That's a great question. I couldn't agree with you more on that one.
I think when we talk about justice, and when I talk about the local conflict and the need for a local response, it has to be backed up by international community support, a sense that the international community is following and is supporting efforts that are being undertaken at the local level, be it justice or reconciliation. If these initiatives are seen as strictly Iraqi- or KRG-led, they won't necessarily have the credibility for local communities because there is that high level of distrust.
What that can mean in a very tangible sense is deploying Canadian or Danish constitutional law experts or criminal law experts to help advise and stand up local processes. There are lots of different iterations by which the international community can show that it remains concerned and engaged. One reason for an international independent investigation, created ideally by the Security Council so it has a chapter VII kind of mandate, which calls for co-operation between both Baghdad and Erbil, is that it shows the international community is taking it seriously and is concerned about justice and accountability. You need that to help shore up the credibility of a process. There needs to be that hand-in-hand of the international community and local efforts for the initial period of time.
In terms of early detection, it's a really good question, because the question is when do you start looking at this scenario? We saw a drawdown for many years, not just in the military presence in Nineveh but also even development funding from across the board. I spoke with many different government officials who were involved in a response, really from 2011 on, who said that the attitude and the orientation was, at the time, that, well, Iraq's on its road to recovery, and it has the capacity to protect minorities. As a result, we saw a disengagement, even just on the diplomatic side, from raising concerns about the protection of minorities and creating programming that would have addressed some of the grievances in Nineveh and elsewhere.
To get to an earlier question, Canada putting more of a focus on addressing the political dispute between Baghdad and Erbil, there has to be a voice or multiple voices from within the international community stressing the need to resolve this particular problem. I'm very concerned that we keep punting it year after year to some situation when we think that Iraq is going to be better and more stable. For communities that are trapped there, the reality is that the uncertainty continues to create inherent vulnerabilities, and those who suffer the most are vulnerable minorities. It could be an area where Canada could have a unique role to play. Given our own history, I think we might perhaps have more credibility on that issue in trying to deal with it than many others.