Foreign Affairs Committee on June 21st, 2006

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

[Inaudible--Editor]

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Okay, we'll have to go through the procedure, then, to amend the motion.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Is the intent of the motion the same?

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Yes, it's just wordsmithing.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Let's hear the motion and the amended motion.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

The first motion is on the Congo:

That the Committee recommends that the government ask its representatives at the United Nations to double the number of peacekeepers for the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) and to double the amount of funding for aid operations in Eastern Congo as soon as possible.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

You've heard the motion as submitted.

Now let's hear an amended motion.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

An amended motion is:

That the Committee recommends that the government recognize the severity of the humanitarian crisis in Congo and ask its representatives at the United Nations to press for a significant increase in the number of peacekeepers for the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) and to double the amount of Canadian funding for aid operations in Eastern Congo as soon as possible.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

That motion does not reflect entirely the intent of the original motion. The original motion speaks wholly of funding and aid operations, but does not talk at all about peacekeeping--

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

It does. It talks about doubling the number of peacekeepers.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Okay, then I'm sorry. I think that motion is in order.

Keith, do you have a copy of the amendment?

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

May I speak to the rationale behind this for a moment? I assume we're not in camera right now.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

No, we aren't.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

The Congo is arguably the worst humanitarian crisis in the world right now. In fact, every single day the equivalent of more than three jumbo jets full of people are dying. More than 30,000 people a month are dying in eastern Congo from a variety of preventable problems.

Most international observers on the ground, including those who are part of the UN peacekeeping operations on the ground, are beside themselves because there aren't enough UN peacekeepers on the ground. Secondly, because eastern Congo is one of the most forgotten humanitarian crises in the world, thousands and thousands of people are dying every single month of entirely preventable diseases and problems, from malnutrition to very simple medical problems that can be treated in simple ways, but they're dying as a result of it.

No one in the world is actually standing up and fighting to bring this to the forefront, to use the multilateral organizations to make the very modest but significant intervention into the Congo that will save an enormous number of innocent civilian lives. That's what we're talking about, civilian lives.

I think we as a committee can put this forward, as a very constructive motion, to try to convince our government that this is something they could do in a very constructive way that will save a large number of people's lives. It's entirely consistent with comments by the Prime Minister on improving aid effectiveness and his comments earlier this year, during the remembrances of the holocaust, that he would not stand by and allow catastrophes like this to continue to occur.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Mr. Obhrai.

[Deepak Obhrai, Conservative, Calgary East, AB]

The intent of the motion in which the member is bringing attention to the crisis in Congo is quite right, and the government is quite right that there is an appalling toll and great suffering in Congo. Congo is one of those countries that has had a terrible state of dictatorship for a long time, with no government and everything. So we continue to strongly deplore the violence, and we are very heavily engaged in Congo.

But the problem with the motion for the government is that the international community is already engaged in trying to bring peace there. There's a three-year transitional peace plan that the whole international community agreed on. It is now working to ensure that the new government will gradually have stability and will move as quickly as possible to control the whole region. There's no question that there are areas--and eastern Congo is one of them--where there is still a need for the government to assert control. In our view, that's the best way to go.

On the second problem, at this time the UN peacekeeping force is the largest ever deployed in Congo. So the UN, with the international community, has put a tremendous amount of resources into Congo. As a matter of fact, they've got 16,700 military personnel and 475 police over there. Therefore, we are working with the other partners to ensure that peace is very quickly brought to Congo and the killing is stopped. I think we are seeing a tremendous amount of progress, despite the fact that some areas have not.

We have also allocated a huge sum of money. We recognize the crisis faced in DRC. We are committed over there, and Canada's total amount is now $29 million. We can all say at any given time that this is less, this is less, and that is more, but taking into account the concentrated effort by the United Nations, by the international community, the government feels there is still an opportunity to go ahead and support that.

So at this stage it's a little difficult to support so much commitment by the government when so much killing is still going on. Everybody is working well together to ensure that peace is quickly returned to Congo. We can all argue it hasn't been done yet, but there's a three-year plan and we need to give it a chance. We're heavily committed there; I'm not saying we're not. But it's very difficult for the government to immediately come out and say to increase the UN forces--and more money. There is step-by-step process going on.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

How many peacekeepers do we have on the UN mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo? Do we know that?

[Deepak Obhrai, Conservative, Calgary East, AB]

The total authorized strength by the United Nations there is 16,700 personnel and 475 police. On October 28, 2005, a temporary increase of 300 military personnel was also authorized by the United Nations. A Security Council resolution on April 10, 2006, authorized the Secretary General to temporarily redeploy an additional one battalion, a military hospital, and up to 650 military observers from the UN mission in Burundi to Congo. Moreover, the UN mandated a European Union force of 2,000 troops to go into Congo. So there is a huge number of personnel out there.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

I was talking about Canadian peacekeepers. Are there any and, if so, how many are there?

[Deepak Obhrai, Conservative, Calgary East, AB]

The Canadians are part and parcel—

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

The peacekeeping contribution is protected through the financial commitments through the UN and that $50 million contribution in the last fiscal year just completed. So if you do that $50 million plus the $29 million, that's $79 million. There are reasons why Canada doesn't—

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Mr. Van Loan, that's not what I asked, and the question wasn't for you. I put the question to Mr. Obhrai. I simply asked him how many Canadian peacekeepers there were. Then I may have another question to ask.

[Deepak Obhrai, Conservative, Calgary East, AB]

We are there under the UN mandate. This is what the UN has requested and the UN has committed, and that's what we've done. As we said, we are also providing some humanitarian assistance as part of CIDA's plan.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

I think we're jumping to conclusions. The motion reads as follows: "That the Committee recommend that the government ask its representatives..." The committee can recommend it, but the government isn't required to do it.

These aren't dangerous motions, but nevertheless... In any case, that's my perception.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you.

Let's make sure we continue to direct the questions through the chair, and we'll try to get the answers to them.

We have an order here.

Madam McDonough.