Evidence of meeting #9 for Subcommittee on International Human Rights in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was genocide.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
The Vice-Chair Conservative Michael Cooper
I gave you 20 extra seconds.
Hopefully you'll have the time to pick that up.
Conservative
Arnold Viersen Conservative Peace River—Westlock, AB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I want to start with Mr. Robinson.
In this article written by you from November 28, 2021, you wrote that, “analysts grounded in reality accept that Russia is not about to invade Ukraine.” This was an article around misinformation and things like that.
How are we to characterize that comment today?
Prof. Paul Robinson
I got that completely wrong. I was not the only person who got that completely wrong. There was a sharp division between military analysts with military dispositions who said it was going to happen and political analysts who pretty much to a man or woman said it wasn't going to happen.
Yes, I got it wrong. I was not alone. I was in the company of a very large number of other people.
Conservative
Arnold Viersen Conservative Peace River—Westlock, AB
What precipitated that? What brought us to the point where a whole swath of people were wrong on this idea?
Prof. Paul Robinson
There are a number of reasons.
The first one is that the Russian state did not prepare it's own public for this at all. If you watched, as I did, Russian television before the invasion, people such as television host Vladimir Solovyov and others, who are regarded as Kremlin propagandists, were all saying it was rubbish. They were actually laughing at it and saying that this is western propaganda, this is a load of garbage and nothing of the sort was going to happen. There was zero attempt to prepare the Russian population for it. In fact, the Russian population was told that the idea this was going to happen was rubbish.
Those of us who expected that you would prepare your population for war were thrown off a little bit by this. We were also thrown off by the fact that what you might call the top political analysts in Russia, people who know Putin, like Fyodor Lukyanov, and others, Andrey Kortunov, Dmitri Trenin—I can list off a whole pile of names—all said it wasn't going to happen. They all said it was just coercive diplomacy.
Because the top names, who supposedly know what people in the Kremlin are thinking, thought it wasn't going to happen, that convinced many of us that it wasn't going to. All the signs coming out of Moscow were against, so that's what led to this misinterpretation.
Conservative
Arnold Viersen Conservative Peace River—Westlock, AB
As somebody who doesn't follow this very closely, the expansionist ambitions of Putin seem to have been on display for a number of years already. Was that not a flag?
Prof. Paul Robinson
The best explanation I've been given on this is by a defence analyst in Moscow I spoke to about a week before the invasion, who explained to me that the Russian authorities had come to a decision that the Ukrainian state was inherently hostile, that it had been for 30 years, that it was incapable of making peace over Donbass and that it was being egged on by the west; therefore, there was going to be a war. If it wasn't today, it would be tomorrow or it would be a year from now or in five years from now.
They were in a position, you might say, like the Germans in 1914, who were convinced that war was coming and it's better to do it now while you still have a chance, rather than five years down the road when there are NATO troops there and you start World War III.
That's the most logical explanation I've been given for Putin's decision-making in this context. In his eyes, therefore, it's sort of preventive war because they'd convinced themselves that this was going to happen sooner or later.
Conservative
Arnold Viersen Conservative Peace River—Westlock, AB
Thank you for being here, Mr. Robinson.
Mr. Czolij, you mentioned the fact around genocide.... You kept calling it a genocide. I've worked in this place around the Uighur genocide when we worked to recognize that. Do you have any specific evidence that you'd like to share with the committee, in particular in light of the accusation of genocide?
President, Non-Governmental Organization Ukraine-2050 and Honorary Consul of Ukraine in Montreal, As an Individual
Thank you.
First of all, to the earlier question, where we're looking for a legal basis to hold Russia accountable for the acts that are being committed today in Ukraine, I just want to remind all the participants here that article 2(4) of the UN Charter says, “All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.”
This gives ample legal basis to hold Russia accountable for its acts of genocide being committed in Ukraine today.
As for your question, for concrete examples, I'll tell you that when I look at article II of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, and if we go through this article to see what it encompasses, genocide means “any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:”
These “acts” are, first, “Killing members of the group”. We've seen that just about every day on any news you watch. Second is “Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group”. In Mariupol, when you're starving people, that's clearly causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group. Third is “Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part”. When you prevent people from having access to food, water, electricity, you're creating those conditions. Fourth is “Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group”. I quoted an example of that. Last is “Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.” There are now about 100,000 children who have been forcibly transferred from the occupied territories of Ukraine to Russia.
Conservative
The Vice-Chair Conservative Michael Cooper
We're going to have to leave it there.
I recognize Monsieur Trudel for seven minutes.
Bloc
Denis Trudel Bloc Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I thank all the witnesses here tonight, as we deal with a subject that is not necessarily easy. It's a conflict that has engulfed us, in the last couple of months, all over the world. It's all anyone's talking about.
Mr. Eboe-Osuji, my first question is to you, and I will probably put the same question to Mr. Stewart.
Mr. Czolij mentioned the fact that the House of Commons had voted unanimously to recognize that there was genocide in Ukraine at the moment by Russia.
You were at the International Criminal Court. In your opinion, can we indeed speak of genocide, from a strictly legal point of view?
Professor, Lincoln Alexander School of Law, Ryerson University, University of Windsor, As an Individual
Since you didn't get a chance, why don't you take this one first and I'll come in?
As an Individual
From a strictly legal point of view, one can talk about some evidence that would perhaps establish that there is genocide. Even though I'm retired, I have to respect the fact that there are ongoing investigations by the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, so I wouldn't want to prejudge what conclusion might be reached at some point.
Of course, there are elements that the Honorary Consul of Ukraine in Montreal has mentioned. There are things that we have noticed. You can talk about genocide, but ultimately you have to prove it. The intentional element is really important, in terms of the purpose of everything we are talking about. There can be an intentional element to the rapes and everything that has been talked about without there being genocide per se.
All I can say at this point, Mr. Trudel, is that there are elements that need to be looked at, and it's worth doing so, obviously. However, we cannot prejudge the conclusion that might be reached by the Office of the Prosecutor, for example.
Bloc
Denis Trudel Bloc Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC
I'm going to word my question differently.
Can we draw parallels between what is happening in Ukraine right now and the genocide that took place in Rwanda, for example? Are there any connections to be made or similarities that might help us understand?
As an Individual
Of course, I worked at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. I was involved in the first genocide prosecutions at that tribunal. In that case, we were talking about killing on such a large scale that genocide was established beyond doubt.
The other example that may be of interest is the case of Srebrenica in the former Yugoslavia. The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia found that there had been genocide in the case of the killing of military-aged boys and men from the Muslim community in Srebrenica. It was a somewhat controversial conclusion that has been challenged by some theorists, but it is another example of a case of genocide.
That's why I don't take a position on Ukraine. We have to be careful. That said, there are still elements that need to be examined.
Professor, Lincoln Alexander School of Law, Ryerson University, University of Windsor, As an Individual
May I come in here?
Professor, Lincoln Alexander School of Law, Ryerson University, University of Windsor, As an Individual
Thank you.
The question was if we can draw a parallel between what happened in Rwanda and what's happened in Ukraine. I look at it this way: I don't think we need to draw those parallels with either what happened in Rwanda or what happened in the Second World War, with the Holocaust, for instance, because that's something people tend to do.
As Mr. Stewart said, genocide leans a lot on the intent element of it, the intent to destroy a group in whole or in part. A reference to the Rwanda tribunal was made. The case law jurisprudence of the Rwandan court actually, when you analyze it, tells you that you do not need to kill a lot of people to have a genocide if that intent to destroy a group in whole or in part is there, an intent to destroy an ethnic group, racial group, religious group or a national group in whole or in part.
Mr. Czolij in his summation discussed five acts of genocide. I will repeat them: killing people, inflicting mental harm and bodily harm on people, depriving births within a group, and imposing upon people conditions of life calculated to bring about a destruction of that group in whole or in part.
If any of those five acts is identified with intent to destroy a group in whole or in part, you don't need to have 800,000 people killed as happened in Rwanda or six million as in the Holocaust to have a genocide.
I thought I should chip in there. Thank you.
Bloc
Denis Trudel Bloc Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC
That's very interesting, Mr. Eboe‑Osuji, but how do we go about establishing that intent?
Bloc
Denis Trudel Bloc Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC
I'll come back to that when it's my turn to speak again.
Thank you very much, Mr. Eboe‑Osuji and Mr. Stewart.