Public Safety committee  We did highlight that we think they are a very significant improvement over the previous directions, which were of serious concern. We have highlighted that they do not go far enough. It's hard to please advocates, especially when it comes to something as fundamental as human rig

Public Safety committee  Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Good morning, committee members. Amnesty International certainly welcomes this opportunity to appear before you in the course of your review of Bill C-59. I'd like you to know at the outset that I'm here on behalf of both the English and francopho

Foreign Affairs committee  Absolutely. I'm sure we both have a lot to say. As I said in my remarks, we're enthusiastic about Canada's acceding to the treaty for two reasons. First, our arms trade needs this kind of scrutiny and control. This is not theoretical. We know there are cases that have come up of

Foreign Affairs committee  We totally agree that there's a role for regulation. We are not at all suggesting that there shouldn't be a regulatory power here. We would absolutely agree that there are many aspects, including further developments that arise after the legislation is passed, that could appropri

Foreign Affairs committee  With respect to your first point, absolutely. I will highlight that, while we certainly did some work around that concern and issued some public statements, the actual study is from the U.S. Department of Defense's own audit process, so it's obviously a very authoritative source

Foreign Affairs committee  We would certainly take the position that no country should be exempt. The same concerns that we are highlighting with respect to the Canada-U.S. relationship we would have with respect to the Luxembourg-Belgium relationship. The fact that this may be how Belgium and Luxembourg d

Foreign Affairs committee  I think we would simply say that, from a human rights research perspective, sadly the U.S. record speaks for itself. Those are commendable things that you heard in your briefing, but I also shared with you recent research that we've carried out that documents flagrant disregard

Foreign Affairs committee  I don't think we would say it's a step back, but we would say that in the critical aspects where we need strengthening, it is not a step forward. The U.S. is already exempted. The U.S. will remain exempted. Our provisions to guard against diversions from one state to another are

Foreign Affairs committee  That's a very good question. As much as we wish that the arms trade treaty would have been adopted in April 2013 and that the entire world would have been on board within a few months after that, we recognize that in any area of international law, and certainly with areas affec

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you so much, Mr. Chair. Good afternoon, members of the committee. Two years ago I was on the ground in the isolated Sudanese state of South Kordofan, where civilians have been cut off from the world since 2011 while the Sudanese Armed Forces carry out an unrelenting campa

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Thank you so much, Mr. Chair, and good afternoon members of the subcommittee. It's an honour and a pleasure to be back in front of you, especially with the four tremendous colleagues you are about to hear from. I'm not going to take up time other than to very briefly situate why

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Okay. Thank you very much. As you know, you have three witnesses in front of you, and one in Tegucigalpa, and we thought it might be nice to hear first from Bertha Zúniga Cáceres from Tegucigalpa. It is over to you, Bertha.

Public Safety committee  There is nowhere we would give the gold star—

Public Safety committee  —and Amnesty rarely gives the gold star. However, there are other countries that we think are much further down that road, and Béatrice has highlighted the importance of a review mechanism that's independent, comprehensive, and expert.

Public Safety committee  We would suggest that the framework exists in the proposal that was made by Justice Dennis O'Connor 10 years ago as part of the Maher Arar inquiry. He was asked to do that. He did it thoroughly. He put in front of the nation a very comprehensive recommendation as to what the mode