Canada has a very proud history in Africa, in South Africa in particular, where the Mulroney government led the fight against apartheid when many other western countries were reluctant to do so. I very much want to see Canada again play a similar kind of leadership role.
I think it's kind of tragic. There were so many, probably some around this table, who greeted Mugabe's arrival as President of Zimbabwe as a great development when it happened and had great hopes that it was a step forward. History has shown us that those hopes were very badly misplaced, and the atrocities committed against his people of all types are horrendous.
The virtual shutdown of democracy is totally unacceptable, and Canada has to do something. I want to find some way to make a statement that is constructive and strong. It's not necessary for us to work in cooperation. I'm disappointed that Thabo Mbeki and South Africa haven't spoken out more strongly and taken constructive action. I don't think we have to wait for them. I think Canada can show leadership, recognizing that obviously the pressure is more effective if it comes from there.
Mr. Obhrai highlighted some of the legal hurdles, though, and I know that in revising your motion, you have tried to find a way past some of them by trying to tie human rights or the crimes against humanity prosecution under our legislation to something that may work, if you can find victims. I don't know if we have victims of that right now in Canada sufficient to maintain such a prosecution. I'm certainly not going to be comfortable voting for an indictment against him that we don't have a legal basis for yet. If we can get an assurance from the RCMP or from someone coming before us who we think satisfies that test, that might be another issue, but I'm a little reluctant to go that far at this stage.
I think your effort to try to revise it is a good step and I'm glad to see that. I want to see us come to something we can all support enthusiastically, that will accomplish what we want it to do. I'm not sure that even the revisions to the motion are there yet. I'm not sure they overcome those legal hurdles of not being able to prosecute a sitting head of state. And he may be there until 2008. If he keeps on going the way he's been going, he's going to be there a lot longer. It won't be through a fair democratic process that he stays, but he certainly shows no sign of giving up.
I'm troubled. I think we have to do something. Maybe there are things we can work on further to get the motion where it will do that. I know you've addressed some of the problems that I originally had, but I'm not sure we're there yet.