Foreign Affairs Committee on Feb. 16th, 2016

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Okay, thank you.

We'll now go to the Liberal side and Raj Saini.

[Raj Saini, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

This question is for Ms. Bugailiskis.

You mentioned Brexit in your opening comments. If that did occur, how do you think it would affect the relationship with Canada?

[Alex Bugailiskis]

We've had to be discreet in commenting publicly on Brexit. I think privately we feel very strongly that we would like to see the U.K. continue as a member of the European Union, if only because it is such a strong ally and partner, and the EU is such an important global actor that it increases our influence and understanding within that organization.

I think the relationship with the U.K. will continue as it has in the past, prior to the European Union. There will be some challenges, I suppose, with agreements that we may have with the EU, such as the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement, but these could be resolved by other means. Right now, we'd like to focus on the referendum and hope that it will be positive.

[Raj Saini, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Then you don't see, going forward, that there would be a difference in the approach or that there would have to be some nuance?

[Alex Bugailiskis]

We have relations with many countries that do not belong to a union and we had them before the European Union, so no, I don't see how it would affect them. It will have an effect insofar as we have agreements with the European Union that won't include the United Kingdom, should they decide to remove themselves from that union.

[Raj Saini, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Okay.

I was going to ask Mr. Gwozdecky my second question.

You mentioned also in your opening comments problems with migrant smuggling. Could you expand on what, internationally and domestically, the government's thinking on that question is and what they may do to limit it?

[Mark Gwozdecky]

Thank you.

Well, migrant smuggling is a phenomenon that happens in many different regions and requires different responses depending on the region. One example I can refer to happens to be the one that's most newsworthy these days. This is with regard to Syrian refugees taking boats into Europe.

One response, which Canada has been a part of in the last week, was a NATO decision to redeploy a naval group—five ships, including one Canadian warship, HMCS Fredericton—to the waters of the Aegean to provide surveillance and monitoring and information collection to our European partners so that they can better understand and manage those illegal flows.

In years past we've had issues with regard to illegal migrants washing up on our shores in British Columbia, and the response has to be—and you hear this word a lot from us—whole-of-government. We need to harness all the resources of our federal institutions and of other Canadian institutions to tackle it.

One of the ways we do that is through capacity-building. We have an envelope of money with which we can go to transit countries or source countries for these illegal flows and provide them support to build up their capacity to manage these phenomena and mitigate and interdict them as necessary, so that we address the problem at the source and don't have to deal with the problem so late—only when they wash up on our shores.

[Raj Saini, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Okay. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Thank you.

I'll now go to Hélène Laverdière, and it's the end of the first round after Hélène.

[Hélène Laverdière, NDP, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to thank the witnesses for being with us today. From a personal standpoint, I'm very glad to see you, if I may say so, and some may know why.

My first few questions are for Mark Gwozdecky and have to do with terrorist financing, specifically.

It's a fact that the UN has set out a very clear mandate to stop the terrorist financing of ISIS. Could you give us concrete examples of Canada's current efforts to that end?

[Mark Gwozdecky]

We're doing a lot and we're doing it in various fora.

We participate in a more globalized coalition of countries called the global coalition against terrorism, and inside that global coalition there is a working group dedicated to terrorist financing.

We also participate in something called the anti-ISIL coalition, another coalition of countries. One of its lines of effort has to do with terrorist financing. There we also work with allies in sharing information and sharing best practices in determining how best to cut back these flows.

The best example I can give you has to do with the question of where ISIL gets its money and how we can cut it off. We're working with our partners, for example, to deny them access to the international financial institutions, and I think we've had a good deal of success in that regard, but our adversary finds different ways to move money and is not always using international banks. That's a bigger challenge for us, but we're working, with our allies in the region in particular, on that challenge.

One of the other major ways in which ISIL raises money for itself is through the smuggling of oil and through illegal taxation of residents of the area. That's much more difficult, because it is happening on the ground. I should say that the coalition is taking direct action against these illegal oil wells and is actually bombing some of those facilities and taking action against oil tankers that are syphoning the oil out, and I think we're having some impact there.

We're also taking action at the global level under things such as the Financial Action Task Force, whereby we're looking at the use of international financial institutions. We're working at the regional and local level, taking direct action against terrorist groups like ISIL.

[Hélène Laverdière, NDP, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Thank you very much.

I have another question about the region.

Amnesty International is reporting that populations are being displaced in the areas recaptured by the Kurdish peshmerga.

I see Alex is nodding. Perhaps she'd like to comment on that.

[Alex Bugailiskis]

Thank you very much.

We are very aware of Amnesty International's latest report and we are very concerned. The embassy has already issued statements to the Government of Iraq as well as Kurdistan's two regional governments indicating that they have a great responsibility to protect civilian populations and respect human rights. We were given assurance that they looked into Amnesty International's allegations and we will continue to work with them to ensure the protection of civilians.

[Hélène Laverdière, NDP, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Do I still have time for a few questions?

I have one quick one about the global peace and security fund. I would like to have confirmation on whether the fund will be replenished, augmented, or whatever. Thank you.

I see a big smile.

[Mark Gwozdecky]

Thank you for that question.

That is one of those many issues that are currently under deliberation. I suspect that by the time of the budget, or pretty soon thereafter, we'll have answers to all of those questions. I'm sorry, but I can't give you a definitive one right now.

[Hélène Laverdière, NDP, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Thank you.

I have another quick question.

I'm not sure who would like to respond, but do we have an idea of the timetable for Canada's accession to the Arms Trade Treaty, or ATT?

[Mark Gwozdecky]

That's another one that is still in the works. It is a complex matter.

I can tell you that it's certainly a commitment of the government to accede to that convention, but it requires a review of our legislation and our regulations to determine where we may need to make changes or not. That, the lawyers tell me—and I trust them—is a very lengthy process. It's going to be many months, not weeks, before we can determine that. Some of those changes may require some fairly significant new frameworks and new mechanisms to be put into place. You'll have to be patient on that. It will happen, but probably in months rather than weeks.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Go ahead, Mr. Rigby.

[Vincent Rigby]

I wanted to go back to your question about terrorist financing. I'm the G20 sherpa to the Prime Minister, and I can tell you that at the last G20 summit in Antalya, Turkey, if you read the communiqué, you see some very, very strong language with respect to terrorism financing.

Mark referred to the financial action task force and the very strong endorsement from the G20, including Canada, which strongly supported the language on strengthening it and promoting greater standards. There was a great discussion on terrorism among leaders at the summit. The G20 is very much on top of this and is doing a lot of work, and we'd be happy to talk to you about it offline.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Thank you.

I'll now go to Mr. Levitt.

[Michael Levitt, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Good afternoon. First of all, I want to thank you for your very comprehensive and enlightening presentation. I think we all learned a lot.

I want to go to your second hot topic, which was Iran. I think it's first on many lists and is second just by number today. I think you've certainly laid out the situation as it relates to sanctions and our following the lead of like-minded countries that have amended their sanctions as a result of Iran's upholding of the agreement as it relates to their nuclear ambitions.

I want to focus for a second on the other end of the spectrum with Iran, and that is how we can use this new engagement to continue to hold Iran accountable for its actions apart from its nuclear ambitions, in particular its domestic human rights abuses, its support of terrorist organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah, and its aggressiveness and incitement against the State of Israel. How can we use this new phase of our relationship to make sure that Canada is holding the Iranian regime to account for the way it behaves in the international community?

[Alex Bugailiskis]

Thank you very much for that question.

As I said in my opening statement, we continue to be extremely concerned by the human rights situation—or the lack of it, I should say—in Iran and the abuse with regard to freedom of organization, freedom of speech, and women's rights. We firmly believe that the ability to engage somewhat more in the diplomatic forum will allow us the opportunity to reinforce the actions we've already been taking for some time.

As you know, for 13 years now, Canada has led and co-sponsored the UN resolution on human rights on Iran. We once again managed to pass it this last December in the UN General Assembly. I think it's been a very important instrument, but it's not sufficient. We need to work with our other partners and allies in continuing to exert pressure and to try to ensure that Iran does follow normal international precepts with regard to respect for international human rights.

Again, I think it will afford us many more opportunities to convey those messages. We need to engage, as the minister has said, not only with those with whom we are like-minded but with those with whom we have major differences.

[Michael Levitt, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

As a follow-up to that question, I think there has been great concern over some of the groups that previously maintained and still maintain a listing as terrorist organizations, such as the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Quds Force. There's no plan to remove them from the list of terrorist organizations, is there?

[Alex Bugailiskis]

That is correct. Iran is still listed as a state sponsor of terrorism and the Quds, or the Revolutionary Guard, is still considered a terrorist organization under our Criminal Code. Any dealings with that organization would be culpable.

[Michael Levitt, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Thank you very much.