Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for two very important questions.
On the first question, it is with great sadness that we see that an institution that was started with the previous Conservative government, in fact, is going to be killed through this budget bill we were debating.
Why it is important is that the Minister of Foreign Affairs said we would be able to do the works of Rights and Democracy through our ambassadors and through our foreign affairs capacity. That cannot be done in Iran.
What we were able to do through Rights and Democracy is to be in countries like Iran to support civil society, to support human rights fighters and protect their capability to actually fight for human rights. Sadly, that has ironically been killed by the government that professes to want to support human rights in Iran.
I would say to the government that if it is really committed to human rights in Iran, it needs to look in the mirror and ask itself why it is killing Rights and Democracy, and why is it taking away the ability for human rights defence in Iran. That is exactly what happened.
On the second point, we have to be very cogent in what we say when it comes to Iran. To support people in Iran, we should not beat the drums of war, or get loose with our rhetoric, or suggest we will go to war with Iran, because that supports the regime. It gives it a pretext to crack down on the population. We know this from talking to people here in Canada who talk to people in Iran. They do not want that. It undermines the credibility.
Recently Israeli President Shimon Peres said, “in order to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear [armed] country you have to introduce a system of verification and inspection” when it comes to nuclear arms. He worried that a system such as we would need to verify any proliferation of nuclear arms could be jeopardized by a pre-emptive attack.
It is unfortunate that Canada is not taking a lead role in nuclear negotiations and verification. There is an opportunity to do that. I wish we would, and I wish we would actually listen to President Peres when he says we should not beat the drums of war but ensure we are going to be responsible actors.