Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to our guests for your presentations today.
I think most Canadians who are aware of what's going on in Somalia are deeply concerned, to put it mildly. We know from the responses of the UN that many are calling Somalia right now the worst humanitarian crisis we are facing. It seems from your presentation today and from the things we read in the paper and other news reports that there's little hope on the horizon.
I know that people--and UN reports, I believe--have said that up to two million people are facing a humanitarian crisis right now. About a million are internally displaced, and recent reports from this afternoon indicate that 15 people were killed in the north from a grenade attack. It goes on and on.
We know that one of the problems was that the UN was supposed to provide stability, following a motion at the UN, but it was usurped by what happened when the Ethiopian troops came in. I guess this is a political question.
Some would point to the fact there was some stability beforehand, notwithstanding people's concerns about the Islamic courts. I know from eyewitness accounts of constituents of mine that there was actually a period when you could drive through Mogadishu without being harangued, harassed, or shaken down, at the time the Islamic courts had brought some stability. Those aren't my words; those are the words of people who had been in Mogadishu.
It seems there was another agenda at play here. It seems that the result of the Ethiopian action, with the support of the U.S., was that any sensible conflict resolution was thrown to the side. In passing, I find it strange that we sit here as a country with one of the largest Somalian expatriate communities in the entire planet.... I'm not saying this to you, because I know you're the people who deliver the policy of the government. So let me be clear about this, especially as I'm the son of a bureaucrat, that you deliver the wishes of the government. But it seems very strange to me that what I'm seeing is that the best we can do is to come up with a couple of million dollars, and we don't seem to be able to put together a more robust response in what is clearly the worst humanitarian crisis we face right now—though maybe Kenya is going to get worse. And from what we're hearing, it's a political crisis.
What are some of the policy possibilities that we have as a country to support reconciliation, be they through what you already mentioned, Mr. Angell, in terms of the most recent meetings with the ICG or...? And if it isn't possible to do anything now, what can we say to my constituents—Somali Canadians and everyday Canadians—that we can get our government to do beyond what I would suggest is a fairly muted response?