Foreign Affairs Committee on April 27th, 2021

[Christopher Waters]

I recognize that in the era we're in, when we're not expanding our diplomatic presence in a massive way, that maybe the only embassy we should put in is in Tbilisi in Georgia. At least we would have a presence on the ground and one that was on somewhat neutral territory.

Structurally, even, putting Azerbaijan interests into Turkey and putting the Armenian ones into Russia frankly sends some really odd geopolitical messages.

I think the dialogue on the ground would be really important. Let's show up, and an embassy in the region would be a good place to do that.

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

That's fair enough.

Professor Mason, you talked about the application of the assessment. First, is the legislation adequate, or do we need to change that, or change the method of assessment?

Secondly, Professor Byers talked about how dangerous drones are . Is there any special consideration that should be given in dealing with arms exports of drones, or the kind of drone technology we're talking about here that's the essence of a drone? Could you reflect on that briefly, please?

[Peggy Mason]

I think I have a slight disagreement with Professor Byers with respect to the substantial risk. In my view, we're both lawyers and lawyers can argue over these things, but I think “overriding risk” and “substantial risk” are equivalent terms.

The problem with Canada is that we don't actually assess substantial risk. We assess evidence of direct use, which as I said is not the proper test. I would associate myself with the other statements that have been made on the drones, that when you have this kind of technology, which I think one witness, Bessma Momani, said is a “game-changer” in the way they can impact the conflict, extra care, extra precaution is warranted, the precautionary principle application, to use Professor Waters' term.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Mr. Harris, thank you very much. We'll have to leave it there in the interests of time and our second panel.

On our collective behalf, I thank our three witnesses for being with us. Thank you so much for taking the time, for bringing us your expertise and your testimony. We'll let you disconnect.

Madam Clerk, we'll suspend briefly to sound-check our second panel, and then we'll resume the discussion.

Thank you so much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Fellow members, we'll continue this afternoon's discussion. I want to let the new witnesses know that I encourage all participants to mute their microphones when they aren't speaking and to address all their responses and questions to the chair.

When you have 30 seconds left, I'll wave this piece of paper. As always, the interpretation is available through the globe icon at the bottom of the screen.

I now welcome our witnesses in our second panel. We have with us this afternoon Daniel Turp, associate professor, Université de Montréal; Allison Pytlak, disarmament programme manager, Women's International League for Peace and Freedom; and from Project Ploughshares, Cesar Jaramillo, executive director, and Kelsey Gallagher, researcher.

Professor Turp, I will ask you to begin with opening remarks for five minutes, please.

You have the floor.

[Daniel Turp, Associate Professor, Université de Montréal, As an Individual]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to acknowledge the members of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development. I served on this committee for a number of years, along with Bill Graham and Irwin Cotler. In those days, we had some very good debates. I remember our debates on the legislation to implement the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. At that time, we heard from Judge Philippe Kirsch, who went on to become the president of the International Criminal Court.

I'll speak briefly, but I must leave at 5 p.m. Unfortunately, I can't be here for all the work, meaning until 5:30 p.m., for personal reasons.

I want to start by saying that I'm pleased that a House of Commons standing committee can address the issue of arms exports. I believe that Parliament plays a vital and fundamental role when it comes to this issue. The government shouldn't be the only party involved. Parliament is responsible for oversight. However, in my opinion, it hasn't really fulfilled this responsibility in previous parliaments. Since the committee has a mandate to study the issue of arms exports to Turkey, it has the opportunity to fulfill the responsibility to some extent.

I hope that this will continue and that a regime can be put in place to ensure that Parliament addresses the arms exports issue on a much more regular basis. In my opinion, transparency and democracy are at stake. The government must be accountable to parliamentarians for the implementation of a treaty such as the Arms Trade Treaty and for compliance with the export and import legislation that implements the Arms Trade Treaty. That's my first point.

Second, when the committee finishes its work, I want it to rule on an important issue regarding Canada's compliance or non-compliance with international law and the Arms Trade Treaty in the specific case of drone exports to Turkey. According to some non-governmental organizations, these exports violated the Arms Trade Treaty.

I want to be sure of this. I believe that parliamentarians are in a good position to make a finding on whether the Arms Trade Treaty has been violated. Canada didn't suspend its export permits. It could have done so, but it didn't. This is likely a violation of international law and the Arms Trade Treaty.

Not many other entities could rule on whether this violation occurred. You're in a good position to do so. I believe that a finding of a violation or non-violation would lend your work a great deal of credibility.

As you know, I'm interested in arms exports to Saudi Arabia. I've taken legal action a number of times in federal court to try to get export permits cancelled. I think that it would be quite worthwhile for the committee members to look at the double standard when it comes to export control and the granting or suspension of permits.

As noted by Steven Chase, who takes a keen interest in these issues, Turkey is accusing Canada of applying a double standard. I think that the committee should also look at this matter.

I'll make one final point. I believe that, as others have said, Canada isn't applying the right test when it comes to arms export and import controls. Canada or Global Affairs Canada isn't applying the substantial or overriding risk test under the treaty correctly. The implication is that the test must assume that arms have been used to establish the possibility and necessity of a permit suspension or cancellation.

This is the wrong test. Ms. Mason said that and I agree with her. This would require you to rule on how the notion should be interpreted, both in the legislation and in the Arms Trade Treaty.

Thank you for your attention.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you, Professor Turp.

I understand that Project Ploughshares and Women's International League for Peace and Freedom have coordinated their remarks, so we will go in sequence to Mr. Jaramillo, Mr. Gallagher and finally to Ms. Pytlak for a combined total of 10 minutes, please.

Mr. Jaramillo, the floor is yours. Go ahead, please.

[Cesar Jaramillo, Executive Director, Project Ploughshares]

Thank you, Chair. Thank you very much for having me here.

When Project Ploughshares appeared before this committee last December, you heard that Canadian arms exports to Turkey were being unlawfully diverted to the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh. Given the weight of the evidence, we argued for all relevant export permits to be cancelled.

Global Affairs Canada has since acknowledged these instances of diversion and proceeded to cancel the export permits, so we are no longer trying to persuade this committee of what is now an established truth. There are important lessons to be learned from this experience, some of which speak to worrying shortcomings in Canadian arms export controls as currently implemented.

First, Canada failed to act proactively. It was civil society and the media, not the Canadian government, that first identified and drew attention to Turkey's diversion of Canadian arms exports. This raises questions not only about Canada's ability to monitor its own exports but also about its willingness to effectively implement export controls in the absence of public pressure.

Second, parliamentary oversight works and we need more of it. This study on arms exports to Turkey and the subsequent government decision to cancel the export permits should underscore this point. We commend members of this committee for your judicious work and reiterate our call for the establishment of a subcommittee to monitor compliance with arms export controls.

Third—and contrary to repeated statements by government officials—the threshold for denying arms export permits is risk of misuse, not conclusive evidence that such misuse has occurred. In the case of Canadian exports to Turkey, the risk of diversion and misuse should have been apparent well before the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh erupted. Surveillance and targeting sensors produced in Ontario had already been found in numerous conflict zones, including Syria, Iraq and Libya.

Fourth, there are important questions about Canadian policy coherence following the cancellation of arms exports to Turkey. Canadian-made weapons are still being exported to recipients such as human rights pariah Saudi Arabia, where there are also clear grounds for the cancellation of export permits. Why this is the case remains an open question that merits further scrutiny.

Last, let us recognize the legal rationale underpinning Canadian export controls. Despite what the committee may have heard from other witnesses, this debate is not about some ethereal notion of taking the moral high ground—even as there are clear ethical implications to export control decisions. It is ultimately about compliance with the law. The law, both domestic and international, demands an objective, reliable system that is free from political interference and economic calculations.

Kelsey?

[Kelsey Gallagher, Researcher, Project Ploughshares]

Thank you, Cesar.

Thank you for having us today.

Canada's recent cancellation of export permits for Wescam surveillance and targeting sensors to Turkey is a very positive move, consistent with domestic and international obligations, and it sets a concrete precedent applicable to other problematic arms deals. However, the events leading to the cancellation illustrate serious issues in the effective implementation of Canada's arms control regime.

Following Turkey's unilateral invasion of northern Syria in October 2019, Canada suspended the issuance of new arms export permits to Turkey. Initially this appeared to be a proactive move in response to a well-founded risk of misuse of the exports in question, yet the suspension did little more than temporarily interrupt the flow of weapons to Turkey.

Under political pressure from the Turkish government, Global Affairs Canada soon moved to quietly release dozens of the weapons exports that had been recently suspended, under a growing list of exemptions. The most common basis for these exemptions was whether a permit denial would result in “especially negative impacts on bilateral relations”.

Goods exempted from the suspension include a series of weapon systems, notably among them the Wescam sensors. These exemptions demonstrate a creeping politicization of Canada's regulatory regime. Neither Canadian law nor the Arms Trade Treaty allows for political calculations when assessing the risk that individual arms exports may be used to violate human rights or be diverted to an unauthorized user.

Wescam sensors face risk of both, as evidenced by Turkey's behaviour in more than one conflict zone. This should have been clear to Canadian officials at the time of authorization. These risks again materialized as Wescam sensors began guiding air strikes in Nagorno-Karabakh in violation of end-user assurances and arguably against Canadian interests in the region.

As the documents released to this committee demonstrate, Canadian officials continued pushing for the approval of Wescam SCAM exports to Turkey merely three weeks before violence resumed in Nagorno-Karabakh.

Canada's recent revocation of permits for certain Turkish-bound weapons is indeed a welcome move and one that has concrete impact, as this technology is not easily or immediately replaceable. However, it comes on the heels of a major failure in Canada's regulation of the trade and transfer of weapons. In order to effectively control Canadian arms exports, the Government of Canada must apply risk assessment standards universally and unconditionally, unfettered by political considerations or fear of upsetting potential customers.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Ms. Pytlak.

[Allison Pytlak, Disarmament Programme Manager, Women's International League for Peace and Freedom]

Thank you for inviting me to speak today.

We were also pleased to hear that the Government of Canada has cancelled permits to Turkey for the L3Harris Wescam surveillance and targeting sensors. Given the volume of information indicating the diversion of this equipment to other end-users, this is a positive step that is in keeping with Canada's domestic and international obligations. It also sets a precedent that can be applied elsewhere, and we welcome the interest of this committee in the matter.

Yet while this was the right decision to make, there are concerns that need to be registered and lessons learned along the lines of points made by the representatives of Project Ploughshares. I want to focus my statement, however, on a particular aspect of the final report of the review, and that is the gender-based violence or GBV risk assessment, under criterion 6. I have to say that for a government that considers itself to be feminist, that acts as a gender champion within multilateral disarmament fora and that will soon formally release its feminist foreign policy, the quality of the GBV risk assessment is lacking.

The findings in this section of the report overlook vital information and do not demonstrate an understanding of core legal concepts. For example, the Turkish military has become increasingly involved in armed conflicts in Syria, Iraq and Libya since 2016. This is where the technology in question is being used, technology that has been described as “essential” to Turkey's deployment of its uncrewed aerial vehicles, or UAVs, and for launching air strikes.

Yet within the paragraph titled “Gender-based violence in the context of the conflicts in which Turkey is involved”, there is not actually any mention of GBV in those contexts, even though its prevalence is well documented by credible and easy-to-locate sources. Instead, the report states simply that Turkey has not “deliberately targeted children, women, or civilians”, comments on its membership within the Convention on the Rights of the Child and states that Turkey takes in refugees.

This is concerning. It is concerning first because the report fails to include any reference to or findings for the risk of gender-based violence in the context of the conflicts where Turkey is involved and where it is using the equipment in question.

Second, the use of the words “deliberately targeted” indicates that the concepts of “commit” and “facilitate” are possibly being taken to mean the same thing. In legal usage, the word “commit” implies directly carrying out an action, whereas “facilitate” is understood to mean “make something possible or easier”. “Facilitate”, in other words, encompasses a broader range of conduct and arms usage.

A risk assessment is meant to assess for just that—the risk of GBV being committed or facilitated by the items in question, and not deliberate targeting. It bears repeating that GBV is wider than violence against women alone and can also include socio-economic and psychological or emotional violence alongside physical and sexual violence.

Multiple credible sources have documented GBV in Syria, Libya and Iraq and affirm that its prevalence has been greatly exacerbated by protracted armed conflict and violence in all those locations. For instance, in 2018, the UN Commission of Inquiry on Syria confirmed that sexual and gender-based violence against women, girls, men and boys was a “devastating and pervasive feature of the conflict”. GBV is also pervasive within Turkey's refugee camps and in occupied Afrin. It is therefore difficult to understand how this information could have been omitted from the report and from a GBV risk analysis.

Men and boys also experience GBV and are sometimes uniquely at risk in relation to UAVs and signature strikes. Some militaries use sex—and in particular maleness—as a characteristic by which to determine a target. As a result, military-age males are more at risk of becoming victims of inaccurate targeting. This is problematic because it erodes civilian rights to protection in conflict and has human rights implications and further suggests that sex can be a key signifier of identity, which itself constitutes a form of GBV.

Finally, it's worth noting that in March 2021 Turkey withdrew from the Istanbul convention on preventing and combatting violence against women, a convention referenced in the report. This move has prompted a strong reaction from many high-level officials within the UN human rights community and Turkish feminists, some of whom have also registered concern over increasing levels of femicide and anti-LGBTIQ activities of people within Turkey.

The reason why I am making these very specific points is partly in response to the quality of this particular assessment, but more broadly to offer insights that can hopefully improve the quality of future, or in-progress, GBV risk assessments, such as in relation to Saudi Arabia, as one example.

To close, I would just point out that it is anticipated that our foreign minister will formally launch Canada's feminist foreign policy in the coming weeks.

In order for us to have credibility as a feminist country, we need to, at a minimum, do more to prevent GBV at home and abroad. We also recommend bolder action in the context of Canadian arms transfers and military relationships writ large, because equipping and emboldening aggressive militarism is fundamentally incompatible with a feminist approach.

Thank you for your time and attention, and I look forward to your questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you so much.

Mr. Bergeron, do you have a point of order?

[Stéphane Bergeron, Bloc, Montarville, QC]

Mr. Chair, with your permission, I want to acknowledge my former colleague Daniel Turp. He'll be leaving us in three minutes and unfortunately I won't have the opportunity to ask him any questions. I was pleased to have the chance to ask him a few questions about this issue, which is of great interest to him and to me. I wanted to greet him anyway.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you, Mr. Bergeron.

Colleagues, we will now go to round one, which consists of four sets of interventions of six minutes each.

Leading us off will be Mr. Morantz.

Go ahead, sir.

[Marty Morantz, Conservative, Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Jaramillo or Mr. Gallagher, I want to ask you a few questions.

In the last week, we had Dr. Leuprecht here. He talked about this idea that arms exports are essentially an instrument of foreign policy. In other words, when governments are deciding whether or not to issue arms export permits, one of the things they'll look at is whether it is in their foreign policy interests.

He said that this comes into direct conflict with the idea that Canada has international obligations as well around international humanitarian law, and to make sure there's a risk assessment process in place that guards against violations of those laws.

I'm wondering if you agree with Dr. Leuprecht's idea and if you could comment on it.

[Cesar Jaramillo]

With respect to Mr. Leuprecht, I wholeheartedly disagree with that notion.

Export controls are very well defined, especially contemporary export controls. They are meant to reduce risk and reduce human suffering, and the equation really does not allow for political considerations, penalties, jobs or any extraneous arguments. This is a very simple equation. If there is a risk of misuse, one should not export, especially if Canada holds the position that we have some of the strongest export controls in the world.

There is an alternative, and that is to overlook risk for profit or for other reasons. However, then we would have to change the narrative that we have some of the strongest export controls in the world. We could perhaps overlook risk and say that we have “okay” export controls or “mediocre” export controls.

If we are to hold the claim that we have some of the strongest export controls in the world, we should adhere to the provisions and expectations of widely recognized instruments, such as the Arms Trade Treaty, which places a premium on risk and the prevention thereof.

[Marty Morantz, Conservative, Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB]

I agree with you. I guess my question was really more around whether or not foreign policy interests happen anyway, despite what you're saying is the way it really should be happening.

That leads me to my next question.

There's a briefing memo, dated September 14, 2020, to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, about a phone call he was to have with his counterpart in Turkey.

In that memo, there are some placeholder comments about his telling his counterpart that he has good news, namely, that he has approved a number of permits. This memo and call, by the way, took place before the Wescam sensor was found on the ground in Nagorno-Karabakh, so the minister would have had no reason to think this conversation was going to be scrutinized in the future.

He said, “Pleased to let you know I have approved a number of permits on an exception basis” as a placeholder comment. Or, another comment might have been, “I am aware of the concerns you've raised with my officials about a number of export permits and I will be considering those very soon, as a priority.... Pleased to note as discussed earlier, Canada has recently made significant changes to Canada's export policy towards Turkey, relaxing restrictions”.

That's the first part of the conversation, harkening back to my first question to you.

The second part of the question—

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

Mr. Chair, on a point of order, I have a great deal of concern that a briefing note is being presented as though it was a verbatim understanding of a conversation that was held. What Mr. Morantz is referring to is a briefing note, but he is presenting it as though that was what the minister said—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

That's debate.

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

—and I have a great deal of concern about that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you for the point of order, Mr. Oliphant. I believe it's on the threshold of being debate. You are next in line. You are free to re-address that issue as you see fit.

Mr. Morantz, you have the floor back. Go ahead, sir.

[Marty Morantz, Conservative, Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB]

I can understand why Mr. Oliphant wouldn't want me to raise this point, and it may or may not have happened in the conversation, but it is in the briefing note from the public service to the minister.

In the very next breath, it says, under the heading “OECD Secretary General Campaign”, that “Canada is nominating Bill Morneau, our former Finance Minister, for the position of the Secretary General at the OECD. Mr. Morneau is a strong candidate and would be an asset to the OECD”. I could go on. There are more statements about how great Mr. Morneau is. He had just resigned because of a scandal, which is a bit odd.

I just wonder, Mr. Jaramillo, whether you're concerned about foreign policy interests coming into the decision-making paradigm in this instance, given what that memo says.

[Cesar Jaramillo]

Irrespective of the specific content or the wording of the conversations, I will say that if the predictable objective application of export controls gives way to political interference, the trust is eroded. The trust and the reliability of the export control system is eroded and that should not be taking place.

[Marty Morantz, Conservative, Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB]

Thank you.

Mr. Chair, those are my questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you very much, Mr. Morantz.

We next go to Mr. Oliphant for six minutes.