The purpose of placing or of establishing an ability for the minister to create a regulation and to put these criteria into regulation is to make all of the criteria that are in the Arms Trade Treaty explicit and very transparent, in particular for Canadian exporters, so that they understand how their exports are going to be assessed in applying for a permit.
At present, we have export permit assessment criteria that were established by policy in 1986, and then subsequently other policy objectives were added, such as a specific reference to weapons of mass destruction and so forth.
The ATT assessment criteria expands on our existing elements and will then establish in the regulation the specific elements. We already take into account in our export permit considerations, by policy, the possibility for a risk with respect to gender-based violence, with respect to regional instability, international instability, the risk of a serious human rights violation, international humanitarian law violations, but this will make it absolutely explicit and a legally binding requirement for the minister in making decisions on export permits.