Thank you, Chair, and my thanks to our guests.
Here at committee, in the media, and in reports coming from Sri Lanka, we've been hearing that this is a war of attrition: wipe out the Tigers and then we'll carry on from there. Some concerns have been put forward about the Tigers. There's also profound concern within the international community and Canada that people are sitting back and waiting for this to be over, and that all we can do is wait till the government, through its army, has wiped out the other side. This is not exactly a rosy picture. It's a picture that has been painted time and again for us at committee.
There have been a couple of ideas—and I'll start with Mr. Sévigny—about Canada's role. One is that Canada should state it's unequivocal concern about they army's use of violence, notwithstanding its right to deal with the insurgency, as it sees it. The concern is that the tactics being used are creating an IDP problem, and we just don't know what's going on. Some 23,000 people left the northeast region in March, and we're hearing 33,000 for the month of February.
Should Canada send one of its government representatives, say, a minister, to Sri Lanka, to clarify our concerns? With respect to aid, we've sent some money, and I'm sure it's welcome, to the extent that you can get it through. But what other forms of aid should we be sending, and how much?
Mr. Sévigny.