Guest column: On disarmament and arms control, Canada has lost its moral purpose

In the late 1990s, the Canadian Government decided to lead the way in banning antipersonnel landmines around the world. The mines were used during times of war, but continued to linger in former combat zones. They posed an enormous threat because they claimed lives and stunted the normal social and economic development of countries long after soldiers returned to their homes.

In response to this problem, then-Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Lloyd Axworthy challenged states to participate in a diplomatic conference convened by Canada in 1997 to produce a treaty that would ban antipersonnel landmines globally. The result of the diplomatic risks taken by the Canadian Government and Mr. Axworthy was the signing of the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on their Destruction, also known as the “Ottawa Treaty” for the location of its signature.

The Canadian Government's inspiring leadership throughout the negotiation and signing of the Ottawa Treaty was typical of Canadian foreign policy during the 1990s and early-2000s, when the Government aimed to foster an international community based on international law and justice.[1] To the credit of its architects, Canadian foreign policy transformed our country into a world leader - not because of the financial power of our banks, the size of our oil revenues, or the deployment of our armed forces, but for our moral leadership in international relations and our decision to make human security a global political priority.

Canada continues to benefit from the strong international reputation that it established during the 1990s and early-2000s, but this is only because of dated examples of our moral leadership and loose comparisons with the United States, which make Canadian foreign policy seem noble by contrast. For instance, while living in France I noticed that the French perceived Canada as a country that supported environmental issues, even while Canadian oil companies exploited Alberta's tar sands. Throughout my time in Ecuador, I observed that Ecuadorians saw Canada as a champion of human rights, even though Canadian mining companies have violated the human rights of Ecuadorian workers.

In the area of disarmament and arms control, Canadian foreign policy has become especially embarrassing due to a combination of political intransigence, self-interest, and a lack of direction. Three examples illustrate the loss of moral purpose in Canadian disarmament and arms control policy.

The first is that the Canadian Government has not ratified the Convention on Cluster Munitions (CCM), despite being an early supporter of the Oslo Process to ban cluster munitions. The Cabinet has approved ratification of the CCM and legislation has passed through the Canadian Senate, but treaty ratification is still awaiting approval by the House of Commons. What’s more, Canada's legislation has been criticized by the Cluster Munitions Coalition and Mines Action Canada because it would allow Canadian Forces to be involved in joint military operations that employ cluster munitions with states that have not ratified the Treaty. Considering that the goal of the CCM is the complete elimination of cluster munitions, Canada's Members of Parliament can be forgiven for any cognitive dissonance they might feel while voting Bill S-10 (An Act to Implement the Convention on Cluster Munitions) into law.

The second example is Canada's recent posture in the Conference on Disarmament (CD), the world's intergovernmental forum for negotiating legally-binding disarmament and arms control treaties. Despite being responsible for landmark treaties like the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, the CD has not been able to adopt any treaty since the 1996 Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty. The CD's political paralysis is rooted in its strict consensus decision-making procedures and the intransigence of individual member states (which Canada is now guilty of).

The Canadian Government has boycotted the CD two times since 2011 under protest against the Conference's rotating presidencies of North Korea and Iran. The Canadian Government explained that it would not participate in the conference while the presidency was held by states with poor track records on nuclear proliferation. But we can’t expect to further the goal of nuclear disarmament by alienating known nuclear proliferators like North Korea or states of concern like Iran. These states must be engaged by, not excluded from, the CD. Comments from Iran's President, Hassan Rouhani, suggest that a diplomatic solution to Iran's nuclear program may exist if an atmosphere of mutual confidence and respect can be fostered between Iran and the “P5+1” (China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the U.S.).

The final example is Canada's lacklustre involvement in the negotiation of the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT), a treaty adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in April 2013 with the stated purpose of “establish(ing) the highest possible common international standards for regulating or improving the regulation of the international trade in conventional arms.”

In stark contrast to Lloyd Axworthy's admirable leadership, Canada's Ambassador to the United Nations conveyed a “do nothing” position through thin arguments like “the world doesn't need any more bureaucracy” in the Preparatory Committee for the ATT Negotiation Conference. The Arms Trade Treaty has now been signed by 112 countries across the world, including by all of our friends and allies in Europe and even by the United States, but Canada's signature is shamefully absent.

So, what has been lost? Canada has lost the moral purpose of its foreign policy. This is most obvious in the field of disarmament and arms control, but is also clear with respect to our environmental agenda (for instance, Canada's withdrawal from the Kyoto Protocol). Policy changes over the last several years have tarnished a symbol of national pride and international prestige. The attractiveness of Canadian values to the rest of the world is being corroded by narrow and short-sighted foreign policy decisions, which ultimately reduce the Canadian Government's capacity to influence actors and outcomes on the global stage through its soft power. If Canadians do not reclaim the moral purpose of their foreign policy, our country will lose all capacity to lead internationally.

Given our recent history, an appropriate place to reclaim Canadian moral leadership would be in the area of disarmament and arms control. First, the House of Commons should immediately fix the weaknesses of its legislation on the CCM and pass it into law. Second, Canadian diplomacy in the CD needs to be constructive; boycotting the Conference only reinforces the political bullheadedness that has prevented this forum from producing a treaty for seventeen years. Finally, the Government should sign and ratify the ATT without delay. Failure to re-establish the moral purpose of Canadian foreign policy will not only continue the painful decline of our international reputation and influence, but also threaten how we see our place in the world, which has until now been a source of Canadian pride.

Nathan Sears is a professor of International Relations at the Universidad de las Americas in Quito, Ecuador, with a focus on topics of security. He holds a Master of Arts in International Relations from the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs, and a Bachelor of Arts in History. He also attended the United Nations Preparatory Committee for the Arms Trade Treaty Negotiation Conference.