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Is Canada failing to live up to its human rights commitments with its arms deals?

January 10, 2016

Is Canada failing to live up to its human rights commitments with its arms deals?

A soldier with the Gulf Co-operation Council forces prays in front of his armoured personnel carrier as his fellow solider keeps watch while they guard the Bahrain Financial Harbour in Manama.

A soldier with the Gulf Co-operation Council forces prays in front of his armoured personnel carrier as his fellow solider keeps watch while they guard the Bahrain Financial Harbour in Manama. (James Lawler Duggan/Reuters)

 Listen 7:58

Canada has condemned a spate of executions in Saudi Arabia, but says it won’t call down its $15 billion armoured vehicles deal with the kingdom. While that deal may be the biggest, it’s not Canada’s only arms deal with countries with human rights issues and internal conflicts. Cesar Jaramillo, Executive Director of Project Ploughshares, argues that Canada is breaking international agreements and Canadian law by failing to be transparent about arms deals with countries including Afghanistan, Egypt, Libya, Ukraine, Bahrain, Iraq, Colombia, and others.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Brent Bambury: Stéphane Dion says the contracts with Saudi Arabia won’t be cancelled. They’re going to look at how future contracts are approved. But we have rules in place. Do you think those rules were followed in the case
of Saudi Arabia?

Cesar Jaramillo: I am certain that there is a lack of clarity about the extent to which these rules were followed. A
recurring theme with this contract has being a lack of transparency. This contract has been shrouded in secrecy since it was announced in December of 2014. You fast forward to today and there isn’t that much more that we know about the details of the contract.

BB: According to our own regulations, the way that I understand it, Canada is only allowed to sell arms if there is no reasonable risk that those arms will be used against civilians. Is there any way to determine whether Canada has made that clear in the case of Saudi Arabia?

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