Bill C-219 would rename Canada's Special Economic Measures Act the Sergei Magnitsky global sanctions act. This is not a cosmetic change; it is a statement of moral purpose.
Sergei Magnitsky was a Russian tax lawyer who uncovered a $230-million fraud carried out by Russian government officials. Rather than being thanked, he was arrested, imprisoned without trial, denied medical care and beaten to death in a Moscow detention centre. He was 37 years old. He died in 2009.
When his name is embedded in law, it tells the world—every abuser, every corrupt official and every torturer—exactly what these sanctions are for and exactly whom they are named after. That clarity has a power.
Here is a striking fact that underscores exactly why renaming matters. Canada's Magnitsky act, the Justice for Victims of Corrupt Foreign Officials Act, was used basically once—in 2018—in its entire existence to sanction Russian officials responsible for Sergei Magnitsky's murder. Every subsequent human rights sanction that Canada has imposed—roughly 1,000—has been made under SEMA, which was updated and broadened as a direct consequence of the Magnitsky act.
In other words, the law that carries Sergei's name has been used once, while the law that doesn't carry his name has been used 1,000 times to do exactly what the Magnitsky act was intended to do. If these sanctions exist to hold human rights abusers accountable—and they do—then it's only logical and only just that they carry the name of the man whose murder inspired them.
This is not only a moral argument but also a practical one. When Canada and its allies seek to coordinate and harmonize Magnitsky sanctions, as they increasingly do, having Canada's equivalent law operating under a completely different name creates real confusion. Diplomats, parliamentarians and civil society organizations working across jurisdictions must be able to identify, compare and align their sanctions regimes quickly and clearly. When every other country calls it a Magnitsky act and Canada does not, that alignment becomes harder than it needs to be.
Bill C-219 would correct both the injustice and the anomaly. I can think of no better illustration of that power than the man sitting in the hearing today—Vladimir Kara-Murza. He played a key role in the passage of 35 Magnitsky acts around the world. He was one of the earliest and most courageous advocates for the entire global movement. He survived two assassination attempts by poisoning with military-grade chemical agents and kept going. When Putin launched his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Vladimir publicly condemned it and was arrested. He was sentenced to 25 years in a remote Siberian penal colony on fabricated charges of treason.
Canada was the first country in the world to impose Magnitsky sanctions on his persecutors, in November 2022, while he was still behind bars. That was Canada's Magnitsky act working exactly as it was designed—not waiting for a conviction in some distant court, but acting swiftly and decisively to impose a cost on the individuals responsible for an outrage.
On August 1, 2024, Vladimir was released as part of a larger prisoner exchange with Russia—the largest prisoner exchange with Russia since the Cold War. Canada's Parliament also granted him honorary citizenship. He is alive and free, in part, because of the pressure the Magnitsky sanctions created. There is proof of concept sitting in this room.
Now, Bill C-219 would make Canada's law significantly stronger. Let me briefly outline the most important upgrades. It would extend sanctions to cover transnational repression—authoritarian regimes reaching into democratic countries to silence dissidents. Russia, China and others do this constantly. I'm personally a victim of this. Canada's law must be able to respond to it.
The new law would extend consequences to immediate family members of sanctioned individuals. Right now, a sanctioned oligarch's wife and children can live freely in Canada, attending university and owning property. That loophole guts the deterrent effect of sanctions. This bill would close it.
This new bill would create parliamentary accountability, requiring the minister to respond when a committee recommends sanctions and requiring orders to be tabled in Parliament. This matters because the greatest weakness in every Magnitsky regime is the gap between recommendation and action. Governments receive lists of sanctionable individuals and simply do not act. Accountability to Parliament is the remedy, and it establishes mandatory annual human rights reporting by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, ensuring that Canada's commitment to prisoners of conscience is documented, tracked and publicly visible.
I spent 15 years working with parliaments on these laws. The countries with the strongest Magnitsky regimes are the ones whose laws have real teeth—where abusers know their assets can be frozen, their visas denied and their family members held accountable. Vladimir Kara-Murza is proof that these laws save lives. Bill C-219 would make Canada's law one of the strongest in the world and I urge the committee to pass it.
Thank you.