Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise to speak to this group of motions. Generally speaking we would be supportive of this group of motions, although we find that Motion No. 5 could perhaps be worded a little better. Generally speaking we agree with the intent of that motion.
As I mentioned earlier, the whole bill is one that is extremely important. Even though it was in July 1998 that the nations agreed to this international criminal court, we realize that the UN General Assembly recognized the need for an international criminal court as early as 1948 in the aftermath of the second world war and the subsequent Nuremberg and Tokyo trials. The U.S., France, Russia and China have argued for a court with circumscribed powers. A Canadian led group of like minded nations supported a strong international criminal court, including the U.K., Croatia, Singapore and Egypt.
When we look at home at how this concept has developed, we realize that the international criminal court and Bill C-19 do not really have a high profile in Canada. We have to elevate that profile and bring to people's attention how important this kind of process is. The limited opposition has been focused on minor issues without putting forward the question of the principle of the court. That is a very important principle that has to be looked at.
Within the non-governmental organization community we know that the International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development has established a wide network of supporters in Canada and internationally, including groups such as Amnesty International, the U.S. based Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, Human Rights Watch and Human Rights Internet. Certainly our party is supportive of the idea of this court.
As I said earlier, we have to look at a broader aspect when we deal with the whole issue of war crimes. One very serious issue that is taking place right now, and if it were to unfold we could certainly say it would lay the groundwork for further war and war crimes, is the national missile defence system which the United States is proposing.
Just recently the President of the United States journeyed to Russia to try to convince the Russian president and the Russian Duma that his system was something they should be unconcerned about and that they should perhaps support. We realize that mission fell flat on its face and now we notice that the Russian president has travelled to North Korea to try to sort out questions and concerns around that whole issue with the North Koreans.
This is a very serious issue. It is something that ties into the topic that we are looking at today when we talk about war and war crimes. Right now, if we look seriously at the issue, Canada could be a leader in this whole area. We could perhaps be calling for a solution to the problem the U.S. feels it faces and would give rise to the need for such a national missile defence system and the whole question of ballistic missiles.
We should be leading the fight to call for an international ban on test missile flights. The whole issue of missiles could be tackled from a different perspective, a preventive perspective, in the same way as we did with land mines. We could be the leaders in dealing with the issue in a proactive, preventive way as opposed to the reactionary way in which the U.S. is dealing with it that is tending to lead to arms augmentation and more build-up rather than disarmament.
I just tie that into the issue because it is very important. We know the outcome of any further activity in that area could certainly lead to many serious cases of war crimes being looked at.