I noted at the last meeting that MP Lantsman believed this bill would apply to the cases of people like Maher Arar. I think I agree more with Ms. Teich's interpretation that the definition of “arbitrary detention in state-to-state relations” in this bill would not apply to his particular case. There can be an argument made about whether or not this bill is intended to be broad or narrow in its focus, but we believe that if we're going to seriously tackle issues of arbitrary detention internationally, these types of cases need to be included.
I take MP Alghabra's question about whether this would apply and whether we should be addressing every case where an individual believes there's been an unfair detention, but if I can take the case of Canadians in northeast Syria, they are being detained indefinitely without charges. I can't think of a different definition of what would be considered arbitrary detention other than cases where people are being detained without charges and with no access to justice. The fact that they're being held in such a way—not in order to influence the Canadian government, but because of unfounded accusations that have not led to legal charges—means they would be excluded from this bill.
I believe it wasn't the intention of this bill to capture those kinds of cases necessarily, but if we want to tackle these issues internationally, these types of cases must be included in discussions and, ideally, in any overall policy approach, whether it's about legislation, modifying consular services or making new policies at Global Affairs Canada.