Mr. Speaker, I thank the House for permitting me to respond. I will be very brief.
I would like to join other hon. members in commemorating United Nations Day and the 50th anniversary of the founding of the United Nations.
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On behalf of my colleagues in the New Democratic Party, I join in paying tribute today particularly to those Canadian men and women who have done so much to strengthen and build the United Nations.
Our peacekeepers around the world-and Canada has played a leading role in peacekeeping-have obviously made Canadians very proud, as well as other Canadian men and women who are active within the United Nations structure.
We certainly join with the Minister of Foreign Affairs in urging significant reform of the United Nations. The concept of a standing army that is able to respond at short notice is one that we welcome. As well we believe there should be far more focus on preventive diplomacy, on the opportunity to prevent crises from developing into national and in some cases international tragedies.
We also support the concept certainly of an international tribunal to judge war criminals, to bring to justice those responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Finally I want to say that we in this party strongly support the concept of broadening the base of the United Nations to encompass a United Nations parliamentary assembly. While we recognize that this is a step that may take some time to develop, certainly we want to encourage the foreign minister in the actions that he is taking to develop support for this concept both in Canada and globally.
In closing, once again I want to join in congratulating those involved both in Canada, NGOs in Canada who support the United Nations, and globally-
Congratulations to everyone on this 50th anniversary of the United Nations and United Nations Day.