Foreign Affairs Committee on Feb. 18th, 2021

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank all of our presenters today.

This is very disturbing testimony, of course. I am a new parliamentarian—probably the newest on this call—hearing this testimony. I have no skin in the game; I have not yet been part of any administration that has been in government. However, from what I am understanding, it is vital that we take action. It is possible that there are people who are eager to assist and to help with this action being taken—other countries are doing it—and that fundamentally Canada is falling down on its obligations.

This could be the last opportunity I have to speak to you.

To all three of the panellists, I would like to hear how you were able to move Canada on the one instance where we were able to repatriate one of our citizens. What were the steps that worked with that?

How are you able to move other governments? What can we do right now to ensure that Canada recognizes its obligations and that this government acts on them?

I could start perhaps with Human Rights Watch.

[Farida Deif]

The case of the five-year-old orphan who was repatriated in October was really a group effort. There was the special rapporteur, who's with us today, and there were different mandate holders who had written about her case and called for the government to repatriate. Human Rights Watch released a report shaming Canada for not returning even one of its nationals from northeast Syria and really being an outlier on this case. There was the advocacy of her family and a lawyer who represents her, who has also put forward a case against the government.

It was really a group effort, but unfortunately what we heard following that repatriation—from both the Prime Minister and the former minister of foreign affairs—was, “That's it. We have no plan to repatriate any other national. The file is closed.” That was deeply disturbing and disheartening for us to hear.

The hope now—through committee studies like this and through members of Parliament who are willing to take this case forward—is that we will see some action on the part of the government to repatriate the children, ensuring family unity without separating the children from their loved ones. It's a very difficult advocacy list. It's not easy, clearly. This is a complicated issue made even more complicated by COVID, but fundamentally it's a failure of political will by this government and a failure of this government to be willing to spend political capital to repatriate this specific group of Canadians, because of their suspected ties to ISIS. We need to remove the stigma from this file and recognize that these are children who are in life-threatening conditions, trapped in a war zone amid a deadly pandemic. These are Canadian kids who need to be home.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you very much.

Perhaps I could ask Monsieur Handfield to intervene next.

[Stéphane Handfield]

What can we do? We managed to accomplish a number of things. And of course, there is public pressure. A petition was posted online and submitted to the house. Over 900 Canadian citizens signed the petition demanding that the liberal government immediately repatriate Canadian children. The Quebec National Assembly unanimously adopted a motion to that effect.

We're not talking about 1,000 children. According to the latest news, there are 24 of them, because a young Canadian girl was repatriated by the British. Half of these 24 children are six years of age or under. They're really just babies. I can't understand why Canada is doing nothing. And yet, the whole world seems to think that Canada is a haven, a welcoming land that advocates immigration and human rights. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms is the supreme law of Canada, but the government is not complying with its own charter by leaving Canadians abroad under conditions that are clearly inhuman.

[Mathieu Paiement]

If you don't mind, I'd like to add something to Mr. Handfield's comments.

Given the context, we have to work from a legal standpoint with Mr. Handfield, and also produce content. As Ms. Deif explained when she was talking about Amira's repatriation, it was really the efforts of journalists and humanitarian workers that forced the government to take action.

So we've been shooting documentary footage showing that Canadians who have been attempting to repatriate members of their family, their nieces for example, detained in camps in Syria, are being denied government assistance. The documentary footage we've been producing is a form of pressure on the government, even though we ought not to be required to do so in a country like Canada.

[Fionnuala Ní Aoláin]

Can I add that I think we have to make the case for children? We see a process of unchilding, where a group of children are made “unchild” and put outside the category of protection of law. That's not just about these children; it's actually an assault on the Convention on the Rights of the Child. It's an assault on children's rights when you start to carve out one group of children who don't get the protection of all children.

The second thing is you have to make a positive case, and that leadership has to come from the government. You have to talk about these children as children. Bring their grandmothers into the conversation. Show these families that there's a child-focused response to this.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you very much.

We're well inside of 10 minutes of our scheduled time of one hour with this group of witnesses. I suggest that we do what we did in the last panel, which is a very rapid set of four questions, one from each party, with no more than two minutes for a question and answer if there is a follow-up issue. If not, in the interest of time, feel free to pass it to the next colleague. We do have some other business to attend to afterwards.

Ms. Gladu, you have two minutes, please.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to all the witnesses.

I'm outraged to hear that the government repatriated one child and left 24 behind. I think that's outrageous.

This question is for Human Rights Watch. Am I understanding that currently, with the border that is open and the mechanisms and other people that are in place, if the government had the political will, it would be able to get those other 24 children home?

[Farida Deif]

Yes. It very much would have. As some colleagues said earlier, several governments repatriated in December and then again in January, so it is possible. There are, whether it's the U.S. government and the Kurdish authorities or.... Others are willing to facilitate that activity.

We have seen, as well, that Canadian consular officials have had engagement. The Canadian ambassador in Erbil, Iraq, has had engagement with the Syrian authorities. Certainly, when the repatriation of the five-year-old orphan happened, there could have been efforts made to repatriate the others, but, unfortunately, we haven't even heard that the government even checked on the well-being of the other Canadian detainees while it was there repatriating the five-year-old orphan because it really had no intention of moving forward on this file.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Ms. Gladu, thank you very much.

Dr. Fry.

[Hedy Fry, Liberal, Vancouver Centre, BC]

I just want to ask a question about this repatriation process. We are talking about concerns here from the government with regard to children who may have been incorporated within ISIS. I think that this cannot just be taken as lack of political will. There have been a lot of concerns from the former government about repatriating people who had ties to ISIS, and we see that this is a question that is constantly asked by other governments, especially the opposition parties.

How do we square that, and how do we know when we bring those children back that there will be an ability to ensure that we are going to have all of us working in the same direction as a Parliament to say that this is the thing to do and not play political games with it? I think political games are what we are at.

I agree with you that these children should come back, but then again, if we all agree that this should happen, there should be a way of ensuring that when these kids come back, they get incorporated into our society and don't have that stigma of wandering around with people calling them terrorists, etc. I have seen that happen in our country in recent years.

Can somebody tell me how we do that without that happening? It's not simply that no one wants to bring the kids back. It's how you do it without having the kids stigmatized when they get back by various other political parties.

[Fionnuala Ní Aoláin]

I'll briefly say that Canada has one of the most experienced and sophisticated child care systems in the world. You have the best resources and the greatest expertise to deal with this problem. You have many children who are in need of full support and families who need support.

What we need here is a reintegration program. There are a lot of countries doing it and doing it well. There isn't a deficit of examples out there. Canada is exactly the best-placed country to show how this can be done.

That both augments Canada's leadership role and makes the case for security, for how you manage to ensure and show others how reintegration and rehabilitation can be done using all of the resources that are available in your child care, health and education systems.

I believe that to be entirely within the grasp of Canada.

[Hedy Fry, Liberal, Vancouver Centre, BC]

I agree that we know how to do it, but I'm suggesting that we had one young man who came back who had been pilloried for many years and had to go to court to be able to be seen as a valid Canadian. We saw what happened there. I think we are concerned for the children when they get back that there are no political games played with these children.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Dr. Fry, thank you very much.

Mr. Bergeron, you have the floor for two minutes.

[Stéphane Bergeron, Bloc, Montarville, QC]

Mr. Chair, what I find fascinating in the exchange we've just had is that Canada would seem to be the only country experiencing problems of this kind. Many other countries, including a number of industrialized countries, have succeeded not only in clarifying citizenship issues, but also in repatriating their young people.

I'm finding it hard to understand why other countries facing the same constraints as Canada have managed to repatriate their nationals while Canada claims to be unable to do so, even though it succeeded in repatriating a Canadian national. According to Mr. Paiement, the only reason she was repatriated was the fact that she was an orphan. Perhaps the Canadian government, unlike others, is afraid of being required to also repatriate the parents of these children. Maybe it's afraid of repatriating potential terrorists.

Isn't that the sort of thing our security services could look into?

[Farida Deif]

I think the real obstacle here is that the government is not keen to repatriate the adults. By repatriating an orphan, it doesn't have to repatriate any adults with them. The fear of course is a political backlash from members of various parties in Canada to repatriating any adult members with suspected ISIS ties.

Clearly, Canada has a robust judicial system that's able to prosecute here in Canada individuals who may have committed crimes. As the special rapporteur said, there is clearly no meaningful way to do this in northeast Syria presently. We're calling for all of the Canadians to be repatriated, not just the children. We're calling for the children to certainly not be separated from their parents or guardian unless that's in the best interests of the child, for all of those people to be repatriated to Canada, reintegrated, rehabilitated and for anyone who may have committed crimes to be prosecuted. That's really kind of what we're looking for.

The reason other countries have done this and Canada hasn't is simply because there was the political will to do so.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you very much.

The final round goes to Ms. McPherson for two minutes.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you again to all our witnesses. This testimony just gets worse and worse, frankly.

I have one very short question. I recognize we've kept you all far too long and we are out of time.

Ms. Ní Aoláin, I'm assuming the letter you sent to the 57 countries was sent to the Government of Canada. Have you received a response? If so, what was that?

[Fionnuala Ní Aoláin]

We haven't received a response. The government has 60 days to respond to the letter. The list of the countries is public and the press statement is also public.

I really would say to Canada that it has 60 days, so use those days well. Use them to action and to figure out what it can do in this circumstance.

As we clearly laid out, there are a number of instant measures, including checking on the status, health and the situation of those in the camps and verifying nationality. We've seen how these things can be done, including COVID.

These 60 days are really a test case for the government. What can you do in 60 days to respond to the Human Rights Council's special procedures mechanism and the attention of being on a list of 57 countries, which demonstrates the collective action problem that has to be addressed?

Use those 60 days wisely. Show us that you can actually respond meaningfully to address your international and human rights obligations in terms of women and children in the camps.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you.

I assume that letter could be submitted to the committee following the response after that 60 days. It would certainly be worthwhile for this committee to be able to see a copy of that letter.

[Fionnuala Ní Aoláin]

We can make that available when it's public after 60 days.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

On our collective behalf, I'd like to thank our witnesses on the second panel for their expertise, their time today and their service. We will give you a moment to disembark with our thanks, then we will continue with a piece of business afterward.

Thank you very much.

Colleagues, I would like to give the floor to Ms. McPherson to to bring a motion.

Ms. McPherson, you have the floor.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

The motion I would like to bring forward and that I would like to table is the following:

That the committee recognizes that, due to failures by the government to ensure adequate supply of vaccines for Canadians through national manufacturing and international procurement, Canada is the only G7 country accessing vaccines through COVAX, an initiative intended to provide vaccines to high risk individuals in low and middle income countries. The committee further recognizes that this failure by the government to secure domestic supply makes Canadians more vulnerable to dangerous variants and extends the detrimental global economic impacts of COVID-19 by delaying vaccinations to high-risk people in poor countries. Finally, that the committee report this motion to the House.

I bring this motion forward because I'm deeply concerned about the fact that Canada is the only G7 country that has accessed the COVAX vaccination. We know, regardless of the rule of law, that this vaccination program, this program of COVAX that was put in place in 2020, was put in place to help low- and middle-income countries, of which Canada is not one. Because we are taking those vaccinations away from other countries, or potentially taking those vaccinations away from other countries, there are important things that could result. One of them is that we could have up to 30% higher morbidity around the world, 30% more people could die because we do not have an equitable way to share our vaccines. The second thing is Canadians are at risk. If variants are developed because we are aren't able to address the needs of the most vulnerable around the world, variants will develop that we may not be able to be protected from by the vaccines we've already received.

Finally, we live in a global economy, and Canada's economy cannot recover while our global economy is being hampered by COVID-19. It is bad public health practice. It is extremely unethical, and it is also very bad for our global economy. This is why I would table this motion for your consideration.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you very much, Ms. McPherson.

Ms. Sahota.