René Laurin

[Kosovo, April 12th, 1999]

As I was saying, while NATO pursues its air strikes, the exodus is continuing. The massacres are continuing and the ethnic cleansing started a long time ago is intensifying. If our goal is to stop the dreaded genocide, the crimes against humanity and the exodus, we must ask ourselves if all of this will not be a fait accompli in a few weeks. We will then ask ourselves: What is the use of going on?

If, for the time being, Russia's opposition remains mainly rhetorical, who is to say that, in a few weeks, this opposition will not take a more active form, such as the sending of military equipment or countering NATO action?

If NATO members are really committed to solve the problem in Kosovo and to make sure refugees return to their homes, they must set a deadline which, if crossed, will entail other military or political action, including ground troops.

While his military storage sites are being bombarded, an armed Milosevic is going around getting rid of refugees, doing what he wants, acting freely on his territory, and we are attacking buildings and storage sites. If this were to go on for too long, it is very likely that Milosevic would have the time to do what he intends to do, and even though his weapon storage sites have been destroyed, he would have achieved his goal.

Lets us look at what has been gained from a few weeks of bombing. In Albania, for example, more than 500,000 refugees are crammed in camps, schools, factories, hospitals and Albanian foster families. Living conditions as reported by international agencies are described as “not too bad”. However, Albania will not be able to cope for very long without substantial assistance from the international community.

In Macedonia, more than 115,000 refugees are crowded into camps surrounded by barbed wire and controlled by the Macedonian authorities. Conditions are very difficult, and the Macedonian authorities have warned the international community on several occasions that they could not take in any more. Most of the refugees are women and children.

There are 25,000 refugees in Bosnia as well. There are 60,000 in Montenegro and 6,000 in Turkey. Over 100,000 middle aged and young men have disappeared. In Kosovo itself, over 500,000 persons have been displaced. They are either in hiding, on the roads or have sought refuge in the country.

So, for the moment, some 800,000 Kosovars are still in their homes, that is, less than the original population of this country, which was some 1,800,000.

Macedonia's parliament issued an appeal for help to the international community. Initially, the Macedonian parliamentarians asked for financial and material help and support for the NGOs in order to take charge of the refugees. Macedonia has already spent $200 million as a direct result of the atrocities committed in Kosovo, of an annual gross domestic product of $3 billion. That is fairly close to 10%.

The parliament also asked NATO members to take in refugees in order to give their countries relief, and this explains the hasty agreement by NATO countries to take in refugees.

Some 30% of the Macedonian population were Albanian speakers, and the authorities feared the ethnic balance would be upset by the influx of refugees. This explains in part their behaviour toward the refugees, the evacuations and border closures. They must be given all possible assistance.

The assembly of the people of the republic of Albania also spoke out in total support of the NATO air strikes and called for ground troops to be sent urgently.

Moreover, Albanian parliamentarians thank the international community for its help and ask that such help be increased to meet the growing needs of refugees and the population in northern Albania.

The time has come to consider our options, whether military, political, humanitarian, diplomatic or other. On behalf of my party, I will propose a number of possible solutions, which we feel this House should contemplate.

At the military level, even though we have not reached that stage yet, we think that ground military action should be considered, or at least discussed. We should look at the benefits and drawbacks of such action. The time has come to think about solutions other than the one being applied right now, that is air strikes.

Since the beginning of the NATO air strikes, President Milosevic has accelerated the pace of the forced exodus of Albanian Kosovars. The police, the militia and the Serb army have continued and even intensified their action against the Kosovars. The net result of this is that with 500,000 refugees—or 621,000 since March 1998 according to the UNHCR—the objectives pursued with the air strikes have not produced the anticipated results, namely to stop the atrocities committed against the people of Kosovo, and nor have they led Milosevic to accept the Rambouillet peace plan.

In that context, the Bloc Quebecois feels that the use of allied ground troops must be considered to stop the atrocities and the repression of which Kosovars are victims, this in light of Milosevic's firm resolve not to make any concession about Kosovo, which is the cradle of the Serb nation.

This intervention to impose peace should be organized, or at least considered as quickly as possible. In fact, the border closings, the mines laid at the borders, and the numerous atrocities against the Kosovars reveal the intentions of Milosevic and his security forces to commit genocide against the Kosovo people.

NATO's military intervention on the ground could allow all Kosovar refugees to go back home, not just some of them. NATO must, therefore, liberate all of Kosovo. This option is the one more closely matching the reason why Canada and NATO are fighting: to implement a peace plan, the Rambouillet peace plan, and to stop the atrocities against the Kosovo people.

At the political level, solutions are also possible, including UN involvement and the application of international law. On April 9, Kofi Annan called for a conditional cease-fire and for Yugoslavian compliance with the numerous UN resolutions. It is vital for the UN, its security council in particular, to be involved in this crisis.

Canada has a duty to try, by every means possible, to submit to the council a draft peace agreement reflecting the main thrust of Rambouillet.

On January 19, 1999, the security council denounced Yugoslavia's refusal to allow the international tribunal prosecutor to investigate the Racak massacre. This request for an inquiry was a follow-up to resolutions 1160, 1199 and 1203, all issued in 1998.

Canada must submit a new request, asking that the security council issue a resolution condemning the actions of the Yugoslav government. Canada must bring before the UN the charges of genocide and crimes against humanity perpetrated by the government of Yugoslavia, in accordance with the 1948 convention against genocide.

Finally, there should be a free and democratic consultation of Kosovars regarding the future status of Kosovo.

From a humanitarian point of view, consideration should be given to ongoing and unconditional aid. The decisions we make today will have an impact on the decisions our children will have to make in 20, 25 or 30 years. Canada cannot slough off 25 or 30 years from now responsibilities it takes on today. Canada is at war against the Serbs and Canada will have to help the people it has fought, the people who have suffered in this war.

Canada will have to help them, and it must think about helping them not just while the bombing is taking place, but also in the years, and there will be many, of rebuilding ahead.

There is a strong risk that the rush of refugees to the Republic of Macedonia and to Albania will destabilize these regimes. Massive, unconditional and direct assistance is therefore necessary if the conflict is not to spread throughout the region.

The appeals from these two countries must be taken seriously and Canada has a responsibility to respond. Beyond these geopolitical contingencies, all western countries have an obligation to provide all conceivable aid to the populations displaced by these conflict.

This aid requires, and will continue to require, significant assistance over a long period. Canada must prepare for this and show its support for non-government organizations such as UNHCR, the Red Cross and the Red Crescent immediately.

Airlifting refugees to Canada has already been considered and careful preparations for this must continue. Canada is willing to receive those displaced persons wishing to come here. However, the government must quickly clarify their status.

Diplomatically, it is vital that thought be given to the chaos that has prevailed in the Balkans since 1989. This situation has brought nothing but grief to the nations in the region, and has also caused many problems for the international community. Human tragedies, including war crimes, crimes against humanity and now the genocidal intent of the Milosevic regime are unacceptable events for humanity.

The human as well as financial and political costs of such chaos are extremely high. Once the present armed conflict comes to an end, the situation in the Balkans will not be stabilized. Tensions will remain very high. Yugoslavian, Kosovar, Albanian and Macedonian infrastructures will be either destroyed or non existent. The financial and political situation in Kosovo, and also in Yugoslavia, Macedonia, Albania and Bosnia will remain disastrous.

This is the reason why the Bloc Quebecois is suggesting that a plan for the whole region be developed right away, a plan similar to the Marshal plan, which was responsible for the reconstruction and ultimately the unification of Europe after the second world war; such a plan would involve massive financial and material assistance to the tune of US$50 billion over several years; this assistance would be dependent on the respect of certain economic and political rules as well as the implementation of a future peace plan.

This massive help, which at first glance appears very significant, would be nothing compared to the cost of a war-torn region in the heart of Europe, a region which, instead of being part of the international community, would only bring chaos and desolation. Such a plan which would come under the authority of the European Union, but Canada and the United States should be involved; it would allow the region to move beyond war and its immediate consequences towards reconstruction and democracy instead of tensions and desolation.

[Kosovo, April 12th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to take part in tonight's debate, but also a bit weary at having to do so, because it is always hard to address humanitarian crises that are not under control and that can lead God knows where.

For the benefit of our fellow citizens who might not have had the opportunity to follow the daily coverage of this crisis in the papers, I think it would be useful to give an overview of the situation.

On March 11, before NATO started its air campaign, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Mrs. Sadako Ogata, estimated that more than 400,000 people had been forced to flee their homes since the beginning of the conflict in March 1998. Among them, 230,000 were displaced within Kosovo itself.

On March 24, the very day the air campaign started, Kosovar refugees totalled 450,000 people, including 260,000 inside Kosovo. In only 13 days, the number of displaced persons has increased by 30,000.

The last solution proposed by the Assembly was the international peace conference in Rambouillet, France. This conference ended in a peace plan which the Kosovars never signed. In a word, this peace plan extending over three years provided for a substantial level of autonomy for the Kosovars, but always within Yugoslavia.

Moreover, it provided for the deployment of NATO troops to ensure the enforcement of that plan. It is this last element that President Milosevic rejected, foreseeing the partition of Kosovo from Serbia at the end of the three years, and occupation of his territory by a foreign force.

It is therefore to put an end to the violence of the Serbian authorities against the Albanian population of Kosovo, which represents 80« of the total population, and to try and convince Milosevic to accept the Rambouillet accord, that NATO conducted air strikes against the Yugoslavian army.

It is essentially for the same reasons that Canada agreed to participate to the NATO'S Allied Forces operation. Canada also recognized that as long as this conflict was permitted to last, it could result in major humanitarian disasters and destabilise the whole region at the same time. This is why Belgrade's acceptance of the Rambouillet peace plan had become essential from a Canadian standpoint.

The Bloc Quebecois supported the NATO military intervention in Kosovo and Yugoslavia because it felt and indeed, like all the NATO countries, still thinks that it is better to try to do something in Kosovo than to let a situation that has been going on for 10 years continue to deteriorate.

But time is a very significant and legitimate time factor with respect to the air strikes in Yugoslavia. I questioned the Minister of National Defence about it in this House, but he did not answer. My first question was about the air strikes. I asked him how long they would go on—weeks, months perhaps—before any result can be achieved. Do NATO countries all agree to keep bombing Yugoslavia much longer before considering other options?

Mr. Speaker, members are presently having a private conversation near me and that bothers me. Would you please ask them to tone it down a little or to take their conversation somewhere else.

[Kosovo, April 12th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I invite the minister to listen carefully to my question. I have twice asked him questions, and he does not always give me a direct answer.

I would ask him to tell us this. Between his statement of last week that a number of weeks, if not months, of preparation were required, and his statement of today, what has taken place so that the Canadian army is now ready, or not, to intervene and to act on a NATO decision?

[Kosovo, April 12th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of National Defence said recently that it would be a few weeks, if not several months, before the Canadian army was ready to intervene in Kosovo.

Since many people are seriously raising the issue of land operations, could the minister tell us about the army's readiness at this point to intervene in Kosovo?

[Kosovo, March 24th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak about NATO's imminent intervention in the former Yugoslavia.

Yesterday, the secretary general of the Atlantic alliance, Javier Solana, gave the go-ahead for NATO bombing, after one last attempt by American envoy Richard Holbrooke to negotiate an agreement with Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic. The Serbian leader has categorically refused to sign the Rambouillet accord, which would have resulted in a ceasefire in Kosovo.

This peace accord was negotiated in a suburb of Paris under the supervision of the contact group for the former Yugoslavia, a group made up of the United States, Russia, France, the United Kingdom, Italy and Germany. Only the Kosovar separatists signed. The accord would have given them substantial autonomy for a three year transition. The peace plan also would have allowed the deployment of 26,000 NATO troops in Kosovo to ensure enforcement. This is the main stumbling block for Serbian President Milosevic. Even faced with imminent allied air strikes, he repeated on Serbian television only a few hours ago his firm opposition to what he considers to be occupation of Serbian territory by foreign military forces.

It must be kept in mind that from the onset of the conflict between the Yugoslav forces and the Albanian separatists more than a year ago now some 2,000 people have been killed and more than 200,000 people made refugees. For 10 months the international community has tried every possible approach to end the war and repression in Kosovo. Kosovo has not respected UN security council resolutions 1199 and 1203, or last October's agreements between the Organization on Security and Cooperation in Europe, NATO and the former Yugoslavia. Belgrade has not complied with its obligations to limit the deployment of its forces in Kosovo, protect the population and bring about a ceasefire.

It must be kept in mind that Yugoslavia has, moreover, been involved in bloody conflict for 10 years. There was Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Slovenia, and now Kosovo. Faced with this intolerable situation in which defenceless civilian populations are being fired at by the ex-Yugoslav army, the international community cannot remain indifferent. The international community will lose all credibility if it does not act immediately. Otherwise, it will find itself encouraging the various abuses being committed by the Serbian government.

In order to protect the civilian population of Kosovo, it seems that the armed solution is the last plausible option. It is unfortunate that it has to be contemplated and supported, but the situation as it stands renders it necessary.

That said, we understand and support Canada's desire to act with NATO forces to help the civilians of Kosovo. However, the minister did not tell us what would happen should the forces of the former Yugoslavia, with President Milosevic at their head, refuse to give in to NATO.

Indeed, what will happen if the NATO air strikes do not make Yugoslavia bend? What will happen if the conflict drags on? What are the long term objectives of the alliance and Canada in this conflict?

The Minister of Foreign Affairs' speech did not provide answers to this question. However, the hostilities with the former Yugoslavia are real. While we know when the adventure begins, who can claim to know when and how it will all end? Obviously, this is all the more true if the Serbs feel they have nothing to lose.

In closing, the people of Quebec and Canada are entitled to know whether Canada will become more involved in this conflict should it continue. What will Canada contribute in terms of humanitarian aid to the thousands of civilians who are in need and obliged to leave their homes?

In this regard, I invite the minister and his government to inform this House of the latest developments in the former Yugoslavia and to hold here a debate on possible changes in the nature of Canada's involvement in the former Yugoslavia.

[Kosovo, March 24th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, in light of the civilian suffering, does Canada plan a humanitarian aid program for the needy?

[Kosovo, March 24th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Defence.

The situation in Kosovo is extremely tense, and a major conflict between NATO and Yugoslavia is imminent.

Could the minister give us a progress report on the current situation and indicate to us what the nature and scope of any potential Canadian participation in this conflict would be?

[Division No. 358, March 23rd, 1999]

I have nothing against that, Mr. Speaker, except that you never indicated to the House that we were resuming debate.

[Division No. 358, March 23rd, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order.

It seems to me that my colleague from the Reform Party rose on a point of order. You took his intervention as a point of order, but it would appear that we have resumed debate without your saying so and inviting the speakers to identify themselves.

Are we still on a point of order about the sharing of time or have we resumed debate?

[Government Services Act, 1999, March 23rd, 1999]

My colleagues opposite would do well to be a little more attentive, and to consider what we are saying, because we are talking about the unreasonable things they are doing and they do not realize it because they are not listening. They rarely listen. They do not listen to the public, the unemployed, women, students and seasonal workers, who are saying “Stop, we are out of breath, we cannot go on”.

They are not listening to that. They are not listening this evening either, because they are afraid of hearing the truth. They are afraid of hearing people talking about real things. Each time we talk to them about it, they say any old thing to avoid listening. And this is what they are doing as I speak so they do not hear me. They are talking. They are trying to talk to me. I am certainly not going to listen to them this evening.

Special back to work legislation, I have experienced it in other lives, before I entered politics. I know what it means. I know what it means for the employer and for the employees as well.

In certain cases, 20 years later, the wounds are still there. They can be felt in society, in the family, in labour relations and I could even say in political terms.

It has always been possible to lead a horse to water, but it has never been possible to make it drink. While it is possible to use special legislation to force people to go back to work, by imposing thousands of dollars in fines to those who do not comply with the act, it is impossible to force them to put their heart into it. It is impossible to force them to work with zeal, to continue to work generously for their employer, to do a good job, to work with dedication, and to be respectful of their own responsibilities, including toward those to whom they must provide services as public servants.

We cannot force workers to do that because these are feelings. These are personal feelings. An employee is willing to behave in such a way if he feels his employer respects him and does not treat him like a number. An employee works hard if he knows he will be appreciated, if he knows his value will be recognized. Politicians across the floor should know what it means to get recognition, given all the millions they spend to ensure their visibility.

Why do we want visibility? To be recognized. But this is not only good for members of parliament. It is also good for employees who work with their heart, who work to provide for their families, including their children's education and future. This is why people work.

The salary is not an employee's first motivation. It is the employer's respect and the recognition of who we are, of our contribution. This is what respect from one's employer is all about.

Does the government expect to promote this kind of work atmosphere with a special bill? We would resign ourselves to such a measure if it were an exception, if we had been negotiating forever and if experience had taught us that there is really no way to reach an agreement, that we are in a cul-de-sac, that we are too far apart. Then we would have to accept resorting to special legislation, to an exceptional measure. However, this is not the case.

Since 1991, this exceptional measure has become the rule. It is the easy solution used to render workers powerless. Tomorrow morning, they will praise them in the House. At the first opportunity, a Liberal will jump up and make a member's statement saying that we have a wonderful public service and devoted public servants in Ottawa. There will be a ceremony next fall at which medals and awards will be handed out. The downside of that party is what is happening tonight.

I do not know what PSAC employees will be thinking at the next public service awards bash. I do not know how many of them will thank their employer. I do not know how many of them will comment on its kindness and sincerity in organizing an awards ceremony.

Can these people do this with any sincerity? To appear sincere, it is not enough to look the part. One must be sincere through and through, and that is harder to carry off because it involves actions and attitudes, not just words.

We should not be surprised that public service workers are frustrated and have taken the action they have. They believe in their demands. According to the our information, what they have asked for is similar to what has been offered in other job categories and, where there are differences, they are prepared to submit them to a neutral arbitrator.

If the government is truly sincere, it should also let an arbitrator decide. The problem will be sorted out. Employees will return to work tomorrow morning. Western farmers will be able to sell their wheat. Correctional services employees will be back on the job. Hospital workers at Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue who look after veterans will continue to do what they did before, and what they are still doing.

As evidenced by the information I obtained today, these people work conscientiously with patients and veterans who are hospitalized. They continue to provide services. They are doing their best to find other means of penalizing the employer without penalizing patients. This takes dedication, diligence and professionalism.

The government should be more grateful and should accept to go back to the bargaining table. I am not telling the government to start giving unions everything they ask for. That is not what a collective agreement is all about. That is not what bargaining is all about. Bargaining involves sitting down together and engaging in a process of give and take. But to do that, the parties must sit down face to face, discuss and determine what the demands are and what can reasonably be granted. To do that, one must also be able to listen.

The government ought to return to the bargaining table, listen to what the union has to say and then ask itself questions like: Is it in the national interest? Is it in the taxpayers' interest? Is it fostering social peace or is it continuing to refuse to give these workers a decent salary and decent working conditions while dipping into the pockets of taxpayers to accumulate huge surpluses?

I hope these thoughts will help government members take a more positive position before the night is through. Let us hope they do.