Foreign Affairs Committee on Nov. 28th, 2024

[Dave Epp, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for all of the excellent testimony from the witnesses.

My understanding of Bill C-353 is that it provides options or tools in the tool chest. There is nothing mandatory about the bill, so I'd like to begin with what I heard as conflicting potential results if we add more tools to the tool chest.

Ms. Teich, in an article you wrote this summer, you quoted a British barrister, Amal Clooney, who said there seems to be a reluctance among many of the Five Eyes countries to use the existing tools that are there. They are there for supporting Bill C-353 and additional tools, in particular targeted sanctioning for hostage-taking and the potential for monetary rewards or PR status.

If I understood your testimony, Ms. Nölke, you are concerned that the existence of more tools and more publicity about those tools might put undue pressure on governments to act without discretion. That's probably stated too strongly. They would have a more difficult time resisting public pressure.

I would ask each of you to comment on that dynamic. Implicit in it is the quality of intelligence in our intelligence community and the ability to make good decisions where there's flexibility and no mandatory nature to those additional tools.

I'll start with Ms. Teich.

[Sarah Teich]

Yes, I quoted from barrister Amal Clooney. She found as part of a large study that there was an “apparent reticence”—those were the words she used—to impose targeted sanctions. She did a study looking at the U.K., Canada, the U.S. and the EU, I believe, and found that particularly in cases of arbitrary detention of journalists, targeted sanctions were not used in response—Magnitsky acts and other current tools.

That's why this bill, in my opinion, is so important. It provides, without anything mandatory related to sanctions, a very clear direction that targeted sanctions can be used for this purpose.

[Dave Epp, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

Thank you.

Go ahead, Ms. Nölke.

[Sabine Nölke]

If the tool is available, it will be subject to debate in Parliament, and the first thing you'll hear is, “We have this legislation, so why aren't we using it?” That will raise the political pressure to act in a certain way. That is the concern. It increases the currency of the hostages. Once a hostage-taker knows that the victim is now the subject of sustained domestic political pressure, the hostage becomes more valuable and the resolution will become more expensive.

When it comes to choosing sanctions as a response, that choice is already available under the Special Economic Measures Act. If you put a specific name to this particular tool, it risks making the pressure to use that tool greater, which in turn increases the political value of the hostage. That would be my concern.

[Dave Epp, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

I could perhaps understand that occurring while the legislation is being debated through Parliament, but once it's in place, do you think that perception in the hostage-taking community, if there is such a thing—

[A voice]

Oh, there is.

[Dave Epp, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON]

—would be sustained?

It would be a tool. It would be, yes, for hostage-taking, but again, it would boil back to the ability of our intelligence community to make recommendations to the government on whether to act on a tool or not. Public pressure or push-back on a government at times isn't a bad thing.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Answer very briefly.

[Sabine Nölke]

I think I'd probably be the first one to agree with that—absolutely yes—but in this particular case, elevating a hostage crisis to a political debate would be counterproductive, in my view.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Thank you

Next we go to Mr. Zuberi.

You have four minutes.

[Sameer Zuberi, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here, both on Zoom and in person.

Mr. Fowler, it's good to hear from you and to see you in person. I'm so happy that you and your family had a positive end to your ordeal.

I want to start off my questioning with you, Ms. Symons. Essentially, I want to ask about Canadian money getting into the hands of criminals and terrorists through this legislation. Do you think that would be the case if the bill became law? Would money end up in the hands of criminals and terrorists through it? Could it end up in their hands?

[Lara Symons]

It could indeed. There's plenty of evidence out there that when there's a kidnapping, whether it's by a criminal group or a terrorist group, plenty of individuals want to take advantage of it to make some money themselves. We've seen many cases over the years of third party individuals coming forward, offering information and co-operation and asking to be paid for it or to be given some concession. The vast majority of times, that information is not good information. Those people who are involved in sharing the information are in cahoots with the people who are carrying out the hostage-taking.

I would be concerned that money would be going to individuals complicit in hostage-taking if third party individuals were incentivized.

[Sameer Zuberi, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

I'm being heckled, Mr. Chair, by a member from the Conservative Party in the middle of this testimony. It's a bit unusual.

Let's take this further. As you said, we now might end up paying a listed terror organization in Canada. When we aren't supposed to be subsidizing listed terrorist groups here at all, this legislation provides the possibility for that to happen. How do we square that circle?

[Lara Symons]

That's a very good question. I don't know how you square that circle.

It's hypocritical, I guess, because families aren't allowed to pay ransoms to terrorist groups, but if government is, that doesn't come across very well. I'm not sure how you can square it.

[Sameer Zuberi, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

I'd like to go to Ambassador Nölke.

With respect to victims, their families and those who have been taken hostage or arbitrarily detained, to your knowledge, were there ever instances when people—families or individuals—wanted their privacy to be respected in such a way that their story did not get out into the public?

[Sabine Nölke]

There have certainly been cases, CBC reporter Mellissa Fung, for example. This was a case where information was clamped down on very hard and it did not get released until after she was released. There are certainly circumstances where secrecy will assist the resolution effort.

[Sameer Zuberi, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

This legislation says that the minister must make a summary report. How would those two things contradict each other?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Answer very briefly.

[Sabine Nölke]

The concern I have is not that information gets transmitted to the families. Ambassador Fowler is quite correct that the families need to be informed of what's going on. However, when you're dealing particularly with terrorist hostage cases, there's intelligence involved, and the families are not necessarily cleared to receive that information. They might be under stress and information that could be prejudicial could be released, so there's a delicacy there in making information exchanges mandatory. There has to be discretion there.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Thank you.

We next go to MP Hoback for four minutes.

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

Thank you, Chair.

I want to thank all the witnesses for being here this afternoon.

This is such a serious issue. We want to make sure that all of the tool box is rapidly available and is at the disposal of our consular people so they can make the appropriate decisions and take action.

I'm curious. I view this as a Crime Stoppers type of legislation in some ways. You're providing the ability to pay informants to give you data and offering residency to people in situations of being threatened themselves if they provide you with data.

Where does that exist right now within the government, Ms. Nölke? Could you do that tomorrow if that was the scenario?

[Sabine Nölke]

I don't think we can do it right now. Whether it's advisable to do it is a different question.

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

That advisability would depend on the scenario. Is that correct?

[Sabine Nölke]

Yes.

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

It depends on the situation. The consul or the person looking at all the facts could decide in a situation that the information is valuable and the person could possibly lose their life if they stay within a country or region.

Wouldn't they be better off making a decision instead of trying to go back to the bureaucracy to go through 30 different steps before they make a decision?