Foreign Affairs committee  Was Ukraine a success or not? Yes, it was a success, and it was an extraordinary undertaking to put all that together in a very short period of time. But it was hugely risky, and I think we took excessive risks. It's a bit like Haiti, but more so. The Russians and of course the Ukrainian government were looking for opportunities to discredit western observation teams.

Foreign Affairs committee  I don't think that we Canadians can claim credit for the success. It was a collective, cooperative undertaking. There were a number of international organizations there, including the OSCE, the European Union, and a number of others. If we had been on our own, it would have been very different, because the difficulties we had in organizing that and training our people would have been exposed.

Foreign Affairs committee  These are big questions: the linkage between an election and a successful election. You were there, and it was a successful election. I think Elections Canada did a great job. I would add that I think we were fortunate, because it was, as you point out, mostly Canadian. That did not get us into difficulty.

Foreign Affairs committee  I can support what Bob has been saying. I think it's important to note that a number of organizations who work in this field draw relatively little of their funding from government. There are civil society organizations, NGOs such as my own. Mine is not focused exclusively on democratic development, but democratic development is certainly a key part of it.

Foreign Affairs committee  As a very short answer, yes, I think the idea is a sensible one. If we disperse too widely, we don't have the resources to do the job, and I think that's what CIDA has been trying to do over the last year. It's a difficult call. Does this mean we would withdraw the kind of support we provided—it's not very much, but some—for the elections in the Congo, which were a great success, and in other parts of the world that are not on our priority list?

Foreign Affairs committee  Very briefly, neither I nor my organization is an authority in the corruption area, but I would certainly point you to the work that is being done by Transparency International. The head of Transparency International in Canada is Wesley Cragg. They can address these issues much more usefully than I can.

Foreign Affairs committee  Merci beaucoup. I'm honoured to be here, although it does strike me that coming to a committee of the House of Commons to talk about democracy is a bit like telling Prince Edward Islanders how to grow potatoes. However, I understand that the emphasis is on democracy in other places and on the practical support that Canadians can provide.

Foreign Affairs committee  I certainly agree with you about the issues of deforestation and erosion. This has been going on since, as I say, the French started cutting down an immense tropical forest that had been there. It looks like an interminable, vicious circle. You put some money into one area and you don't have enough to deal with the other simultaneously essential areas.

Foreign Affairs committee  I guess I'm repeating myself, but one of them is certainly security. Nothing is going to happen unless there's greater confidence that you can go to work and get back from work, that you can send your kids to school and the kids will come back from school—and that there is a school.

Foreign Affairs committee  The first time I travelled from Santa Domingo, which was called Ciudad Trujillo in those days—as the dictator had named it after himself—to Port-au-Prince, I had the sensation that I was moving from one planet to another. It's the same island, but they are so different. There is not a great deal that can be learned from the relative success of the Dominican Republic and that can be applied to Haiti.

Foreign Affairs committee  You ask all sorts of good questions. What's first? It's impossible to separate job creation from security. You absolutely need to spend resources on building security, building training, building a police force that has some credibility, not only in the Port-au-Prince area but also further out, where there is less control.

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you. As Boyd said, we were talking at the outset about the panorama perspective of Haiti. I first visited Haiti over 40 years ago at the time of “Papa Doc” Duvalier. I've been back on and off for different reasons over the years. With just a few bumps upward, it hasn't been a very happy 40 years, and it hasn't been a happy 50 years.