to pursue a study that would lead to some reformulation of the strategic concept, which would take nuclear weapons out of the equation and, of course, take them out of Europe. This, I think, is a very important issue for Canada, and it ought to be pursued.