Subcommittee on International Human Rights Committee on Jan. 29th, 2019

[Cheryl Hardcastle, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

In the interest of time, instead of eloquently leading into this, I'm just going to be blunt, and hopefully it will be a shortcut for you to understand my point.

We were talking earlier about fostering the idea of gender equality within a male-dominated society as we move forward. We have men in a lot of decision-making positions right now. In order to get women into these decision-making positions, we still have to have these men enlightened.

You were talking about training and how important that is. I think, just as an example, there were gender equity awards, or something like that, awarded by the United Arab Emirates, all of which went to men. Some people are rolling their eyes, but you can see a situation where this is so male dominated. At what point do we say that's our priority, to train men as well, and not just women?

Yes, you're nodding your head, so you get what I mean.

[Beth Woroniuk]

I think that's a really good point, and thank you for the question.

The thing we've learned is that working towards gender equality is not just about fixing women. It is important that women have more skills, more education, and more access to credit to build their own businesses, but we know that we have to look at that relationship between women and men. That's where these discussions are so important.

I think we've learned that change happens over generations. Some of the most interesting discussions I've had on gender roles and inequalities have been with my two sons. I think this is the kind of discussion that happens inside families, inside different organizations, inside religious organizations. It's the changing of these social norms that happens over time.

That's why it's often the women's organizations that are the key players doing this. They know their local situation best. They know what kinds of arguments work in their communities. They can approach this issue in a very concrete and specific way and share strategies internally about what works. One of the best levers to move on changing social norms and social attitudes is a stronger support for women's rights organizations working at grassroots levels.

[Rachel Vincent]

I was just going to add that one of the global challenges is fundamentalisms, and I say it with an “s” because there are multiple forms of fundamentalism.

When I was working and researching a book a couple of years ago that included and documented stories of women human rights defenders, one of the stories was about a woman defender of Moroccan origin living in France, who was trying to tackle an issue or trend that we're seeing globally of young men being more reactionary on women's rights than some of the older men. She had lost a son who had been recruited as a terrorist and she was going to schools in France and speaking to young people not only about her loss, but also about the role of young men and what masculinity should be. She was very powerful because she was speaking from a place of loss, from having lost her son and using that personal experience to reach out to others. Again, it's because she understands the context and the vulnerability, the poverty, that they come from, the vulnerability that these young men experience. She is from those communities where young men are being targeted for such activity.

Again, to reinforce Beth's point with that example, just today I read that two-thirds of Afghan men oppose women's rights, but if you look at the trend, it's the older men who are more flexible on that point and more willing to consider women's rights to be something of value, as opposed to the younger men in Afghanistan.

Again, I think those are the kinds of things that women's rights organizations on the ground would know better than we would of where the pressure points are to address those issues.

[The Chair]

You have two more minutes.

[Cheryl Hardcastle, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Canada is funding a couple of initiatives right now and targeting training for human rights defenders. Should we be finessing this? Should this be finessed more towards the local level, or do you think what we're doing right now is the right approach and that it just needs to build momentum?

[Beth Woroniuk]

I think one of the key elements to this is that there's not one right training approach. Local organizations of defenders usually know what they need, the skills they're lacking and where to get them, and are often best placed to design their own training. Supporting these organizations is the best way to go, rather than our designing a made-in-Canada training program that we think people should take.

You can sense a theme here, that we really think local women's organizations are best placed and suited to this and know the solutions, but what they often lack is the resources to put their plans into action.

[Rachel Vincent]

Perhaps I could add another example. At the end of my presentation, I was stumbling in trying to talk to you about these Yemeni women. I was invited to provide some media training to them because, obviously, they want to access more western media to explain their analysis of how to end the war in Yemen.

What they asked for as a follow-up—meaning that I'll probably be going back to them—is training on UN Security Council Resolution 1325 as a framework, because they're trying to.... Going back to your point about mediators, they're interested in that. Indeed, one of the things we hear over and over again at the UN is that there aren't enough qualified women to sit around the peace table. Well, there are, and these women are very aware of this critique about there not being enough women and have been training themselves to be mediators, to actually know the 1325 framework and how to do peace negotiations. That's the kind of training they're asking from us. Again, it's coming from them; we are not telling them.

[The Chair]

Thank you.

I will ask members to keep this round to four minutes so we don't run out of time.

We'll start with Mr. Fragiskatos.

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you for being here today. I've had the pleasure of hearing both of you testify in other committee settings.

On the topic of UN resolution 1325, I think it's apropos that it has come up here today. It sounds that having women human rights defenders defending their interests is a moral good in and of itself, but beyond that, we also know if we're trying to champion the idea of peace in our foreign policy and in our international development policy, there is very good empirical evidence that when women are involved in negotiating peace after conflict those societies remain much more stable. When women human rights defenders are involved in a peace process, it sounds as if they might be your best bet because they have so much experience and understanding of the politics and political situation in their society, understanding what is necessary for restoring that society, its legal system, its political system, its socioeconomic situation.

Would that be a good guess?

[Beth Woroniuk]

Thank you for that observation. That point is right on target.

One of the elements of the research that people sometimes overlook is that it's not just a matter of involving women, any women, in peace processes. It's when women have support behind them from civil society connections and have a meaningful space to operate in those peace negotiations. That's exactly the role that women human rights defenders can play, because they have those connections and that experience. They often come out of a particular area where they have knowledge of judicial issues or how things operate in a particular geographic context, or they may have strong relationships with community and religious leaders. That then helps them knit communities together and build peace.

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

I think it's quite important. As you say, it's not just about adding women to the peace process and then, as a result, having a much more promising opening towards a peaceful path. It's about recognizing that particular lived experiences stand out, and when we're talking about women human rights defenders, they have a unique experience that ought to be recognized. So when Canada and other democracies wish to advocate for peace, we ought to be championing the cause of women human rights defenders if we're interested in finding a sustainable path towards peace in various conflicts.

I very much support everything you're doing, but I worry sometimes when politicians in western countries say that they ought to get behind cause X, Y, or Z in a particular country, because that can then be spun by opponents of peace defenders in the target country by saying that these women human rights defenders, for example, are backed by the Canadians and Americans and Europeans and are advocating for outside interests. It can make their situation on the ground even worse because they're then seen as not being of the society, if you know where I'm going with this.

I think there are ways around this. What would you counsel in this situation?

[The Chair]

Unfortunately, we don't have time for the answer, but you may be able to refer back to it in one of the future questions.

We will go to Mr. Sweet for four minutes.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Flamborough—Glanbrook, ON]

Really, from the bottom of my heart, I just want to say thank you for your great work, your courage, and for being available to women who are in desperate situations, such as women from Yemen or the Yazidi women who have been mentioned. I want to thank you very much for the good work you do.

You mentioned, and I agree with you totally, that one of the most important work is to support and fund local women's organizations, to make sure they're building bench strength—to use a sports metaphor—in the local area, to have change happen.

You know, the worldwide web is a great tool for good and a great tool for evil, and there are all kinds of demeaning material on the web. I don't need to go through the litany of it, but I find that some of the disturbing discussions I have with young men result from material they've seen on the web from which they come up with presuppositions about how women should be treated.

Whether in your group or others, is there a strategy to address this? Of course, for anything criminal, obviously, it's a matter of raising awareness of that with law enforcement, but is there a strategy to monitor it, name and shame, or re-educate, so that these things don't have the power that the worldwide web can give them?

[Beth Woroniuk]

I think there are numerous strategies and organizations working to try to address this issue. We do hear from women human rights defenders that digital security is of prime importance.

As Rachel said, a lot of young women get targeted. We know a lot about trolls, but they are often very hard to counteract. Some groups do security training. Some of it even revolves around how to keep your phone safe. There's digital security in another area as well, in terms of what you have on your phone if you're an activist, and how that could work.

I think it's not an easy issue to address, but if digital security is something the committee would like to take up, we'd be happy to recommend groups working in that area to come before you to explore that issue more.

[Rachel Vincent]

I would say that one of the young women we brought to Canada for six weeks a few years ago is an expert on digital security. She works in Guatemala with community organizations on training in digital security. She's a young indigenous activist and is fabulous. It would be great to hear from people on the ground about how they're dealing with this.

Women's organizations are highly creative in dealing with digital threats, from Iran to Guatemala and everywhere in-between. One of the things I have learned from them is that they have a lot to teach us.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Flamborough—Glanbrook, ON]

There are both aspects. I understand the need for individual digital security, but there's also the broader false education trying to posit women in a very terrible light so that mistreatment is perpetuated.

[Rachel Vincent]

It's a problem globally for all of us.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Flamborough—Glanbrook, ON]

Yes, it sure is.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair]

I wish we had more time because I think there's a lot of information here.

We will go to Mr. Hehr for four minutes.

[Kent Hehr, Liberal, Calgary Centre, AB]

Thank you very much for your very enlightening presentation. I note that you indicated earlier that one of the things you're most concerned about for women human rights defenders and human rights defenders in general is that safe passage to other jurisdictions in times of conflict, in times of strife, with climate change and conflict around.

Would you comment on whether or not being involved in things like the global compact for migration and other things like that are important for the Government of Canada, and whether these types of institutions through the United Nations help women defenders of human rights?

[Rachel Vincent]

I can speak for myself. I'm not an expert on migration per se, and I think that's an important element to address in your study. That's why one of our recommendations focuses on both the permanent and the temporary relocation needs of women human rights defenders, and the need to be speaking to IRCC as well as to human rights defenders and others on the list that we submitted.

Global migration is at an all-time high, and defenders are among those who need relocation, so it is increasingly a reality that we are all living. Canada, as a country that has brought in Syrians, for example, is one that human rights defenders look to, so I think that's a role that we need to look at and take seriously. That's why we hope that you'll cover it in your study.

[Beth Woroniuk]

Of course, with Canada's being part of the United Nations systems, we do rely heavily on UN institutions. IRCC relies heavily on UNHCR, the refugee organization, for the identification of women at risk and other refugees. Certainly it's part of the global system that we operate in, and a strong multilateral system can serve Canada well.

[Kent Hehr, Liberal, Calgary Centre, AB]

I think this will probably be the last question.

Give a best practices that you think we need to take note of at this time and that you would ask us to follow up on or hear about. Are there any best practices out there in the field that were not touched on here at this time?

[Beth Woroniuk]

I mentioned some, including for example how different European countries offer respite and quick visas to get defenders out of emergency situations. That's something that Canada could take another look at. It would be interesting. The Government of Sweden has piloted an emergency bracelet program, Project Natalia, where defenders have a bracelet they can activate if they are picked up by authorities. That might be something to look at. Certainly the way different governments fund organizations through their aid programs, or other ways, that support defenders would be something that would be really important to look at as well. Given the importance that these networks of women human rights defenders and LGBTIQ defenders, how we can best support those movements is really important as well.

[Rachel Vincent]

I just want to respond to your last question. Very quickly, I think that countries like Canada have a huge role to play within the UN system in advocating for women's inclusion in peace processes. The UN can be a hostile environment for women human rights defenders and Canada has played a good behind-the-scenes role in the past. That's just a short answer.