Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak in the debate this evening, however late the hour, to share with members of the House some thoughts on this important issue. I do not believe the last member who spoke bothered to address the second aspect of this question, whether we should continue our troop presence in the Central African Republic.
This debate is to deal with two things, whether we should retain our troops in the Central African Republic and whether we should make our troops available in the event, and only in the event, they are needed for an operation in Kosovo. I would like to address those two items.
The first item is dealt with more simply. It is a smaller number of troops, some 65 or 75 troops, who are in a communications position in the Central African Republic.
It is important to speak to this because it shows the type of commitment that Canada and our armed services are making toward peacekeeping in the world. We need to keep our troops in the Central African Republic.
There is an election to be held there shortly. We have responsibilities as a member of the security council to ensure peace and security in the world. We have chosen to be on the security council. We must accept the responsibilities that go with that post.
It seems to me that Canadians and our armed services as well would be anxious to serve and to continue to serve in the Central African Republic to ensure that an election will be held there in a way that will guarantee establishment of a free and democratic country there. It is one of the best things we are doing in the world today where we are able to provide to the world some of the finest people in terms of peacekeeping.
They are some of the finest examples of men and women who are able to work in different communities and difficult situations in order to bring their expertise, particularly in that area which requires bilingual expertise which is the perfect example of what we have in our services, and make it work in a way which will ensure peace in that African country.
It would be a tragedy if the official opposition were to have its way and, for the reasons given by the last speaker in talking about the inability of us to survive and provide the services necessary to keep those troops there, we were to withdraw from that essential function.
Of far greater import is the debate over the issue of whether we should be prepared to stand and commit troops to Kosovo.
I will share with the Canadian public and members of the House an experience which I had in January this year which makes me believe it is not only our duty and obligation but it is common sense for us to make available our forces for that operation.
I will address at the end of my comments the observations of the hon. member who preceded me that we do not have the capacity to make the commitment I would ask our troops to make.
I happened to be in Vienna at the OSCE parliamentary assembly in January this year. A group of us came together. The chairman of the Russian Duma, a member of the U.S. Congress, a French member of parliament, I and other members of parliaments from around the world. We crafted a resolution on Kosovo in which we sought to bring both sides together. We criticized both sides for their excesses and asked that both sides come together to achieve a peaceful solution to the dispute there.
As we were leaving Vienna 45 innocent Kosovar civilians were taken out by the Serbian police in charge of that country and shot point blank, massacred. I realized then that all the talk, all the words in all the parliaments of the world in the end cannot change a situation if we are not willing to back up at some point our words with some force and some action.
That is where we are at tonight. That is what we have to determine in this House. Are we, as representatives of the Canadian people, willing to commit our troops, part of ourselves, to the process of trying to bring peace to Kosovo?
We would not be where we are in the process of trying to bring peace to that region if Mr. Milosevic had not been told that there will be an employment of force. We need the presence of troops. We need the threat of troops to kickstart the Rambouillet process. That is now working. We need the presence of troops ultimately to ensure that process will work.
We have seen before Mr. Milosevic and his lack of respect of international engagements. Nothing short of the presence of an enforceable mechanism to make sure that he will adhere to his responsibilities, if he enters into a political arrangement, will make any sense in that arena. We have learned that through bitter experience in the Bosnian theatre and we are learning that today in Kosovo.
Are Canadian troops needed for that? The Reform Party may well take the position that everything I have said is correct but that there should not be Canadian troops there. It is true that we need a larger presence of European troops. This is a European problem and Europeans should be in a position to deal with these issues themselves.
However, there are two features we must bear in mind. We as Canadians have a specific responsibility in peacekeeping because we have contributed to the United Nations role in peacekeeping and we have made a specific and an enormous worldwide contribution to that area. When we look at the contribution we have made in Bosnia we recognize that this is exactly where Canadians can make a difference.
I believe that a force in Kosovo will not be able to make the difference that it makes with Canadian troops there. I have had the opportunity and privilege to visit our troops in Bosnia. Our troops are serving there with great pride, with enormous professionalism and with great expertise. With all deference to the member who spoke before me, they are doing so knowing they are equipped to do their job, are able to do their job, are trained to do their job and are proud to do their job. The Canadian people are proud of the job they are doing there.
Canadian troops will make a difference in the event that troops are required in Kosovo. I urge our government to ensure, if and when the call is made under the UN mandate and through a NATO operation to provide troops to make sure that peace will come in Kosovo so normal men and women can survive and live decent lives without being threatened with arbitrary execution or being expelled from their homes, that we will be standing with our allies and with, I hope, as in Bosnia, not only NATO allies but Russian troops and troops from other parts of the world who will join us to try to bring peace to this troubled region.
I have participated in many of these debates on similar subjects about whether we should commit our forces to the betterment of humanity and to the advancement of the Canadian goals of tolerance and of making a better world. In each one of these debates the Reform Party has taken the same position: “Oh, yes, we think this is a good idea but we are not equipped. We should not be there. Our men and women should not be exposed to this because they are not equipped”.
Do Reform Party members go and talk to our men and women? Have they been to Bosnia as we have and talked to them? Have they consulted our troops? The last member was honest enough to constantly say “I know that our troops would like to do this but we do not think they should do it”. He is a greater expert in the knowledge and understanding of what our troops are able to do and what they would like to do than themselves.
Let him consult our troops or, even better, let him and his colleagues come with me and my colleagues to meetings of the OSCE general assembly, for example, in which the Reform Party refuses to participate. They will not come and talk to colleagues from Albania, Kosovo, Russia and other countries. They do not believe in that. No, they do not deign to travel. It is not worthy of them to be involved in debates with the other members of the world community so that they could have a better understanding of what is taking place.
They were not there in Copenhagen where you and I were, Mr. Speaker, when we debated the Kosovo issue this year in the OSCE parliamentary assembly. There was no Reform Party member there because they chose not to come. They do not wish to be associated with discussions of these issues. They do not wish to taint their debate in this House with any sense of knowledge or understanding of these issues. They choose to sit here wrapped in a blanket of ignorance that enables them to take the position they are taking in the House tonight. I think that is most unfortunate.
Let them come out of that eggshell they are in. Let them come with us, meet the people, come to the OSCE this summer, come to St. Petersburg, meet colleagues from other parliaments around the world, get an understanding of the problems that other people have to deal with, and we will be able to deal with those together as we could as Canadians, as our troops will be dealing with when they are there on the ground with their Canadian values and their Canadian sense of how to make things work for a better world and for better conditions for people to live in.
I read with great interest an article which the member of parliament for Red Deer, who is the spokesperson for the Reform Party, wrote in the
National Post
recently in which he accused the government of a failure of being willing to take a strong stand on issues. The Minister of Foreign Affairs, he wrote, “is interested in soft power, will do nothing, is cowardly, cavilling, unwilling to take a stand”. The world in his view was a Manichaean one, one of darkness and of light, and we in the Liberal Party were unwilling to ever take a stand on these issues.
Where are we tonight in this debate when members of the Reform Party faced with a true, articulated and clear issue of darkness are unwilling to take a stand? They are the ones who are unwilling to deal with this. They are the ones that are of soft power because they are soft on understanding the nature of the way in which the world operates. They will not participate in it in a way which enables them to be a real player.
I would like to leave members of the House with this thought. If we as Canadians are to play the role in the security council, which we have just accepted this year for the next two years, the best thing we can do is contribute to the peacekeeping conditions in which the United Nations and in which other international institutions are able to keep the peace. If we do not contain situations such as Kosovo and situations such as prevail in the Central African Republic, conditions will prevail in the world which will in turn come and overwhelm us in this country.
It is for that reason we must go forward in this debate. It is that reason we must adopt the position of enabling our troops to be available in the sense of availing the world community of a chance to make peace for the sake of the people who live in Kosovo, all the people of Europe, and ultimately the people of the world if we are to have a better life for all of us.