Svend Robinson

[Questions On The Order Paper, May 8th, 2000]

With respect to the APEC summit of 1997 in Vancouver: ( a ) did the Prime Minister discuss security arrangements with then director od operations Jean Carle either prior to or during the summit; and ( b ) was the Prime Minister aware of Mr. Carle's plans to displace security barriers in order to avoid embarrassment to visiting heads of state?

[Petitions, May 3rd, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, I have a second petition which was sponsored by the Muslim Students' Association at the University of British Columbia. It notes that the atrocities taking place against the innocent people of Chechnya are a campaign of brutal and unjust terror that violates the human rights code of justice and freedom. Therefore the petitioners request that parliament intervene immediately and take action by condemning the attacks on civilians forcing Russia to stop her aggression and brutality of unarmed civilians and also to suspend economic aid to Russia.

[Petitions, May 3rd, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour today to present two petitions. The first petition is one which calls on the government to recognize that based on the historical fact that this year 2000 we celebrate the arrival of Leif Ericsson to Canada 1,000 years ago. It calls for the attention to recognize the 1,000th anniversary of this voyage from Europe to North America. Having a designated day to remember and celebrate the importance of this occasion, the petitioners note, will be a great opportunity and benefit for our children to learn more about it in schools and libraries and for the rest of us who appreciate such events in our country's history.

Therefore, the petitioners call on parliament to consider the designation of such a day starting this year 2000. It will be quite a loss in the history of Canada to go through the year 2000 without recognizing such an important occasion as Leif Ericsson's voyage to Canada. I note that the petition has over 100 signatures mainly from the Scandinavian Centre in Burnaby collected by Celeste Wiberg.

[Crimes Against Humanity Act, April 6th, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, this is a profoundly important question. I know that Canada is putting on the agenda of the security council this month the issue of the impact of sanctions. I am hopeful that perhaps arising from that study we can look at the fact that in many respects sanctions are having a devastating impact on people who are not in any way responsible for the terrible actions of those against whom they are allegedly directed. For example, the sanctions on the former Yugoslavia are hurting innocent people but in no way are diminishing the capacity of Milosevic. That is why many of us have appealed for the government to join in calling for a lifting of those sanctions.

The sanctions in Iraq are the most glaring example of that.

We have also seen the impact of the blockade on Cuba and its people and the impact of the denial of a blockade. It is an American blockade in this case. It is not an international blockade. In fact it is an illegal blockade which has been condemned by the United Nations.

We have to start recognizing that these tools are blunt tools which hurt innocent people.

I hope that the committee which is studying this bill will have an opportunity to do that. I know that the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade, of which I have the privilege of being a member, will also be tabling reports, both on Iraq and on Kosovo, and will be addressing these very serious issues of the impact of sanctions on innocent human beings.

[Crimes Against Humanity Act, April 6th, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his question. I certainly want to thank him for the role he plays in international affairs as our spokesperson on development issues. He certainly has a longstanding record in this area in working with a number of groups including, I believe, the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops over the years on many of these issues.

I am very hopeful about the response of Canadians on these issues. Sometimes we hear that Canadians do not care what is going on outside our borders. The fact of the matter is more and more young people particularly are getting involved and want to make a difference.

Yesterday I had the privilege of speaking at the University of Toronto on the issue of Iraq and the impact of sanctions on Iraq. It was very heartening to see the large number of young people who were present and who wanted to get involved.

People are working in solidarity with movements, trying to promote human rights in many different parts of the world. Whether it is in Burma or Colombia, working on behalf of the Kurds or in solidarity with Tibet, and in many other parts of the world, there is a growing awareness of the importance of this. Sadly it is not reflected so much in the media, but I am heartened by the extent to which Canadians do recognize that we are not just citizens of our local communities and citizens of Canada, but we are truly also citizens of the world.

[Crimes Against Humanity Act, April 6th, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House today on behalf of my colleagues in the New Democratic Party to indicate our strong support for Bill C-19 and to commend the minister for bringing forward this historic and landmark legislation.

It is appropriate that today, April 6, we as parliamentarians should be considering legislation that deals with genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. Today is the sixth anniversary of the start of the Rwanda genocide, 100 days of terror which led to the murder of as many as two million people, Tutsis and moderate Hutus. They were calculatingly and unmercifully butchered in what was clearly a genocide on April 6, 1994. It is timely that we consider this important legislation at this time.

I want to note as well that an essential element of this legislation is to establish what the minister called a culture of accountability. We strongly support the notion of that culture of accountability, that those who have blood on their hands, those who are responsible for these terrible crimes, must be brought to justice.

It is with a sense of sadness that I remind the House that one of those who must be held accountable for the genocide in Rwanda remains within Canada's borders today. Mugesera Léon, who publicly called for ethnic cleansing and extermination of the Tutsi people in the period leading up to the Rwanda massacre, is still in Canada today. Mugesera Léon said in a speech that was broadcast in November 1992 nationwide on Radio Rwanda:

We will take care ourselves of the massacre of the cockroaches, the Tutsi. We demand that we make a list of all those people. What are we waiting for decimate these families? Destroy them. No matter what you do, do not let them get away.

The author of those words, which were an incitement to genocide, is in Canada today. He remains unpunished. Canada must not be a haven for people like Mugesera Léon. Canada must not just deport this individual. Surely we must extradite Mugesera Léon so that he can stand trial for his terrible crimes against humanity. My colleagues and I in the New Democratic Party join with people from the Rwandan community and many others in appealing to our government to demonstrate leadership on this fundamentally important question.

I support the bill. I salute the government not just for bringing the bill forward. I commend not just our government but in particular Ambassador Philippe Kirsch who has played such an extraordinary leadership role in the international community in bringing the International Criminal Court from a dream to reality. The statute that created the court came into force on July 17, 1998, in Rome at a conference which was chaired by Ambassador Philippe Kirsch.

It has been over 50 years since the United Nations first recognized the importance of establishing an international criminal court, an international tribunal to prosecute crimes such as genocide. In a resolution of 1948 the general assembly noted that genocide had inflicted great losses on humanity and pointed out that in order to liberate mankind from such an odious scourge international co-operation was required. In the early 1950s the United Nations attempted to pull together a statute to create an international criminal court. It is only today, some 50 years later, that the court has finally become a reality.

Canada can be proud of the role we have played in the establishment of that court. It is not just of our government. I want to signal as well the contribution of many NGOs. The Canadian Network for an International Criminal Court included a broad cross-section of NGOs. It included many churches. It included the International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development. It included Amnesty International and many other Canadian NGOs.

Among those I want to pay particular tribute to today is one gentleman from the World Federalists of Canada, Fergus Watt, who played such an instrumental role in rallying support for the International Criminal Court within Canada.

This is a day to celebrate the creation of this important international tribunal, but it is also a day to reflect on what might have been and what should be when it comes to genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.

I have mentioned the history and we know the tragedy of Rwanda, of Bosnia and Herzegovina, of East Timor and of the crimes against humanity in Chile. Certainly many of us were saddened that Augusto Pinochet, instead of facing his accusers, the families of those who disappeared, those who were murdered in cold blood, in a court of law, has now returned to Chile where tragically he may never, ever face justice. As my colleague from Saskatoon has said, that is a shame and a tragedy. Hopefully under the International Criminal Court there will be no repetition of the failure to have a reckoning for those kinds of terrible crimes.

We know that Canada's record with respect to the prosecution of those responsible for crimes against humanity who are within our borders is a shameful one. Irving Abella has written eloquently of our history of slamming the door shut to those who were attempting to flee the Holocaust in Nazi Germany. His book was entitled None is too Many . The fact of the matter is that we have not come to grips with our responsibility to bring these war criminals to justice. Certainly the passage of time does not in any way diminish the significance of their crimes.

As I said, the legislation codifies and ratifies our adoption of the principles of the Rome statute established in the International Criminal Court. One very important element of that statute is that there are a number of provisions specifically addressing the plight of women and children in armed conflict.

The statute recognizes, for the first time, rape, sexual slavery and other forms of sexual violence as war crimes and as crimes against humanity. It also recognizes the enlistment or the use of children under 15 in armed conflicts as a war crime. Those are very important provisions. I know that Canada fought particularly hard to ensure that they were included in the legislation.

We can be proud of our role, but there are inconsistencies in our approach. Even as we support this legislation, even as the government introduces this landmark legislation, we are fighting in another international forum, the ad hoc tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, the international criminal tribunal looking at war crimes in the former Yugoslavia. We are fighting its jurisdiction to look at the issue of war crimes which may have been committed by NATO in the former Yugoslavia during the very tragic events which occurred in the spring of 1999 both in Kosovo and in Serbia.

We cannot have it both ways. Our government cannot on the one hand say that there must be responsibility for crimes against humanity and war crimes and that it must be universal, yet when there are attempts made to ensure that those universal principles apply within the context of the situation, the war and bombings which took place in the former Yugoslavia, our government cannot say that that jurisdiction does not apply to us.

Canada is indeed one of the 10 countries that have been cited in that complaint brought by Professor Michael Mandel of Canada, among others. I believe we have to take that very seriously.

We look at some of the allegations made about the conduct of that war. A bridge was bombed by NATO in broad daylight. A nine year old child on a bicycle was murdered in cold blood, along with too many others. A train crossing a bridge was hit by NATO missiles not once but twice. The headquarters of Serbian television and radio were bombed deliberately, killing innocent technicians and makeup artists, young men and women. We have to ask ourselves if those who are responsible for these crimes must not also face their day in court. I believe that indeed they must face that reckoning.

We can also look at another context, a context of what many of us believe is effectively genocidal policies. That is the context of what is taking place in Iraq today. It is what has been taking place over the past decade under the imposition of United Nations sanctions which have resulted in the death of over 500,000 innocent children. This has been well documented by UNICEF and other international tribunals. It has been eloquently denounced by the former UN humanitarian co-ordinator, Denis Halliday, eloquently and passionately denounced by his successor, Hans von Sponeck, who has announced his resignation.

I had the privilege of meeting with Hans von Sponeck when I visited Iraq along with a delegation from a group called Objection de Conscience or Voices of Conscience. They pointed out the combined impact of the destruction of Iraqi infrastructure from bombing in the spring of 1991, the ongoing bombing which is taking place illegally by the U.S. and the United Kingdom, and the massive starvation of innocent civilians, children and others, malnutrition used as a weapon of war against innocent children.

Dr. Sheila Zurbrig of Halifax, one of the world's experts on this subject, has made it very clear that this is a breach of the most fundamental international obligations which exist. The Geneva conventions say that we cannot use malnutrition and starvation as a weapon of war, yet that is what is happening in Iraq.

I want to be very clear. This is certainly not suggesting that we should not be calling Saddam Hussein to account for his crimes against humanity. We all know of the terrible attacks on the Kurds, the gassing of Kurds in Halabja and elsewhere, but it is not acceptable that innocent Iraqi people should be victimized in this way, allegedly in order to attack Saddam Hussein.

Denis Halliday said that we are destroying an entire society. It is as terrifying and as simple as that.

We call for support for this resolution, this bill before the House today. At the same time I would appeal to our government to recognize that we should not be a part of the genocidal policies in Iraq ourselves. We should be using our position of leadership as we preside this month at the security council to call for a de-linking of military and economic sanctions, for the immediate lifting of economic sanctions, for an end to the illegal bombing in the north and the south, for the opening of a Canadian embassy in Iraq and for regional disarmament in that deeply troubled region.

It is very important that we work toward the day when there will be truly universal accountability under this International Criminal Court. It is not good enough, frankly, that the United States should say that it will not be bound by this statute, that it arrogates unto itself the power to say no, it will not be a part of this acknowledgement by the international community that there must be a tribunal that has jurisdiction over all, including the United States. It has said no to the International Criminal Court, no to the land mines convention. We appeal to the United States to join with Canada in signing and ratifying this treaty.

The reality is, as former United States under secretary of state David Newson wrote in the Christian Science Monitor , “If the U.S. will not accept its obligations to the citizens of other lands, its own citizens will be less safe abroad”. I think it is important that we recognize and understand that.

Today we call on the Government of Canada to continue its important and valuable work in seeking the ratification of this treaty by other countries as well. So far I believe seven countries have ratified this treaty. Sixty are needed before it comes into force. Let us hope that we can get those 60 before December 2000 and that we can get those ratifications without any opting out declarations.

Let us celebrate the fact that the Rome Statute that establishes the International Criminal Court did not include the death penalty. I heard with sadness my colleague from the Reform Party, whom I congratulate on his recent naming as foreign affairs spokesperson for that party, lament the fact that this treaty did not include the death penalty. Surely we have moved beyond that to the point that we recognize that the death penalty is a barbarism that should not be included in any statute and which should be abolished throughout the world. I hope we continue to take a strong position on that.

Finally, let me say that I welcome the minister's suggestion that there be a full study of the bill by the committee so that those who do have concerns about the bill can be heard. I know that the Ukrainian Canadian Congress for example has written to members of the foreign affairs committee voicing concerns about the legislation. It is important that we invite them to be heard at the committee and that their concerns be listened to.

David Matas speaking on behalf of Amnesty International has raised concerns about some elements of the legislation while strongly supporting it. There are issues such as the rights of the defendant in the statute; the question of the mental elements of crime; the importance of clear definitions of crime both inside and outside Canada; the fact that individual criminal responsibility should be entrenched in the law; and that section 3.77 of the criminal code should be kept to ensure that people with connections to crime can also be convicted, that those who are directly involved and those who are intimately connected with crimes should accept their full responsibility.

Those are our concerns. As I have said, we support the bill. I am pleased to rise on behalf of my colleagues in supporting the bill.

In closing, I want to remind the House of the words of José Ayala-Lasso, the former United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. He said that a person stands a better chance of being tried and judged for killing one human being than for killing 100,000.

That has been the truth too long on our planet. Let us hope that the adoption of the bill will be an important step forward by Canada on the road to universal jurisdiction, on the road to full responsibility and hopefully on the road to one day eliminating all crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.

[Division No. 1263, April 4th, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, on December 13 last year I rose in the House to ask a question of the Minister of Justice. My question related to a young law student at the University of New Brunswick, Robbie Peterson.

Robbie Peterson was brutally attacked in the early hours of the morning the previous month on a downtown street at a major intersection. He was attacked for one reason—because he was gay. Similar gay bashings occur across this land.

I called on the Minister of Justice to recognize that this is a serious problem and specifically to bring forward an amendment to the Criminal Code of Canada to outlaw hate propaganda which promotes violence and hatred based on sexual orientation.

The Minister of Justice recently tabled an omnibus bill in the House amending a number of statutes, including the criminal code, but unfortunately she did not include that important amendment to expand the sections of the criminal code on hate propaganda to include sexual orientation.

Under the current provisions of the criminal code, those who incite hatred against any identifiable group where such incitement is likely to lead to a breach of the peace can be subject to criminal sanction. Identifiable groups include those distinguished by colour, race, religion or ethnic origin.

That law has not changed since it was brought into force in 1966 and the silence of the code on this important issue sends a very destructive message. I believe that the silence of the code is unconstitutional.

Section 15 of the charter requires that the equal benefit of the law, including the criminal code provisions on hate propaganda, be extended to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender persons.

What does it mean for the criminal code to be silent on this important issue? It means, for example, when a hatemonger like the Reverend Fred Phelps wants to come to Canada to burn the Canadian flag and to promote hatred and violence directed at gay and lesbian people, the police in Ottawa cannot stop that man from crossing our border. In fact, it was Sergeant Callaghan of the Ottawa Police Force who said and I quote “If this was done against a Catholic or a Jew or a black person, charges could be laid. If we had that legislation, we would not have to put up with this nonsense on Monday. We could have told him `If you show up and you start spreading this hate, we will arrest you'.”.

I plead with the government to give our law enforcement officers in Canada the power to take that important action. It is important because if we say it is all right to promote violence and hatred based on sexual orientation, that is a licence to the thugs in our country. It is a license to the thugs who get involved in gay bashing. It also sends out a negative message in terms of self-esteem for young gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people.

I want to note that a gifted artist in Peterborough, Spencer Harrison, has pointed out that under the current provisions of the criminal code and the denial of equality, this leads to hatred and to violence. He has put together a project called The Queer Project that documents the impact of this hatred.

I call on the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice to do the right thing, to join with provincial and territorial attorneys general to listen to the premier of Ontario, the Leader of the New Democratic Party in Ontario, Howard Hampton, to amend the criminal code provisions on hate propaganda to include sexual orientation.

[Assisted Suicide, April 4th, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, six years ago, Sue Rodriguez died after a long and courageous struggle with ALS, Lou Gehrig's disease.

Sue also fought another valiant battle before parliament and into the Supreme Court of Canada for a change to the criminal code provisions on physician assisted dying for terminally ill persons.

Even with the best of palliative care, too many Canadians are forced to suffer pain, anguish, indignity or pharmaceutical oblivion in their final days. Doctors must reject the eloquent plea of people like Terry Graham of Brampton or of Dr. Cohn Woolf of Toronto to allow them to die with dignity at the time they choose. Some, like Halifax orchestra conductor, Georg Tintner, jump from their balcony in despair.

I call today on the Liberal government to show compassion and humanity and listen to the eloquent call of Terry Graham, dying of mitochondrial myopathy, who recently said, “I'm just waiting to die. I'd just as soon shoot myself. It's quicker.”

I urge our government: Listen to the voices of three quarters of Canadians, amend this cruel and inhumane law now.

[Petitions, April 3rd, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present a petition signed by hundreds of residents of British Columbia including my own constituency of Burnaby—Douglas on the subject of sanctions in Iraq.

The petitioners note that the sanctions are genocide as defined by the convention against genocide and take several hundred more lives each day, and that collective punishment is prohibited by international law.

They point out that one-fifth of the Iraqi population is currently starving to death in Iraq and 23% of all children in Iraq have stunted growth according to the UN FAO, and that the international law prohibits the use of starvation as a weapon even in times of war. They note that between August 1990 and August 1997 over one million Iraqi children died of embargo related causes according to UNICEF.

Therefore the petitioners call upon parliament to do two things: to recall all Canadian military personnel and equipment now taking part in the blockade of Iraq, and to use all possible diplomatic pressures to urge the UN to end the sanctions against Iraq.

[Foreign Affairs, April 3rd, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Foreign Affairs.

Canada will preside this month at the security council with a focus on human security. Will Canada finally speak up for the security of the people of Iraq, where over 500,000 children have died since 1990 as a result of inhumane UN sanctions? Will Canada call for the immediate lifting of these genocidal sanctions as recommended by former UN humanitarian co-ordinators Denis Halliday and Hans von Sponeck? Will we stop calling for studies and call for action to lift these sanctions now?