Evidence of meeting #78 for Foreign Affairs and International Development in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was att.
A recording is available from Parliament.
November 2nd, 2017 / 12:55 p.m.
Conservative
Ziad Aboultaif Conservative Edmonton Manning, AB
Thank you to the witnesses.
Mr. Butcher, I have a quick question for you.
Outside the technicality and the agreement itself and what's around it, there are some major exporters not part of the agreement yet or who haven't entered the agreement yet. How do you see the effectiveness of this agreement, and how do you see the future of it while there are certain countries still out?
Policy Advisor on Arms and Conflict, Oxfam
That's a very good point. There are certainly major exporters outside the treaty; Russia and China would be two. The United States is sort of half in and half out, at the moment, although its domestic legislation is fully compliant with the treaty.
We at Oxfam view this as a long-term process. A lot of countries joined the treaty very quickly and over the past three years of its being in force have been learning how to operate it. Other countries will come in later. We see this happening more gradually now, but it's happening. Russia has stated an intention not to join the treaty. China, as we understand it, is slowly and quietly examining whether it is in its interest to join the treaty. Other countries will be doing the same thing.
In terms of this treaty, it's very interesting that, for example, as a large number of African countries join the treaty—and we are encouraging others, particularly in east Africa, to do the same—and as they operate the treaty and their arms imports are being reported, since they are complying with the terms of the treaty, a country like China, which exports a lot of arms to Africa, is brought some way into the treaty's ambit, just because arms it supplies, but might not report the supply of, will be reported by the African states that have bought them. The treaty gradually and slowly will build up to work more strongly and will spread across the world.
Certainly for us, the greatest guarantee of getting more countries into the treaty is that they see it working. They see it contribute to security and transparency in the arms trade, and they see it being in the interest of states to be part of it. That requires the robust implementation we talked about.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Bob Nault
Thank you, Mr. Aboultaif.
Colleagues, that wraps it up.
Mr. Jaramillo of Project Ploughshares, and of course Mr. Butcher from a faraway place, representing Oxfam, thank you very much for your presentations and well-thought-out discussions with the committee.
Colleagues, this ends our committee for this week. We'll see you on Tuesday.
The meeting is adjourned.