Madam Chairman, this evening's debate will enable the Prime Minister to have a better idea of what the members of this House think the message to be passed to President Bush on Monday should be.
First, I am sure the Prime Minister will extend his condolences to the U.S. President on behalf of this House, all parliamentarians and the general public, and will assure him of the solidarity of the people of Canada and the people of Quebec toward the American people.
That said, the Prime Minister will have to remind the President that the terrorists attacked all democratic countries by attacking New York and Washington. This is something the Prime Minister has already said here in the House, as have all parliamentarians, and President Bush himself. It is important to establish this right at the beginning of the meeting, in order to see within what framework the response will take place, and what will be done after that, because more than retaliation will be necessary. This is the framework within which the meeting between the Prime Minister and the U.S. President must take place.
Canada will have to bring pressure to bear to make sure that the retaliation is effective. In order for this to be the case, a broad coalition will be necessary, the broadest possible. At the moment, there is the coalition within NATO. The ministers of foreign affairs and of defence of the European Union countries met today, thus expanding the coalition.
Steps must be taken to ensure that the coalition involves the United Nations, thus bringing in all the peoples of the world, because terrorism must not be viewed as involving only the western countries, the rich or the powerful countries, but rather all of the countries in the world.
We have seen what happened in the United States, but the first victims of terrorism are, above all, those who are suffering in Afghanistan every day under the Taliban. These are the ones who have lived under pressure and dictatorship for years. That is where it all starts.
The retaliation, therefore, must not be limited to the rich countries, but must involve all of the world's peoples, because terrorism affects all countries. Terrorism knows no nationality, no creed, no colour.
The same should go for democracy, and I am using the conditional because it is not so. It should have no nationality, no creed, no colour. As I was saying on Monday, we must be respectful of God and Allah, and not get them involved in the wars of men. We must not fall into the trap of the empire of the good against the empire of evil, of the good guys against the bad guys. This only serves the bin Ladens of this world. It is a fundamental mistake.
Our response must be effective and measured. Monday's motion said that those responsible must be brought to justice. In order to respond to this vicious attack, we must consider all the options. But under no circumstances should retaliation be directed at civil populations. We must never forget that the people of Afghanistan are not responsible for bin Laden's actions.
Democracy and freedom have nothing in common with ignorance, obscurantism and violence. The Prime Minister must make sure that the U.S. president takes into account certain fundamental elements based essentially on the attitude advocated by the Prime Minister himself, namely patience and wisdom.
I think this attitude must guide our actions at all times. We must remind the U.S. president that, when we talk about building the largest possible coalition, it means that we cannot give carte blanche to the United States, no more than to any other country. A coalition means that decisions are made collectively after taking all the time necessary to have an informed debate in order to consider all aspects. We must stay away from populist solutions, and easy solutions inspired by panic. We must not sacrifice the freedoms that we have here.
That would certainly suit those who attack freedom, civilization and democracy. Thinking that law and order will resolve everything means starting from scratch.
When I spoke of the need to bring the perpetrators to justice, that presupposes making every effort to ensure that an international court of justice could hear the case of the individual in question, whom everyone suspects to be Mr. bin Laden. If the strikes indeed represent an attack on the international community, should the tribunal not be an international one? If we want only countries which oppose extradition of the individuals charged to countries with the death penalty, a lot of European countries and Canada, there is a problem. If we want Arab countries to be part of the coalition, we have a problem.
At that point, the international tribunal could decide in an exemplary and democratic fashion, which does not fall into another dangerous trap in which we might end up with people who were the victims--I understand their legitimate anger, but it is not useful--a tribunal that is judge and jury, and carries out the sentence.
Madam Arbour, who is now with the Supreme Court, was the driving force behind the international criminal court. Milosevic is not being judged in Croatia, or Bosnia or Serbia but before the international court. Therein lies the strength of the sanctions taken against those who attack democracy and humanity.
Likewise, we must do everything to create--I know the court does not exist at the moment--an international criminal court that is ad hoc so long as the treaty on the international court of justice has not been ratified. We did this in Rwanda and for the former Yugoslavia. I think this provides a lesson to all the dictators of the world, who want to play the same game as Milosevic or Pinochet. We saw, in the case of Pinochet, both Belgium and Spain levelling charges
Similarly, I think that, with the help of the Europeans, we must do everything possible to ensure that the guilty parties are brought before an international tribunal.
That having been said, despite all these conditions, the fact remains that as long as we do not address the basic causes underlying the development of terrorism--extreme poverty, oppression, dictatorships, the absence of democracy, despair, and loss of hope in the future--we will solve nothing. This is what children are facing daily in some regions of the world. They cannot imagine themselves alive in a few years' time. Thousands of the world's children die every day. It is this hopeless--if we do nothing--but explosive situation which gives rise to terrorism, fanaticism and religious fundamentalism, just as a mushroom will spring up in rot.
If we do not address these basic causes, we will perhaps succeed in doing something about bin Laden, but others like him will spring up. This is unfortunately the fact of the matter. We did this in 1991 with the gulf war. We went after Saddam Hussein. Who is now the leader of Iraq? Who is suffering in Iraq? Not Saddam Hussein. Right now, the Iraqi people are suffering and Saddam Hussein continues to reign, not just in Iraq but throughout the region.
So we would be deluding ourselves to think only of technical solutions, which would let us play hardball but which would ignore the heart of the problem, one that allows terrorism and fanaticism to take hold.
I will conclude by saying that I hope that the Prime Minister will be able to say to the U.S. President “When I take a decision on behalf of Canada with respect to any major intervention, I will take it as democratically as possible, with the support of the House of Commons”, which will mean a vote, which was what his party demanded at the time of the gulf war in 1991.
When one demands something while in opposition, one must be equal to those demands once in power.
This is what the Liberals called for in 1991 and this is what they must do now. The message will carry that much more weight and will strengthen the international coalition accordingly.