Evidence of meeting #3 for Subcommittee on International Human Rights in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was bahá'ís.
A recording is available from Parliament.
1:50 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Scott Reid
We're out of time on that question and response.
Mr. Hiebert, you're next.
I'll just mention that if we keep these brief, we'll have time for Mr. Silva and then Mr. Sweet, allowing everybody to have a question.
Mr. Hiebert, please.
1:50 p.m.
Conservative
Russ Hiebert Conservative South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC
Thank you.
Mr. Chair, I'd like to start by saying that I'd like to give notice of motion to consider adopting a motion at our next meeting. I don't think we'll have the time to do so today, but I would certainly be prepared to draft something and have it for everybody's review at our next meeting.
Thank you both for being here.
With the limited time I have, I wanted to clarify a couple of things. You mentioned more than once targeted sanctions, travel bans, asset freezes. You mentioned a third option as well, Mr. Akhavan. I didn't catch it. After travel bans and asset freezes, in your opening presentation you had another suggestion.
1:50 p.m.
Conservative
1:50 p.m.
Professor, Faculty of Law, McGill University
Well, they could in part be from Canada. With respect to the Zahra Kazemi affair, the Criminal Code clearly provides jurisdiction for Canadian courts where the victim of torture is a Canadian citizen. And I'm dismayed that if two Canadian tourists are killed in Mexico, there is an immediate RCMP investigation, but when a Canadian citizen is brutally tortured and murdered in Iran, there is a tremendous resistance to taking any action.
In the case of Canada, it's an unhappy coincidence, if you like, that one of the most notorious figures in the repression of dissidents also happens to be implicated in the Zahra Kazemi affair. At the international level, there is the possibility of at least discussing before the United Nations Security Council the referral of crimes against humanity committed by the Iranian leadership to the International Criminal Court.
I think the mere discussion of this issue would have an impact, even if we believe it's not politically feasible. The adoption of resolutions that name the particular individuals involved in orchestrating these crimes is, I think, the direction in which both the diplomatic discourse and the prospect of more tangible judicial sanctions should go.
1:50 p.m.
Conservative
Russ Hiebert Conservative South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC
And how would you identify who would deserve to be named and sanctioned?
1:50 p.m.
Professor, Faculty of Law, McGill University
Well, that's interesting. If one looks at the nuclear issue, the Security Council seems to have had no problem identifying particular individuals. There can be a commission of inquiry, there can be appropriate procedures to ensure this is not done in an arbitrary or indiscriminate way.
And we've seen this issue raised in many, many contexts--for example, the financing of terrorist activities, and the multinational corporations that might be doing business in the Congo. This is not something that is entirely alien to the Security Council and other bodies.
1:55 p.m.
Conservative
Russ Hiebert Conservative South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC
Why do you think Iran is so sensitive to the views of the countries of the Caribbean and Africa? Does that extend to other members of the Commonwealth?
1:55 p.m.
Professor, Faculty of Law, McGill University
Part of the rhetoric of Iran is that the human rights record of Iran is fine, but that western countries under the influence of American and Zionist circles are using this as an issue to denounce the Islamic republic and the sovereignty of the Iranian people. It's extremely important to demonstrate that this is not the case, that it is a wider global concern. The Iranian government has gone to great lengths, even with respect to small South Pacific states, such as the Solomon Islands, basically to give them small aid packages in order to make sure they don't vote against Iran in the General Assembly.
So the fact, for example, that Asma Jahangir, a Pakistani human rights expert, denounces the persecution of the Bahá'ís is far more damaging, in a sense, than western leaders doing so, because they are expected to make these remarks.
1:55 p.m.
Conservative
Russ Hiebert Conservative South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC
All right, my last question is this. You've talked about other religions being recognized within the constitution but the Bahá'í faith not being recognized. Are there other small minority faiths that are also being persecuted like the Bahá'í?
1:55 p.m.
Professor, Faculty of Law, McGill University
It's a very good question. I would say that the majority are being persecuted. There are more ayatollahs in prison today in Iran than there ever were under the secular government of the Shah. A special court was established in 1987 for the specific purpose of prosecuting dissident clergy. Ayatollah Montazeri, referred to by Ms. Tamas, who had issued a fatwa saying that the Bahá'ís had the rights of every other Iranian citizen, was supposed to be the successor to Ayatollah Khomeini. He's been under house arrest for the past 20 years.
So the Bahá'ís are the only minority that is categorically legally excluded. They're not recognized as a legitimate religious minority, so they have no rights under the constitution. But other minorities are under various degrees of pressure.
The point is that in an authoritarian theocracy, monopolization of religious truth is the basis of power. So one of the biggest threats to the regime are dissident Islamic clerics who say that for 500 years of Shia Islam, there has always been a separation of state and religion, and who believe that the orthodoxy of their faith requires a separation of political power from the spiritual life of people.
1:55 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Scott Reid
That uses up all the time in that round.
Mr. Silva, please. I will ask you to be brief.
1:55 p.m.
Liberal
Mario Silva Liberal Davenport, ON
Mr. Chair, I'll be very brief.
First of all, I want to thank both of you for coming here on such very short notice.
When we hear, both from the witnesses today and from other reports, of the demonization of the Bahá'í people, the language that has been used, the identification and monitoring of the Bahá'ís, and the arrests that have taken place of people of that faith, this is incitement to genocide. It really is the beginning stages. This is what we have witnessed in many other countries, and it's very frightening.
Canada, as the champion and author in many ways of the responsibility-to-protect doctrine, has an obligation as well to be proactive. It's not just incumbent on this committee, which has adopted the motion that was put forward last Tuesday, but I think this also requires Parliament to give its stamp of approval and of concern. I would hope that from this meeting we would be able to ask the foreign affairs committee to adopt the motion that was adopted at this committee and that we would be able to have a debate in the House of Commons so that the House of Commons could also pronounce itself publicly on this issue.
That's a statement and also a motion.
1:55 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Scott Reid
Duly noted. We have a notice of motion requirement that it will have to dealt with at our meeting next Tuesday.
If you have no questions to the witnesses, we'll turn to the last but not least member of the committee, Mr. Sweet.
1:55 p.m.
Conservative
David Sweet Conservative Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Congratulations, Professor, on your appointment.
I would like to echo what Mr. Silva just said. I was listening to the testimony from both of you, and things such as the daily incitement of hatred in all kinds of mass media, the desecration of graves, the ransacking of property and sometimes confiscation of it, and the arrests, all sound eerily like the events leading up to pogrom of the Jewish community prior to the Second World War. So like Mr. Silva, I have some grave concerns in that regard.
I want to zero in on one point that my colleague Mr. Hiebert had talked about, but I just want to get a little more detail.
Is the sole reason the persecution is so pernicious towards the Bahá'í religious minority because they're excluded, or is there some other element of independence that terrifies the ayatollahs?
2 p.m.
Professor, Faculty of Law, McGill University
It's a difficult question to answer. I think there is a combination of fanatical hatred in certain quarters that have been indoctrinated with this demonology for many years and those who genuinely believe that the Bahá'ís are out to destroy Islam. But I think at another level there is a much more cynical scapegoating of the Bahá'ís as a sort of convenient political tactic to rally the masses. We know hate-mongering and political homogenization is one of the oldest and most convenient instruments of authoritarian regimes.
The Bahá'ís historically have been used in this sort of “othering” and stigmatization. This device has been used to consolidate Iran's Shiite identity. In that sense, it is a contrived and instrumentalized use of religious belief in order to consolidate political power.
But I want to end by saying that one of the promising signs, which Ms. Tamas alluded to, is that in addition to Ayatollah Montazeri, you have student leaders, human rights leaders, Kurdish leaders, Communist Party members, an incredibly broad array of Iranians who are now standing in solidarity with Bahá'ís. Recently, 300 Iranian non-Bahá'í intellectuals wrote a letter of apology for their silence in the face of the persecution of the Bahá'ís, and that is what is really scaring the regime. That there is now widespread sympathy for the Bahá'ís among the Iranian public, and they're losing their grip on power. That's why the ominous prospect of an escalation of violence in the coming months goes hand in hand with great promise of the emergence of a liberal culture in Iran.
2 p.m.
Conservative
David Sweet Conservative Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON
That plays into the next and last question—because of the time—that I have.
On the 300,000 Bahá'í people in Iran who are having their property stolen, being jailed, and having no access to universities, what is the state of the human condition right now in the community? For 30 years this persecution has been happening and accelerating. The two of you must have some communications there. Are these other intellectual communities that are rising up and defending them enough to encourage them through this?
February 26th, 2009 / 2 p.m.
Director, Office of Governmental Relations, Bahá'í Community of Canada
One of the things that have stunned me about the Bahá'ís I've met from Iran who have suffered imprisonment or torture or confiscations is the complete lack of resentment in their hearts. The manner in which they've responded to their oppressors has been quite atypical from what we would expect from our society. I think they've shown an incredible resourcefulness.
When their universities were closed down and after they couldn't persuade the government to let them put their students in university, the professors who were fired started their own little underground basement university and started educating the youth. They noticed that there are literacy issues in disadvantaged children, so they're out trying to help by doing literacy in neighbourhoods, not mentioning their faith, simply as a service to the community.
I would say their spirit is far from extinguished, but that doesn't change the agony in their hearts. I'm thinking a lot about the 12-year-old and the 14-year-old children whose parents have been in Evin prison since May 14, and what that is like for them every day when they get up in the morning and don't know where mom and dad are.
So there is human agony, but in terms of response, there is no question the spirit has not been broken and that the Bahá'ís of Iran turn to the people in their community and try to be of service and be good citizens.
2:05 p.m.
Conservative
David Sweet Conservative Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON
Thank you, both.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
2:05 p.m.
Conservative
2:05 p.m.
NDP
Wayne Marston NDP Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON
On a point of order, I'd like to suggest, since I think there's a kind of consensus around this issue, that the committee waive the 48-hour notice for Mr. Silva's motion.
2:05 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Scott Reid
Is there consent to waive the 48-hour notice period for the motion?
Mr. Hiebert.
2:05 p.m.
Conservative
Russ Hiebert Conservative South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC
Mr. Chair, of course we all feel the same way. It was my intent to bring forward a motion more uniquely crafted than what we've looked at in the past, and for us to discuss this on Tuesday. The witnesses have provided us some additional information and ideas that we could incorporate into a motion that would be more specific in its usefulness in seeking that the Government of Iran make some changes to its policies.
It's my hope that we would have at least a couple of days to incorporate these excellent suggestions and then debate and hopefully pass the motion at our next meeting.
2:05 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Scott Reid
We could do something like that.
Procedurally, what I have to do here is ask if we have unanimous consent for this, just so that members know what it is, because the clerk was writing this up as we were chatting earlier.
The motion that would be before us would be to ask the main committee, our parent committee, to adopt the motion that was passed by this committee in the 39th Parliament on the issue of abuse of the human rights of Bahá'ís in Iran, and to table it in the House.
Procedurally I have to ask you if there is consent to that. I'm just going to find out if there is consent.
Yes.
2:05 p.m.
Conservative
David Sweet Conservative Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON
Mr. Chairman, I think we're in semi-agreement here. I would say that if we have unanimous consent on this, the additional motion for our present circumstance could still be worked on for the next meeting.