Foreign Affairs committee  The most basic part of an export permit is an authorization to specific users for specific purposes. If either of those conditions is breached by diversion to an unauthorized user or an unauthorized use, that is a breach of the terms of the export permit. Therefore, the governmen

Foreign Affairs committee  Yes, that is even under existing permits. In fact, this business of keeping existing permits going is very unusual. All of the other countries—and with respect to Saudi Arabia, most of our allies—have actually suspended the exports. Belgium, for example, doesn't export the turre

Foreign Affairs committee  I wonder if I could jump in, too, on a couple of things. Reference was made to wise men. That's an announcement that the minister made that he was going to establish a group of independent experts who would advise, but that hasn't been done yet. A reference has also been made

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you. The first part of your question was with respect to comments that had been made. They were made by Justin Mohammed at Amnesty International, specifically about the fact that Bill C-47 to allow Canada to accede to the Arms Trade Treaty actually did not implement all o

Foreign Affairs committee  It's not actually radical when you consider the kind of world we live in now with the kinds of challenges and the kind of “new think” we need. It's not actually that radical at all. It's just radical for the old-time diplomacy at Global Affairs. If an independent agency has the

Foreign Affairs committee  I would just echo what has been said by Project Ploughshares representatives.

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you very much. First of all, I don't know of any such pressure, but the far more important point is that it's entirely beside the point. Canada has legal obligations, which it freely entered into, with respect to the Arms Trade Treaty. It also has obligations that have bee

Foreign Affairs committee  I was involved in the last update to the export control guidelines in 1986, under the Mulroney government. At that time, unless they were very uncontroversial, the export permits had to go to the minister's office. As far as I'm aware, there has been for quite some time a require

Foreign Affairs committee  I'll respond first. So far as we are aware, it is still ongoing. We actually haven't heard anything. The last we heard of the investigation was The Globe and Mail report on October 30.

Foreign Affairs committee  Again, that's an excellent question about which we know nothing, because that really is the—

Foreign Affairs committee  But there's another aspect to this. That is the fact it was against the backdrop of a full embargo by Canada.

Foreign Affairs committee  Officials will have to answer that question because no public information has been given.

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you very much for inviting me here today. Canada needs an independent, impartial Canadian arms export control agency. Since I became president of the Rideau Institute in June 2014, we have been tracking the long and sordid saga of our continuing arms exports to Saudi Arab

National Defence committee  Thank you very much. Yes, it's absolutely important to champion women in the peace process, but that means that you have to have a good peace process. It's part of the bigger picture. It's not just saying that we support women. It's getting behind the peace process tangibly. It

National Defence committee  Yes, just to echo that point, both the Netherlands and Germany have three-year commitments and this is really what the UN has been urging, to have some kind of continuity. We'll basically be preparing to leave when we go in, so it's not sufficient. If I may, though, I would like