Mr. Chair, I appreciate the fact that the government has given us the opportunity to have this discussion tonight. I want the Canadian public to know that the Prime Minister spoke to the Leader of the Opposition on this subject and I also had a chance to speak with him as well.
From the Prime Minister's comments in our one discussion, and I had a couple of discussions with the Minister of Foreign Affairs, I had a sense of deep caution on the part of the government. I had a sense that it was looking for support and a broad consensus in the House of Commons as to what would be appropriate for Canada to do.
I will tell the House what I told the Prime Minister. I said that we live in a shrinking world. We live in a world where violence in one corner, whether it is Timbuktu, Gao, Kabul or anywhere in the world, places that perhaps Canadians 15 or 20 years ago would have said what did it matter if people were killing each other in some place that seemed to be far away. The answer to that simple question is, it matters a lot, not only morally, not because we are morally connected to what goes on in the entire globe, but because our interests, our security interests are directly affected. We cannot afford to be narrow, isolationist or small minded about how we look at problems in places far away, so we have to avoid thinking in that way.
We also have to avoid thinking ideologically. It was the great Conservative, Edmund Burke, who said once that there was no greater menace than to govern in the name of a theory. We cannot govern in the name of a theory. We cannot say that we think Latin America is more important to us than Africa, which the Conservatives did say. They said that they would concentrate more on one part of the world than another.
We cannot afford to say that we will not fall in with the United Nations, that we will do it on our own. The reality is we do these things together.
Yes, the government has been very careful to say it will give the French a cargo plane for a week. What if the conflict lasts more than a week? What if it lasts beyond February 15? The parliamentary secretary says that we will find out. Yes, we will find out. Therefore, I do not know why the Government of Canada would not say that it takes this conflict seriously and that it will keep its plane running as long as it feels it is necessary to protect the security of Mali, to protect the security of West Africa, to protect the security of Canada and to protect the security of the world. Why would we not take that position?
I am not suggesting that we should consider free trade as unimportant, because how could we make Africa safer, then? We cannot look at safety and terrorist cells in Africa without also considering Africa's prosperity.
Africa's prosperity and economic success has obvious links with the political context and the safety of populations, as we know. We cannot export a blueprint for democracy the same way we export cars or minerals.
I believe that some ideas and values are universal, such as freedom, freedom of speech, equality and the need to respect the dignity of every person. But the most vital and critical issue at stake is safety and terror. We need to say it, we need to say the word out loud. We should not be afraid to say that there is terrorism involved.
Terrorism is a problem not only in Africa, but around the world.
The organization responsible for the worst human rights abuses in Northern Mali has been labelled a terrorist organization not only by the United States, but also by the UN.
We have seen an important evolution in international governance and international law. We now have a situation where the United Nations is naming non-governmental organizations that are a threat to the stability and security of the world. We should not think that this list is limited, or that it will not find itself in some other part of the globe over the next 5, 10, 15 or 20 years. We do not know.
President Obama gave a great inauguration speech, but he said one thing with which, personally, I disagree. When he said a decade of war is over, I can only say, with great respect to the president, that we do not know that. We should not assume that, knowing how dangerous the world has become. Nor should we say that we will deal with this in an ideological fashion, or that we think that there is a military solution to everything.
I know the parliamentary secretary is going to be on his feet saying, “Should there be Canadian boots on the ground”? We know there are special forces now in Mali. I have said publicly that I have no objection to that. If it is necessary for special forces to be there to protect Canadian interests, then they should be there. We should not be shy about that.
However, we also need to understand, as my colleague from Ottawa Centre pointed out, that it is a complex situation. It is security. It is democracy. It is an issue that goes right across north Africa. Therefore, we need a comprehensive approach.
The government seems to have a philosophy, which was once associated with a former leader of my party, Mackenzie King, of whom it was said he would never do by halves what he could do by quarters. I would hope that the government would not be quite so cautious. I would hope that the government would explain to Canadians why these things are connected, why a country, which many people could not even place on a map, nor could they name the countries that surround it, is important to the world and is important to Canadian interests. If there is instability in Mali, there is instability in Mauritania. We have two distinguished Canadian diplomats who spent 133 days captured by terrorist forces. Are we going to sit around here and say we do not really think these are critical interests?
My view is that we should be very clear. We support the United Nations, not in some kind of blanket way that says whatever the UN says or does is right, but when the United Nations Security Council says there is an interest, Canada should take an interest.
It is interesting that the Minister of Foreign Affairs was explaining to reporters the other day why Canada was not able to do more in Syria. What did he say? He said there is no Security Council resolution that would allow us to do more. Now we have a Security Council resolution, which is why I say Canada should not be so timid. We should not be so reserved. We should be supporting. As the parliamentary secretary said, it should be African led.
I said that to the Prime Minister. I said that to have a mass of Canadian troops going in would not necessarily be the wisest course, but nor should we reject the principle that we can train, we can be present and we should never say on a blanket basis that there will never be a Canadian troop in Mali. That is not sensible.
We have to take steps against terror and, to put it in colloquial language, we have to whack them back. We have to give them a disincentive to violence, a disincentive to terror and a disincentive to punishing their own people. We have to recognize the regional nature of this and also, potentially, the long-term nature of this. We need a strategy of which we can be proud.
We are not doing as well as we could. We are not doing as well as we should. We are not doing as well as we have done in the past and we are not doing as well as we should be doing in the present. However, I still appreciate the opportunity to participate in the debate and look forward to the questions and comments from my colleagues.
