moved:
That this House take note of the evolving situation in the Great Lakes region of Africa and of Canada's leadership role in the international community's efforts to alleviate human suffering in the region.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to begin by thanking the honourable Leader of the Opposition, the leader of the Reform Party, the leader of the New Democratic Party and the leader of the Conservative Party for their co-operation during last week's discussions on the urgency of the situation in Zaire. This is certainly a great example of how the members of this Parliament work together to ensure a unified position with respect to the very serious crisis unfolding in that part of the world. We are certainly most interested in the debates that will be held in the coming days in order to determine the direction and the initiatives to be taken with respect to the missions to Zaire, and also to ensure that the voices of each party in this Parliament, which represents the Canadian people, are heard.
The purpose of this is to bring before Parliament the resolution seeking support for the Canadian initiative in eastern Zaire and the surrounding regions.
It was about eight days ago when the entire world, including all Canadians, recognized that we stood on the precipice of one of the most tragic human disasters the world has ever faced. Millions of people were sitting in eastern Zaire without any food, sustenance or support. There was enormous potential for the whole crisis to develop into a situation of huge significance, not just in the region but for everyone. The prospect of a humanitarian disaster shook us all.
In the circumstances, a week ago Saturday the Prime Minister, consulting with a number of other world leaders, took an initiative
in line with what we believe is the long Canadian tradition of involvement as a major peacekeeper to stop the stalemate, to change the inertia that was taking place at an international level. There was a need for political will to take place.
We have learned, as we have gone through these new kinds of crises in the last several years, that the resources are there, the capacity is there and the institutions are there, but what is often missing is the political will. Last weekend the Prime Minister supplied that missing ingredient and took the initiative to begin mobilizing the world community.
Since then, of course, events have taken place rapidly. We were able to bring together a coalition of a number of countries prepared to offer direct assistance for a multinational force which would provide a secure environment within eastern Zaire to ensure that any humanitarian aid could be effectively delivered and at the same time to support and facilitate the voluntary repatriation and movement of refugees back to their homes in Rwanda.
In addition to that, political support had to be mobilized at the United Nations to get the right kind of resolution. Without going into the long history, although it was just a short time ago, Canada took the lead in this important international coalition building. Canada was able to garner the support of a number of countries which were prepared to commit and to mobilize political support at the United Nations. On the weekend just past we were able to obtain the full endorsement of the United Nations security council.
I want to give my vote of appreciation to the leaders of each of the respective other parties in the House. I spoke to them last week to explain the kind of urgency and the quick changing circumstances we faced. We received both their basic support and willingness to wait until the House returned on Monday to have a full debate which we are committed to. I want to thank them very much for signifying and expressing their own commitment during this very tumultuous period this past week.
We now see that the situation has changed. We should take enormous satisfaction that one of the major objectives that was set out just a short week ago was to ensure that the large masses of refugees held in camps and who had been a part of that system for the last two years are now on the move. The dramatic pictures we see every night on television clearly demonstrate that one of the major objectives has already in large part been achieved.
One of the contributing reasons, one of the factors that unlocked or triggered that movement was that in the past week our own country took on the responsibility of organizing the international community. The international community's presence that would soon be felt became a strong and compelling influence in terms of that massive movement that we now witness daily. In part we can take a certain amount of satisfaction that the job is already under way, but we should also recognize the job is not yet over.
At last report there are still hundreds of thousands of refugees in eastern Zaire. We hope that they will be able to join the movement that was started on the weekend, but at this point in time there is no way of knowing. We are still trying to assess the information intelligence with regard to the refugees in the southern part of Zaire around the area of Bukavu. The objectives still remain and they have the UN security resolution force behind them to ensure that humanitarian assistance is given. At the same time we are able to support and facilitate the continual resettlement of refugees back into their home communes.
In this case we still stay committed as the Canadian government on behalf of the Canadian people to do whatever is necessary to meet the current needs. We continue to support these developments and provide any resource necessary to not only ensure the application of humanitarian aid but to look at the broader question of peace building in the region so that we will not have a reoccurrence, that the same problems will not visit us again a year or two down the road and to begin working for longer term settlements of the root causes of the problems.
We seek the support of Parliament today for the initiative of Canada as we seek to find the most effective and useful ways in which we can respond to the humanitarian crisis in Rwanda and Zaire.
To put this into context and why I think this is particularly important as a juncture point in debate, we have witnessed since the ending of the cold war several years ago the emergence of not uniform global peace but a new kind of conflict, low intensity conflicts, often internal conflicts, but which have a nasty way of spilling over their boundaries, creating enormous repercussions in their own regions around the world at great cost to life and resources in those regions and for which we all bear the burden. It is the new kind of world we live in.
As we begin to learn our lessons day by day, week by week, as we go through each of these conflicts, we now begin to apply those lessons in an effective way. If we do not do so we will see the continuing cycles of violence, the targeting of whole communities one against the another, the ugly words that appear in our vocabulary, ethnic cleansing and genocide, that have become all too common in our parlance.
We have to continue to be cognizant of the enormous despair of hundreds of thousands of civilians who are the victims of these conflicts, the women and children who bear the brunt and who often are the most vulnerable and cannot protect themselves against these kinds of internal conflicts, faction fights and the enormous violence we have witnessed for so long.
Clearly, traditional responses are not enough. The lessons we acquired in our diplomatic, political and military textbooks on the cold war do not apply to the new situations.
One of the first lessons we learned is that these internal conflicts are "not a family matter". Given their effect on international security as a whole, given the widespread consequences brought about by these matters, as we have seen just in the past week, it is incumbent on and the responsibility of the international community to find the appropriate response.
We cannot use narrow national interests as an excuse for inaction or delay. It is a matter for all common humanity. I believe that is the will of Canadians to serve as a steward in that cause of humanity.
The Prime Minister went to the core of the issue last week when he said that no one can remain indifferent to the suffering in eastern Zaire, no one can close his eyes to the consequences. If the world community does not act, more than a million lives will be at stake.
I think that summarizes basically why we have taken the role and the leadership that we have.
Third, we have learned that what is basically required is no longer the singular responses of just military force or political action. We now have to find an integrated, strategic, comprehensive way of melding political, military and humanitarian efforts so that there is a complete and total response, that we are able to be flexible and provide adaptations, that we can no longer simply go by the old guidebooks.
We now must find notions of combining peacekeeping in its traditional form as established by Michael Pearson many years ago but also with a new concept of peace building, how we work into post-conflict situations to have stabilized communities.
The medical community has a good word for it, triage. If you are a casualty in a traffic accident and you come to the hospital, they do not immediately perform the operation. They stabilize the vital signs. They make sure the blood is pumping. They make sure the body is warm and things are stabilized before they can start the treatment and the cure. One of the new lessons we have learned and the required lessons is to begin seeing how we can provide that triage in these new kinds of international conflicts.
Specifically as it applies to Zaire, we face a situation that challenges all these lessons that we have learned in this new conflict situation, how to provide innovative responses to the new kinds of humanitarian crises. I think we have already shown one important lesson and that is to quickly and effectively use political will and mobilization to bring the international community toward finding a solution.
I would recommend to all members, if they have the time, to read a dramatic report that was issued after the Rwanda conflict which stated that the missing link that led to the genocide was a lack of political will at the international level. That will was supplied over the past week. I am pleased to say that it was the Canadian Prime Minister who provided that basic sense of commitment and engagement to make it happen.
As a result, the scope of the disaster has been substantially reduced. However, we now have to make adaptations. We are now seeing the vast movement of refugees coming across the border as a consequence of that galvanizing of the international area. However, there is still an urgent need for humanitarian assistance to sustainable solutions.
My colleague, the Minister for International Co-operation, will be addressing in more detail how on the humanitarian side we can begin to support work by the various international agencies and care groups that are involved in that region.
We must be prepared to continue to do what we can to ensure that there is continued security. At the present moment we are gathering the information intelligence, working with our allies, working with the African states, the Europeans and the Americans to ensure that in eastern Zaire itself that as the problem begins to be resolved, we also do not see remaining pockets where there is still continued violence, insecurity or instability.
We are beginning to look at how we can meet the objectives but perhaps use a different mix of tools. I hope members of Parliament will be prepared to work with us in developing that ongoing adaptation and adjustment as we move into new fields.
I welcome the response of members of Parliament on the usefulness of setting up regular joint meetings of the defence and foreign affairs committees. Then we can constantly brief members of Parliament from all parties, get their responses and build them in as part of our ongoing policy making and our response mechanism. I put that proposal out and I hope the spokespersons for the opposition parties will indicate whether they would be prepared to engage in that kind of ongoing parliamentary dialogue.
To make sure we have it, Canadian military personnel are now in Rwanda. General Baril will arrive there within hours to do the major reconnaissance. They will help to give us a much better understanding of the situation in the region and how that will affect our deployment plans.
The consultations I talked about are intensifying. There will be a major planning session in Stuttgart within two days which will bring together all the donor nations. We are in constant contact and have been over the weekend with a number of the key players, with
those who are prepared to donate and contribute to the force and with those who represent the African states.
I will be meeting with the ambassadors of the African states later today to engage them in the same kind of consultation and response so we can calibrate and tailor our responses to fit the needs, because that is our primary objective. We have also asked our Secretary of State for Latin America and Africa to visit Africa. She is on her way now to visit certain African capitals, to consult again with the key African states about what they think would be the appropriate response.
It is a continuing involvement. We on behalf of Canadians want to ensure we have the capacity and are in the position to offer the leadership that was initiated last weekend by the Prime Minister.
We must now recognize that a conversion is taking place. The movement of refugees in its own way is a source of enormous satisfaction. It is beginning to deal with one of the root causes of the problem, but there are still issues to face down the road. There is the longer term question of the resettlement of the refugees back into Rwanda. The millions of people now returning to their homelands have to be given basic support and sustenance.
We have to ensure there is proper monitoring in that area so the communities can come together, so there can be reconciliation and development in those areas. That will also involve a continuing ongoing commitment of the international community. We will do our part and offer whatever leadership is required to help deal with those kinds of issues and develop responses.
Last weekend in Paris during a meeting on Bosnia I engaged several of my counterparts as foreign ministers about how we can begin to think through those longer term responses and how we can begin to develop an effective international response to that changing condition.
The United Nations Security Council has also recognized very clearly the need for a follow-up force. Planning is already under way for a second phase as to how we should maintain a system of stability to ensure the problems do not recur. There is a lesson out of the past situations in Rwanda, Somalia and other areas. If we simply say that the immediate crisis is over and that we can now walk away, then we are bound to face a recurrence of the problem within months or years.
For that reason the United Nations has special envoy Ambassador Chrétien working in the region not only to deal with the immediate questions of negotiation about the humanitarian crisis but to make recommendations that will be used by the United Nations, ourselves and other countries to begin planning that longer term response. Again we can take some satisfaction in having received a call from the United Nations with a request that Canada find a proper envoy. We all admire enormously the work of Ambassador Chrétien. There is no one better suited for the task in the work he is doing there to provide international leadership at this crucial time.
In addition to those direct initiatives, I put forward another idea in a speech I gave about three weeks ago at York University. I am sure all members read it as soon as it came off the press.
The need for a peace building strategy by Canada was put forward. It is a need to begin to look differently at some of these kinds of problems; that within our own resources and our own political capacity, how we can provide support for countries emerging out of conflict; how we can provide the ability to help them stabilize so that the problems do not return with frequency.
The issue of Zaire is a good example of how peace building, a rapid, integrated, multifaceted response on the civilian side is as important as the rapid multifaceted response on the military side. We now have to find a forum for the same kind of effectiveness by the civilian peacekeeping side, which we now call peace building, as we have had on the military side.
This means providing assistance to re-establish the rule of law. It means supporting political reconciliation, including the issue of human rights, particularly minority rights. It means developing confidence building measures between the groups and factions that have been in conflict, designed to defuse tensions on the borders, across the borders and among people within those borders.
It means securing an environment so that the continued humanitarian assistance and rebuilding can take place. People cannot go about rebuilding their lives if they are worried that they will be attacked at any moment. That is why one major commitment we have made in places like Haiti is to provide training and support for the establishment of national police forces using public accountability and a sense of transparency so that those countries can begin to acquire that sense of security.
It means the massive problem of resettlement and reintegration of refugees and displaced persons and the reconstruction of a political and civil society in many of these countries. That is the new notion of peace building: how to use our own experiences as a country which has learned how to build bridges across boundaries; a country which has learned how to build a linkage between groups with different languages and different backgrounds; how to use the experiences we have gained internationally over the years to form these kinds of coalitions and alliances; how we begin to work with other like-minded countries so that we do not do it alone, but we
work within the UN context as a coalition of countries dedicated to the notion of peace building.
That is very much the challenge which now faces us. That is the second track we must begin to follow. As we have begun to almost see a certain resolution of the humanitarian crisis, we must now make sure that a new crisis does not occur. Through the kinds of initiatives of peace building that I talked about, I think we can begin to help resolve those issues.
I know it has been the question and concern which was clearly uppermost on the minds of members in terms of the briefing we held this morning. That is why I want to underline and emphasize the importance of being able to respond to these kinds of international difficulties not in a singular way, not in an inflexible way, not in a single dimension, but to provide a subtle, flexible broad based response in which we can bring to bear the best resources of this country to help solve the conflict.
In conclusion, I again ask members of the House for their support in this initiative. It is not a support which is open ended. We will come back to Parliament on a regular basis through the committee system to ensure that it is constantly being referenced and constantly asking for a response. We have to work together.
I believe this is in the vital interests of Canadians. Many out there are asking why we are involved in Rwanda which is so far away, why we are spending resources in a far off place. Every Canadian has a vital interest. If we do not solve the problems, if we do not help to make that kind of contribution, it will be on our doorstep in a matter of time.
It is the underside of globalization. If we can gain from the benefits of a global system in terms of trade, investment, productivity and growth, we must also bear the responsibility of ensuring the global system is stable, orderly, safe and secure. That has been a long tradition of this country. It is in the tradition that will allow us to continue not only to provide security for other people but our own security as well, by making sure that the world is secure.
I thank members of Parliament for their courtesy and indulgence. I look forward to the ensuing debate and to their continued support as Canada engages in a mission where we are showing leadership in the world in representing the best values and interests of the Canadian people.