FAIT Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS AND INTERNATIONAL TRADE

COMITÉ PERMANENT DES AFFAIRES ÉTRANGÈRES ET DU COMMERCE INTERNATIONAL

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Tuesday, November 2, 1999.

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[English]

The Chair (Mr. Bill Graham (Toronto Centre—Rosedale, Lib.): I call the meeting to order.

We're very pleased to welcome the foreign minister of Greece, the Honourable George Papandreou, who spent part of his youth in Toronto and therefore obviously is a person of world experience. We're extremely pleased to have you with us, sir. I know members will be interested.

I apologize for the fact that although several members were here, the meeting was delayed a bit and some of them had to leave.

Normally our practice is to ask our guests if they'll perhaps just give a 10- or 15-minute introduction, or whatever they're comfortable with, and then we open it up and members would like usually to ask some questions. So if you would be good enough, sir, to give a statement to the committee, then I'll open it up for questions.

Hon. George Papandreou (Minister of Foreign Affairs, Hellenic Republic): Thank you very much. I'm sorry I'm a bit late. I was with the Prime Minister, and the meeting took a bit longer than was planned.

Relations between Greece and Canada are of course very good. We have not only traditionally had warm relations, but I think the fact that there is such a large number of Canadian citizens of Greek descent has created a very strong link between our two countries. We are very glad to see many of them now involved in politics. And of course I am one of those Greek Canadians in one way. My family was here for five years. We spent five years here, the period of time when Greece was under a dictatorship, a very difficult period for Greece.

Greece today is a very different country, democratic, the most stable country in the region. As a matter of fact, we are shouldering a very important responsibility in our corner of the world—southeastern Europe, eastern Mediterranean, the Black Sea, that region, which is quite a volatile region. Greece is the one country that is both in NATO and in the European Union, and sees as its main task to help this region be able to become part of the European family, which has provided so many countries over the past 50 years after the two world wars with security and development and democracy and a sense of stability, which had not been seen on this continent for quite a few decades previously—quite a few centuries, as a matter of fact.

So we feel that this prospect, this vision of this region being part of the European family—or the Euro-Atlantic structure, as we sometimes call it—is a vision that at this point is beginning to unite the peoples of the region and is opening up new avenues of understanding and cooperation.

It's in this spirit that we have worked through different crises in the Balkans, to play a role that is often one of trying to be a go-between in the conflicts. We have tried to stave off the problems in Kosovo by working both with Albanians and with the Serbs. Unluckily, we were not successful, as you know.

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However, we worked very closely with our allies and with the countries in the region during the crisis, during this war, and of course with Canada also, with Lloyd Axworthy. We participated in a number of meetings together and also worked closely and were supported—and thank Canada for this—in our humanitarian efforts both in Kosovo and in the rest of Yugoslavia, where Greece was in fact at some point the only country that had humanitarian groups. It was during the bombings, of course, and we were the only ones who finally could have access both to one and to the other side because of the role we were playing.

We have also now developed a new opening with our other neighbour, Turkey, which is of course in the NATO alliance, but with a number of problems that have developed over the years. One is the Cyprus problem. In 1974, on the pretext of coming to the protection of the Turkish Cypriot community, Turkey invaded this island and has been there with about 35,000 troops ever since. Now we are hoping that new efforts of the G-8, which Canada participates in, and of the UN will be successful in beginning new substantial negotiations toward the solution of this problem. We believe the two communities can live together in peace under one roof, certainly in a decentralized federal structure, and as part of the European Union, which will guarantee both prosperity and protection of human rights.

I think we've shown that Greeks and Turks can live together and it is a myth that they cannot. In the recent earthquakes there was an outpouring of solidarity from Greece, not from the government but from the citizens in the street, as one would call them. I was inundated with calls asking how they could give blood, how they could send money, how they could send clothing, tents, and so on. A lot of non-governmental organizations went over to Turkey to help, and this has developed into a true people-to-people diplomacy, in a sense—a people's diplomacy. There was a very warm welcome from the Turkish side, particularly from the citizens and the press. This was reciprocated when we had a similar experience, not as devastating, but a similar experience about a month later in Athens.

We had already begun a dialogue with Turkey on issues of common interest in areas such as commerce, tourism, culture, security, environment, and multilateral cooperation. I think this openness also helped, so that when the earthquakes came in fact there was a new hope that developed.

In our bilateral relations with Turkey, we are basically saying we want something very simple: that treaties be respected, borders be respected, that if there are any questions about the treaties that exist they should be dealt with through legal means and not through use of force. And we have proposed that if there's any issue that Turkey has.... We have no issue, except for one that we recognize, the delineation of the continental shelf. We feel that our borders otherwise are very clear and have been there since the Second World War. The Dodecanese were given from Italy to Greece and they have very clearly delineated borders with Turkey as they had been negotiated with Italy, so we feel there's no real issue, but we have said that if there is an issue, there is the International Court of Justice at The Hague, where Turkey can take its complaints, and we will be glad to accept whatever the verdict is.

On this basis we have, as I said, begun a dialogue with Turkey and hope things may move in a better direction. There's a big decision in Helsinki, Finland, in December, when we will decide whether Europe will make Turkey a candidate country for the European Union. This is a big decision. It's more like becoming, let's say, another province, rather than part of NAFTA. So it's a big decision. Of course, they would only become a candidate. Depending on the number of negotiations we're having within the European Union, we will make a yes or no decision in December.

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I could go on and on. In the region there are many issues and problems. I know you have a keen interest in Kosovo, as you have in Bosnia, as you have had troops deployed there.

I want to thank you also for the positions you have taken on issues very dear to us, such as Cyprus and the Macedonian issue. In the past you have been very much in solidarity with Greece. So let me express that.

I'd be open to any questions on areas of interest you may have. Thank you very much.

The Chair: Thank you very much, Minister. That's very interesting.

Do members have any questions?

[Translation]

Mr. Rocheleau.

Mr. Yves Rocheleau (Trois-Rivières, BQ): Thank you, Mr. Papandreou, for coming here today. I'd like to hear your views on the future of Greece as part of the greater European community. How will the concept of sovereignty evolve in the face of the new emerging Europe? How will the concept of the sovereignty of nations be perceived in ten, fifty or one hundred years' time?

[English]

Mr. George Papandreou: That is a very interesting question.

Greece, as you may know, has been a member of the European Union since 1980. The European Union is unique in the world, in that it is an organization where sovereign nation-states voluntarily have come together and given up part of their sovereignty to a supranational body. That body is now called the European Union, but before it was known as the European Community, before that the European Coal and Steel Community, and so on and so forth. As we are moving ahead, there has been more and more integration where more and more issues are, as we call them, communitized in a sense; that is, they become community policies.

I think there have been many positive aspects, but there are also some negative aspects to this. The positive aspects are that in this globalized world the types of problems we are dealing with—social, economic, and so on—in many ways can be dealt with more easily if we unite our forces. Take environment, for example. It goes beyond borders, and therefore working together and creating a common environmental policy is very important. If we in Greece had different standards on our products and there were different standards in Italy and Germany, this would in fact create many difficulties, for example, in trade. As we make more common standards and hopefully these standards are also to the benefit of our citizens, then we make trade more possible, help business development, and so on. At the same time, we also protect our citizens with specific standards.

There are other issues, such as the EMU, the European Economic and Monetary Union, which we feel will create a much stronger and more competitive economy in Europe and also a sense of common identity among the Europeans. At the same time, creating a much larger structure means the average citizen sometimes feels somewhat further away from government, particularly from the European government, and less participative in this. So there is what we call a democratic deficit in the European Union, and we therefore have to begin to rethink the structures of how we make decisions, of how we get the different citizens and representatives of different parts of the society involved in decision-making, whether it's through non-governmental organizations, labour organizations, employer organizations, or local government, and so on.

There is a big debate. We are moving now from 15 countries to a point at which we may in a few years be at 26 countries, then moving up to 30 countries at some point in the next 10 or 15 years. In the next two years, we will therefore be discussing major constitutional reforms of the European Union. For that, of course, there are two different tendencies.

I would say one tendency is to move more towards a confederal type of a body in which we would have something more like two houses, let's say a Senate and a House of Representatives if you were to take the U.S. example. But there are others who want a looser type of organization in which there are still many decisions made in the European Union but there is still a large degree of autonomy for the nation-states. It's a fascinating process. It's very interesting, and an experiment in human history.

The Chair: Mr. Mifflin, sir.

Mr. Fred Mifflin (Bonavista—Trinity—Conception, Lib.): Thanks very much, Mr. Chairman.

First of all, thanks very much indeed, Minister, for your frank introductory remarks. They're very much appreciated.

I'm very interested in the proportion of your gross national product that you spend on defence. I think it's one of the highest in NATO, if not the highest. I realize, of course, that you have different problems from Canada because you live in a different part of the world. I guess my question is in your democracy, is it hard to maintain that ratio of GNP to defence, given the usual strains on social programs and other kinds of things? Do you see it changing up or down, or pretty well remaining the same?

Mr. George Papandreou: I think we are the highest. I think it's 4.7% of our GDP. I think Turkey is next at 4.5%, and the United States is third, somewhere around 3% or something or other. I'm not exactly sure of the percentage.

It is high. The reason it is that high is because of the types of problems we are dealing with in the region. Certainly if we were living in a different area of the world, a much quieter area of the world, it wouldn't be that high. Also, this wouldn't be the only difference, but I think the task we have is different as we move out of the Cold War situation.

Of course we have a problem with Turkey. There has therefore been an escalation of procurements of arms and so on over the past twenty to thirty years. However, if we didn't have this problem—and hopefully we won't have this problem, hopefully we can solve our problems—there is, as I said, some opening here. That would mean we would not only want to lower the spending, but would also want to relocate the spending into a different type of army that would deal with problems more like crisis intervention or peacekeeping, peacemaking, humanitarian efforts and so on. But that's not what our army is really trained for. Areas like Bosnia, Kosovo, and others where we do have troops are really a training ground for a new approach to what our armies would be able to do.

It is a burden for two reasons. One is the social programs that you mentioned. We could spend more money on education and health and other types of social programs like pensions and so on. But because we are in this so-called Euro-zone.... We are hoping to be part of the Euro-zone in 2001, and we will actually be applying to be a member of the Euro-zone early next year. One of the stipulations is that our budget is under a 3% debt. We are now quite under that. We're around 2.1%. We're now working on inflation, which has to be somewhere under 2%. We're around 2.4% or something like that, which is a very big change. Two years ago it was about 14%. Of course, if we could cut down on our military budget, this would make things much easier.

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The Chair: That's where everybody focuses.

Mr. George Papandreou: I know you have a similar debate on this issue, yes.

Ms. Eleni Bakopanos (Ahuntsic, Lib.): Yes, it came up in the House today.

The Chair: Mr. Cannis.

Mr. John Cannis (Scarborough Centre, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Yes, Minister, we don't know because our opposition one day wants us to spend, the next day they want us to cut. We're confused.

If I may, Minister, let me just begin by saying that I know you welcomed us when the Canadian NATO Parliamentary Association visited Greece in 1996. You were then Minister of Education and you welcomed us to your office, so it's an opportunity now for us to welcome you here to Canada.

Mr. George Papandreou: Yes, and I thank you very much.

Mr. John Cannis: It's nice to have you back home—and I guess I can use that word as well.

Minister, you touched on some very important issues. I'm just going to go down the list, and you can choose in your own way to respond to every one of them.

I was pleased to hear about your comments with respect to the G-8 efforts with respect to Cyprus. I think there were some very positive signals sent there. Certainly after 25 years I think the communities out there—and especially the Canadian Cypriot-Greek community—are thirsting for some positive steps to go forward, and we're very pleased with the signals that we've been getting. But in tying Cyprus together, you also talked about the European Union and Turkey's interest in joining the European family. If you can, just elaborate on that a little bit and Greece's role and how they see it.

In saying that, I also want to tie in on what you touched upon, the borders, the Dodecanese. You're well aware that I was born on the island of Kálimnos, and that has certainly been an area of dispute over recent years. One of the things that concerns not just the people who live in that region, but certainly people who now make Canada their home, who make Australia their home, who make the United States their home, and those who have ancestral properties, family members and what have you there, is to see some excursions that are unfolding and questions that are coming up every now and then.

I pose this question to you: In bringing in the European Union concept, do you not see that if Turkey indeed were to become a member of the European Union, security with respect to those borders would possibly arrive as a result? Hypothetically speaking, I can't see the Italian borders, for example, being questioned by another European Union member today.

There is another thing that concerns me. You talked about the confederal system. We in Canada are as distinct as all regions in Europe are. There's quite a distinction between a Spaniard and an Italian, a Greek and a Frenchman. In Canada, we are such a diverse country. If you go from one end of our country to the other, you will see what we call this beautiful mosaic. One thing we've prided ourselves on, for example, is that in Quebec we have a very distinct society, as we have in Ontario, as we have in British Columbia, etc. How do you see this confederal system working to maintain the cultural identity that you've enjoyed as Greeks or Italians, Germans or French, etc.? What measures are now in place, or what do you see that could be put in place so that the confederal union is there and is working, yet again each individual state's identity and cultural pride are maintained and expanded?

Thank you.

Mr. George Papandreou: Big issues, big questions.

The Chair: Perhaps that's a long series of questions, Minister. If you're talking about Turkey coming into the EU, maybe you could just help us on your view of whether Cyprus can get into the European Union. If so, does it require a settlement of the northern issue as a precondition to that, or is there some other way it could be handled?

Mr. George Papandreou: Okay, then let me begin on Cyprus.

Cyprus began negotiations with the European Union close to two years ago, or maybe less than that. It is doing very well. There are a number of chapters—I think it's around thirty chapters—that they must go through. There are all kinds of discussions. What happens really is that each country has to adopt and adapt the legal framework of the European Union and can do so in different ways, and that's negotiated. What's also negotiated is the time limit within which this will change, and if there should be any exceptions and for how long. Usually we don't accept exceptions, and if there are, they aren't for a very long period.

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For example, when the Austrians came in, they said they didn't want their land to be able to be bought up by Germans. We said, well, in the European Union anybody is free to buy land in any other country if he or she is a citizen of the European Union. They asked for an exemption of five years, which they got, and they actually created a system that was not discriminatory to any citizen but made it somewhat more difficult for a German to come in and buy, because of the types of rules and regulations that anyone would have to go through to buy land. I'm just giving you an example. So it's quite along process.

Cyprus is doing very well in the negotiations, and we've come up, of course, to the political problem. We hope this process of moving toward the European Union, as you mentioned, and Turkey moving toward the European Union will actually use this dynamic for solutions to these issues.

Why a solution on Cyprus in the European Union? Just think of the Turkish Cypriot community, what benefits it will have if it becomes part of this union. It won't feel isolated on this island with only a Greek community but will be within a much larger community of more than 15 nations by then. The Turkish language will become an official language of the European Union, and they will participate in the European Parliament and the bureaucracy of the European Union and of course in the council of ministers. In the courts there will be specific provisions, which are provided by the Amsterdam treaty, which provides for human rights in all the member states. And they will be getting a lot of funding for development—they now have about one-fourth the standard of living of the Greek Cypriot side.

So we feel that it can be really a catalyst, but let's say they don't see it that way. And they and Denktas haven't seen it that way. He's sort of king of the hill, and he likes being king of the hill; he doesn't want to be number two in a larger country. Does that mean Cyprus can never become a member? That would be really adding insult to injury, in a sense, because the Greek Cypriots aren't the ones who invaded; the Turks invaded Cyprus. They want to solve the problem, but what if the Turks don't want to solve the problem? Should the Cypriots be left out of the European Union?

We're saying they should become part of the European Union irrespective of whether the solution is found. We want a solution, of course, and it would be much better if Cyprus were in the European Union after a solution, but that shouldn't be a precondition. Many countries in the European Union have agreed with us on this. The British, for example, have been very outspoken on this and have been very positive, but there are others, such as the French, who we have to convince. I'll be in France next week trying to convince them on this.

On Turkey, very right, we want the whole process of becoming part of the European Union to help solve some of these issues.

As a matter of fact, what is Europe? Europe was created at a time after the Second World War when the Europeans decided not to fight over borders: let's respect them as they are, however illogical they may be, because borders are sometimes very illogical if you see who's living on what side of the border. But let's respect them, and once you respect them, you can lower their importance. Today, or very soon, you will be able to travel from Athens to Germany without a passport. Certainly in many countries you travel without a passport, so people don't even know there are borders in the European Union.

That means that countries solve their problems, if they do have problems, through peaceful means. This is what we will be discussing in Helsinki, saying if you become a candidate, Turkey and other countries that are wanting to become candidates in the future, you must therefore accept certain rules of the game. If you accept these rules of the game and you make reforms in your countries on human rights, respect of international law, accepting the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice at The Hague, democratic procedures, minority rights of the Kurds, and so on, and a number of other issues that are economical, then we will start real negotiations with you on your becoming a part of the European Union.

So this is very much in our thinking, and this is why we say yes to Turkey becoming part of Europe, on the condition, of course, that it also Europeanizes—not just in title, becoming European, but in real reforms, showing the real political will to change.

A final issue is that Europe is, in a sense, becoming a mosaic of identities, and in a different way from Canada, Australia, or the United States. The United States, of course, has followed a slightly different policy, initially trying this melting pot idea. But you have been in the forefront of a much more multicultural approach.

What our experience has been in Europe is that we've had two processes: one of integration, where we all develop a common culture—basically a political culture—of democracy and European political values; and on top of that, we have our very special cultures—our languages, our traditions, our histories, our ways of living our lives. And you can see in Europe that this is not lessened because of the European Union, but it's been accentuated. I think people are much more proud or it's much more interesting to bring these special characteristics out. If you go to the Catalan or Basque areas in Spain, you'll see that they have integrated more, but they've also come out with more of their identity in the European Union. This also seems to have played an important role in the Irish conflict in northern Ireland, in a positive way.

I think we're moving toward a mosaic, which will not be exactly like Canada, but will have many of the same concepts.

The Chair: Thank you, Minister. I'm afraid you're running late, so I think we're keeping you from a reception. But maybe I could just trespass on the reception for one minute by asking you a question that puzzles us quite a bit.

What is Greece's position on the reconstruction of Serbia and whether aid to Serbia should be preconditioned on Mr. Milosevic's removal or not, or whether there is some form of humanitarian or reconstruction aid that should go forward anyway? We had the Romanian defence minister here last week, and he was pointing out that Romania is very dependent on the Danube River, and there are other countries too that are dependent on Serbia and are anxiously awaiting some solution. They may not want to wait until Mr. Milosevic goes. What is Greece's position?

Mr. George Papandreou: Well, we share everyone's opinion and their worries about Milosevic. Our question is, how can we be more effective in making change in Serbia and Yugoslavia? I think there are two questions here, as a matter of fact. One is the humanitarian issue, and the other one is the political issue.

On the humanitarian issue, I think it's quite clear, to us at least, and I think to many other countries in the European Union, that the humanitarian issue is above and beyond ideology and politics. We should give humanitarian help to those who need it, whether they are Serbs, Albanians, or Turks—there are some Turks in Kosovo—or Roma or whatever. Therefore, it's important. The winter is coming on, and there will be many very dire problems. In some cities there is only 20% of the energy supply because of the damage of the bombings.

Then we go to the political question, the reconstruction issue. Our opinion is that there should be certain measures that can be taken to give a strong signal to the Serbian people that the international world is not against the Serbian people, but against the regime and the policies of the regime. How do you make that differentiation? Well, this is one of the issues we've been discussing.

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We're trying to work with the opposition to possibly get them united—come up with their own program, come up with a leader or some form of a collective leadership that is credible. And then on their demand, we actually make moves in lifting some of the sanctions, so that we can legitimize them and give them more credibility within Yugoslavia, and also send a very strong message to the Serbian people that we are with them, that we're not against them, we're against Milosevic.

Greece and Holland have a common proposal in the European Union, which was adopted. It's called “energy for democracy”, and we now are sending oil to a number of municipalities in Serbia that are opposition municipalities. This type of activity is something we will develop.

Finally, there are certain things like the Danube River, which we think must be cleaned, because it's damaging the whole region—Greece too. Although we don't have a direct connection with the Danube River, when our neighbours are hurt economically, it means our economy is also hurt—our investment, our markets, and so on. They've been pleading with the international community to lift these sanctions, and particularly to help reconstruction on the Danube.

The Chair: Well, Minister, I know the room is called for, and I know we're keeping you from a reception for the Canada-Greece Inter-Parliamentary Association, so on behalf of all the members, I'd like to thank you very warmly—

Mr. George Papandreou: Thank you very much, and I hope to see you in Greece.

The Chair: I hope we'll see you, or perhaps we'll see you down the hall.

Mr. George Papandreou: Yes, it's certainly easier.

The Chair: I have a copy of a parliamentary report I'd like to give you.

We're adjourned.