Good afternoon.
I will just make the usual disclaimer that UN officials make at the beginning of such evidence, which is that my attendance before the standing committee is in my capacity as special rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism.
I'm here to provide an informal, unsworn, oral briefing to the foreign affairs committee in the framework of the discussion on Syria and Iraq. Nothing in my remarks should be construed as a waiver, express or implied, of the privileges or immunities of the United Nations officials or experts, pursuant to the 1946 Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the United Nations. Thank you.
Let me make some generic remarks.
As you know, the mandate I hold has been intimately engaged with the situation of civilians, particularly women and children, who find themselves in northeast Syria, including a significant number of Canadian nationals. The mandate I hold, along with 15 other special procedure mechanisms of the United Nations, has issued a letter to 57 states, of whom Canada is one, that have their nationals currently held—women and children—in camps and in detention sites in northeast Syria.
This list, in my view, is not a list that any state wants to be on, because it is a list that defines a set of obligations to individuals in this territory and defines the failure of states to live up to their international obligations.
We have made clear in this letter that there are multiple and serious human rights violations taking place for your nationals, Canadian nationals, in the situation in northeast Syria. They include torture and inhuman and degrading treatment, including for Canadian children. They include the danger of, and actual, sexual and reproductive harm to women and to minors. They include arbitrary detention, risks to the right to life, restrictions on freedom of movement, denial of the right to non-discrimination, and the abrogation of the rights to education, health, and clean and safe water.
I have consistently affirmed the obligations of states, including Canada, to urgently repatriate their third country nationals.
Let me be clear that other states are doing this. My mandate works closely with a large number of states that have, even throughout the COVID pandemic, worked to ensure the safe return of their nationals. With the exception of one minor child, an orphan, Canada has not been among those states making large-scale returns.
I want to stress that your nationals are being held by non-state actors who have no legitimate basis to hold them.
The situation is worsening in the camps. The mandate has, for example, been aware in the last two weeks of a significant military incursion in the camps, a clearing out, and another data and biometric data-collecting exercise on persons held there. We remain deeply concerned about the gathering of information on third country nationals and the question of with whom that data will be shared.
Let me make a couple of brief remarks about a group that has not had much attention in the camps: adolescent boys, young boys under the age 18.
It's particularly concerning to me that while our attention has been on females—girls and mothers—there are a sizable number of adolescent boys being held in prison facilities on what appears to me to be multiple spurious grounds. Some of these facilities, including for Canadian nationals, have been described as rehabilitation camps. I would unreservedly voice my concern at the use of this nomenclature. There is no legal basis to justify the detention of any of the children being held in these so-called rehabilitation sites. None have been legally represented, no best-interest test has been applied to keep them there, and no child has meaningful exit from the camp unless Canada is prepared to take them back.
There is an obligation not just on human rights and moral grounds to return your women and children home, but also on security grounds.
The long-term security of this region and of all states will only be secured when all the individuals in the camps are returned or a safe process has been put in place for those who can't be returned on the basis of non-refoulement. Security and human rights are the basis for return, and both are imperatives.
Thank you.