Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your invitation to appear before you. My name is Muzna Dureid and I work with the White Helmets as liaison officer. First, I would like to thank the Canadian society and the Government of Canada for their historic intervention to protect the White Helmets members who were given the opportunity to flee Syria, the country of fear and death. Without your moral intervention, our team and their families would have died in Syria.
The life of the members of our team who remain in Syria is still in jeopardy, and they are targeted by the forces of Bachar al-Assad and Russia. A lot of them have been killed, and we lost 302 volunteers. The White Helmets were set up in 2013 to come to the assistance of the victims of war. We are also known by the name of the Syrian Civil Defence. That humanitarian organization was funded by Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Japan.
Inspired by the UN Blue Helmets and aiming to support emergency assistance, Syrian Civil Defence brings together volunteers who intervene on the ground or in prisons. There can be as many as 3,000 volunteers. We carried out approximately 200,000 rescue interventions. In Canada, the 19 White Helmet families are continuing to arrive. They now live in Nova Scotia, Ontario, Saskatchewan and British Columbia. We hope that our mission will continue; that is why we are in contact with the Canadian Red Cross and the National Search and Rescue Program. We want to integrate and serve our new country, Canada, as our new homeland. We hope to be able to continue to be active in the same way in Syria, and we would like to contribute to saving lives here, if possible. I thank you for your efforts. We are grateful for the work done by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada.
In 2016, the United Nations announced that it would begin to work on the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration in the context of the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants. This declaration came to be following the wave of migrations that led to the death of over 7,500 migrants in the Mediterranean Sea in 2015 and 2016 alone. Since the year 2000, as the refugee crisis unfolded, the number of irregular immigration victims went up to over 60,000. The destination countries did not carry out rescue operations; they only countered the ocean-going migration attempts. To support the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, human rights and the protection of the most vulnerable, the compact includes among other things the establishment of a forum to review international immigration. As a follow-up mechanism, a meeting will be held every four years as of 2022. We recommend that Canada support that forum.
In that context, following up on the commitments made by the countries of the pact will be essential. That is why we are asking the UN to respect the plan described to that end in the Global Compact, which plans to include civil society organizations as stakeholders, including migrant community organizations. The Global Compact is not legally binding. There is a risk that its progressive measures will only be lip service if no leadership is shown in that regard.
Investing in refugees is an investment in the future. We are human, just like everyone else. I lost my friends to the Mediterranean Sea, people who were looking for a better life. All of those who say no to the pact are voting in favour of human trafficking, slavery, rape and the murder of all these human beings who are looking for a better future. I am an asylum seeker here in Canada. I arrived in Montreal in November 2016. I used to work with the women in the camp before I left for Canada. I used to deliver whistles and flashlights to the women simply so that they could go to the washrooms during the night. Just imagine the situation of these women in the camps. They make up 48% of the refugee population.
I was one of the finalists among those chosen as the 25 best immigrants in Canada after spending only one year here. I was chosen by the Quebec Ministry of Immigration, Diversity and Inclusion as a Montreal leader.
I also took part in consultations on Canada's 2017-2022 National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security. I did all of that in a year and a half.
All we need is the opportunity to change our reality. You will see that we deserve it. What we don't deserve is that our lives be wasted. We should not be used as a political threat.
Thank you.