Subcommittee on International Human Rights Committee on June 11th, 2019

[David Anderson, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anita Vandenbeld]

Thank you.

We'll now go to Mr. Fragiskatos for seven minutes.

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

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Ms. Savic, for being here, and thank you for your work. Stateless minorities face a particularly difficult time in the international environment when it comes to raising their voices, and your spearheading of advocacy here in Canada means a great deal. I want to ask you about that with my first question.

Here in Canada, while you've also mentioned that you're collaborating with others—in Europe, I take it, and perhaps the United States—where does your advocacy tend to concentrate? Is it within national parliaments or the United Nations, or is it a combination? How do you do it?

[Dafina Savic]

Everywhere, quite frankly and, as I mentioned, that is because one of the main issues of Roma is invisibility. It's an invisibility in terms of Roma as a people. For a lot of people in the Americas, the very existence of the Roma is being denied. When I introduce myself and I say that I'm Roma, people are like, “That's not a thing.” There are even the stereotypes associated with gypsies.

There's a strong dehumanization of Roma, which is actually one of the steps in genocide, in terms of the strong belief that—quote, unquote—“being a gypsy” is not a people but a lifestyle. It contributes to the dehumanization of Roma. It makes it very difficult to address issues in the Americas. Even in human rights circles when we are presenting the situations of Roma, that is often disregarded, or they say, “Oh, but Roma, that's a little different.” That's one aspect.

In terms of our advocacy work for the past seven years, we've addressed it at every level, both provincially and, as I mentioned, federally. Since 2012, we have submitted a report on Bill C-31 to every single minister. We've requested meetings, which unfortunately we haven't had yet. We're still waiting.

I am a former UN minority fellow, so we are also working with the UN's OHCHR based in Geneva. We were part of the past two regional Roma in the Americas workshops, which we helped organized in the Americas. We were recently at Harvard University, and we facilitated the collaboration between the OHCHR and Harvard University to continue the recommendations that were made during the last Roma in the Americas regional workshop, which took place in Boston. We're working now with the UN for the upcoming session, which most likely will be in Mexico.

We also work with a strong network of European-based organizations that are working strongly with the Council of Europe. That initiative actually led in 2015 to the official recognition by the European Parliament of the Roma genocide. We are working with them mostly in terms of the recognition of the Roma genocide. We've recently been approached by the European Network on Statelessness to become a member of the network, which is also addressing issues mainly of statelessness, mostly in Europe.

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

You're busy. That's your point.

[Dafina Savic]

Yes, a little bit.

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

It sounds like it. Again, I commend you, because it requires a lot of effort, to say the least.

I've had the opportunity in the past, in a previous life, if I can put it that way. Prior to going into politics, I worked as an academic and media commentator, and your experience parallels very closely what the Kurdish minority and the Amazigh minority have done in terms of raising international attention and awareness about their cause.

I wanted to ask you, though, about something quite specific. You've touched on it here today a bit, but I wonder if you could expand. What are the main goals? If you're going to leave this committee with a message on what you would like to see this government enact in terms of an approach to some of the issues you have raised, what one or two take-aways can we keep in mind as a committee?

[Dafina Savic]

We have a few, but I'll keep it to two.

In terms of our objectives in Canada in relation to the situation in Europe, really over the past seven years our priority has been the recognition by the Canadian government of the Romani genocide. As I mentioned, it is an essential step in preventing a genocide as we see it, especially today, because what we are asking in the bill that we drafted is for a commitment to recognizing the Romani genocide, but also with that commitment, committing to addressing the human rights situation of Roma not only in Europe but worldwide.

Also, securing rights for Romani refugees has been a priority for us, so the elimination of Bill C-31, or at least the revision of the criteria used to determine what does and does not constitute a safe country is definitely a priority. I think the Canadian government has the responsibility, at least as a first step, to speak out about the very gross violations that Roma are facing. When Roma are being killed, the world is actually silent, so I think Canada could take a lead on responsibility in this.

I just want to say that we are currently working with Global Affairs and Canadian Heritage regarding the recognition. We have asked Global Affairs to address situations with embassies in those countries, so we have been in touch, for example, with the ambassador to Bulgaria regarding the recent killing of a Roma child and the hate speech promoted by a minister at the time. We are now trying to address situations in France. The Canadian government could take a leadership role in at least facilitating dialogue between the embassies in those countries with strong Romani populations.

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

I'm happy that engagement has at least begun, so thank you for that.

You could come to this committee with 40 priorities and not leave us with any priorities, but you've left us with two things to consider and ponder.

Madam Chair, do I have time for one more question?

[The Chair, Liberal, Anita Vandenbeld]

You have one minute.

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

Okay. This is my final question then.

You talked about social media and about particular images and particular narratives that are circulating on social media. I know you didn't get into it, but I'm going to guess you mean WhatsApp and Twitter, and perhaps we can think of other examples. Here in Canada, in fact, we've had a whole debate, and recently a committee of parliamentarians based in Canada but from various countries convened to talk about what democracies can do to look at social media. As MPs, we continue to urge—and I know the government has said this as well—social media organizations to recognize their responsibilities to combat false information, fake news, the real fake news, and not the fake news that some say exists, which is actually true.

Can you go into that?

[Dafina Savic]

Sure.

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

You've talked about the Roma as being particular victims, victimized within, especially populist rhetoric these days that builds upon historical narratives that have always targeted the Roma. When you talk about advocacy, are your organization and others like it asking Facebook, Twitter and those who run WhatsApp to get serious about policing the sorts of activities that happen on their platforms?

[Dafina Savic]

I guess there are three answers to your question.

First, I mentioned before that we work in strong collaboration with other groups that have been victims of genocide. Recently, in April, in the context of Genocide Awareness and Prevention Month, we were here to ask the Canadian government to adopt a policy on the prevention of online hate. We all know that genocide begins with words, and one of the main triggers is actually the legitimization of hate speech, especially on social media. You mentioned Twitter. I mentioned what happened in France, which was actually purely the result of the promotion of fake news on Twitter, which led to attacks on Roma settlements. Most people were hospitalized simply because of the spread of a rumour. There's a medieval stereotype in which Roma were believed to actually steal children. Based on the spread of that, hate against Roma was promoted. Of course, we are addressing it.

I think that in the Americas the issue, as I mentioned before, is that we actually have to fight to get people to stop using the word “gypsy” as being synonymous with “nomad” or “free-spirited”. The level of dehumanization is very strong. In Europe, we have many—

I see that my time's up.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anita Vandenbeld]

Yes. Thank you very much. Maybe you can elaborate in a later answer.

We'll go to Ms. Hardcastle for seven minutes.

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

Ms. Savic, I'd actually like you to continue to elaborate on that, because I have to be honest with you that if we're going to educate people and be candid and be respectful of Roma, I want to understand more about using terminology like “gypsy” and what we can do on social media.

Go ahead.

[Dafina Savic]

I won't give you their historical background, because it is quite long. I'll just give you an understanding of why the terminology is derogatory. Of course, as in many situations, the use of the G-word is often debated.

The root of the word “gypsy” comes from the Greek word athinganos, which means “untouchable”. This term was imposed on Roma when they first arrived in Europe. Because they had darker skin, they were falsely believed to be Egyptian. “Egypt” became “gyp”. When you say you're being gypped, it's synonymous with theft. The very identity of Roma is associated with theft or robbery. We have American TV shows like Gypsy. It has nothing to do with Roma, but it has to do with misbehaving, I guess, or theft and robbery. There's a restaurant that just opened in Montreal, and it's called Gypsy. We contacted them and said that was derogatory. They said they thought it was “free-spirited” and so it was okay.

In terms of the level of understanding, convincing people to use the right terminology is difficult. We made a recommendation to the United Nations to adopt a resolution to officially condemn the use of the word for their purposes. The challenge that comes with that, similar to the use of the N-word, is that some Roma will identify themselves with the term, as it's been like that for centuries. It's about reclaiming the term. So a lot of layers of complexity lie with that.

As for what concretely can be done, definitely there's social media. I think Facebook especially has been under a lot of scrutiny. In the case of Myanmar, for example, there's the responsibility of social media in allowing hate speech. Definitely there are concrete things that can be done. I think the first thing is to start to condemn globally the use of such terminology when we see it. It is very difficult, given the scope of the human rights violations of Roma, to address terminology. In the Americas, I would say it's one of the root causes of the dehumanization of Roma and the perception of Roma as not being a group of people but rather as a social behaviour. This in fact is one of the reasons that the human rights violations against Roma continue to be justified today.

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

That's really interesting. I was just signalling, because I think the members of Parliament who are from the Montreal area need to have this explained to them. Even a best-case scenario would have the restaurant change its name, but you understand a small business person's perspective; they put a lot of investment into the name. They can also use social media to talk about what they're embracing and what they're denouncing. They can do that.

[Dafina Savic]

Of course.

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

That's so intriguing. I'm so glad you spoke to us about that, because there is a lot we can do.

Can you tell us what we should be taking away in terms of this issue of the designated country of origin list and removing the countries? Where do you think we should be going with that moving forward?

[Dafina Savic]

Of course, our recommendation is to eliminate Bill C-31 as a practice. Bill C-31 did not only negatively impact Roma. In fact, the safe country list constitutes all the countries that are under the European Union, as well as Mexico and the United States. Most of the countries were arbitrarily placed on the list. After the removal.... The visa that was imposed on Hungary and Romania was a direct result of the fear of Roma coming to Canada.

Moving forward, definitely our recommendation is to eliminate Bill C-31, but if for whatever reason that's not possible, I think definitely we should reinstate the provision that was part of the Minister of Immigration's mandate, which is to revise the criteria that decide whether a country is safe or not. This is not only for Roma but also for minorities at large in most of these countries where we definitely see a rise in the far right. We see a rise of anti-Semitism as well in those countries. In those countries there is also a strong homophobic sentiment. I think we need to define the criteria under which a country is considered safe, and for whom.

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

I need to clarify that in May of this year, all the countries were removed from the list.

[Dafina Savic]

Yes. Well, the thing is that there are still impacts from that. Since 2012, in terms of the commission and the way the decisions are made, I can only speak to the situations of Roma refugees, because those are the cases we've worked on. For example, I mentioned that we have a deportation case that we're working on now. We see the impacts of the bill in terms of the perception it had that those countries were safe. That's actually used in decisions to justify the lack of credibility of the claim, because those countries are perceived to be safe.

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

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anita Vandenbeld]

We will now go to Mr. Tabbara for five minutes.