Thank you, Mr. chair.
I am a bit frustrated to hear about Sudan in the context of the oil companies and their wealth when the reasons why we should talk about that country are the misery of people, the war, the fact that they have been living in camps for many years and that there is no end in sight. Personally, I find that a bit odious.
In fact, we talk about the wealth of the northern countries and about the power of the countries extracting the natural resources but we nearly never talk about the lives of the local people. It is as if they did not exist. I find that intolerable because, at the end of the day, the wealth that the other countries are accumulating is of absolutely no interest to me, if only because this wealth is located in African countries the resources of which we are extracting while leaving the local peoples in extremely dire situations. I listen to you, like I listened to the government officials who were here before you, and it is as if Darfur was not in Sudan. Talking about the companies operating in Sudan without talking about Darfur does not make any sense, as far as I am concerned. Of course, I have never been there and I do not know how people live on the ground but I know that there are people there who live, give birth and die in camps and that we do nothing for them. It is criminal. It is a crime against humanity and it is intolerable.
I will try to calm down and come back to the topic of the day.
Mr. Goldstein, you are part of a group called STAND Canada and you are recommending an embargo. However, all the experts tell us that embargoes do more bad than good for the people. Since we know that there are very few Canadian corporations in Sudan, what would be the point of an embargo? Would it be for us to be able to claim that we have done something in mobilizing Canadian, American and European students? Do you really believe that this situation would be resolved the day the few Canadian corporations operating in Sudan have left?