SDIR Committee Meeting

The Subcommittee on International Human Rights of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development met in camera at 1:10 p.m. this day, in Room 237-C, Centre Block, the Chair, Scott Reid, presiding.

It was agreed, — Whereas the Subcommittee heard timely and compelling testimony during this year’s Fourth Annual Iran Accountability Week regarding the deteriorating human rights situation in Iran, including that:

The Iranian regime has engaged in widespread and systematic violations of the human rights of its own people, including arbitrary arrests, detentions, beatings, and torture;

Executions in Iran continue unabated, and have even intensified, with more people per capita executed in Iran than in any other country, an execution binge that has seen more than 730 put to death during 2014, more than 350 in 2015 alone, and some 45 people executed in a single week in April;

The Iranian regime has the second-highest incarceration rate of journalists and bloggers in the world;

The Iranian regime continues to detain political activists, members of religious and ethnic minorities, women, human rights defenders, student activists, academics, artists, journalists, and other leaders of civil society;

Members of the Baha’i community remain subject to harassment and persecution and are denied access to education and employment opportunities, with the seven Baha’i leaders – known as the Yaran-i-Iran – now beginning their eighth year of imprisonment; and

Be it resolved that the Subcommittee:

Condemn the systematic and widespread state-sanctioned assaults on the human rights of the Iranian people, particularly including the leaders of Iranian civil society;

Recognize the importance of not allowing the ongoing nuclear negotiations with the Iranian regime to overshadow, distract from, or sanitize the regime’s human rights violations;

Call upon the Iranian regime to declare a moratorium on its state policy of wanton executions;

Urge the Iranian regime to release the following political prisoners and prisoners of conscience: the seven imprisoned leaders of the Baha’i, senior cleric and long-time advocate for religious freedom in Iran Mr. Hossein Kazamani Boroujerdi, Iranian-Canadian Saeed Malekpour and Pastor Abedini;

Call upon the Iranian regime to uphold the rule of law, protect the independence of the judiciary, end its culture of impunity, and cease and desist from its arrest and imprisonment of lawyers for no other reason than that they have defended victims of human rights violations;

Urge the Iranian regime to cease and desist from its persistent and pervasive assaults on the rights of women, including cruel and inhumane treatment, and to implement its promise to improve gender equality;

Call upon the Iranian regime to end the criminalization of dissent and the arrest and imprisonment of journalists and bloggers;

Urge the Iranian regime to permit the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran to visit the country and its prisons;

Reaffirm the unanimous call of the House of Commons and the Senate of Canada, which have urged the Government of Canada to explore sanctions as appropriate against any foreign nationals responsible for violations of internationally recognized human rights in a foreign country, when authorities in that country are unable or unwilling to conduct a thorough, independent and objective investigation of the violations.

Urge the Iranian regime to respect the right of all Iranians to run for elected office, and to increase the transparency of the Iranian electoral process by allowing elections to be monitored by independent domestic and international elections observers, beginning with parliamentary elections in 2016;

Express solidarity with the people of Iran, who are themselves the targets and victims of the Iranian regime's massive assault on human rights;

Call on the government to continue its leadership in the annual UN General Assembly Resolution on the human rights situation in Iran and mainstream concerns with Iranian human rights throughout the United Nations System.

It was agreed, — Whereas, since becoming leader of the Russian Federation in 1999, Vladimir Putin has gradually reversed the democratic reforms implemented during the 1990s, weakened governing institutions, established political control over investigatory organs and the judiciary, increasingly restricted independent media, repressed civil society organizations, and consolidated a corrupt and authoritarian ruling regime;

Whereas on February 27, 2015, Boris Nemtsov, a prominent and vocal Russian opposition leader was shot and killed by unknown assailants while walking across the Great Moskvoretsky Bridge in the shadow of Moscow’s St. Basil’s Cathedral and in full view of the Kremlin’s walls and security cameras;

Whereas Vladimir Putin has publicly referred to Boris Nemtsov and other critics of his regime as “National Traitors” and “Fifth Column” in response to his production of authoritative reports that confirm high-level official corruption in multiple sectors;

Whereas Vladimir Putin has announced that he has taken personal control of Russia’s official investigation into Boris Nemtsov’s murder, and the investigation has since pursued several implausible motives, including “a provocation to destabilize the political situation in the country, where the figure of Nemtsov could have become a sort of sacrificial victim for those who stop at nothing to achieve their political goals” and an assassination by “radical personalities” from Ukraine or Islamic extremists; and

Whereas the past record of Russian authorities in investigating political murders suggests that they will not conduct an independent, credible, and public investigation into the circumstances leading to the murder of Boris Nemtsov;

That the Subcommittee:

• Condemn the murder of Boris Nemtsov and the climate of fear, hatred, and impunity that continues to surround this and other political murders in Russia;

• Offer condolences to the family, friends, and colleagues of Boris Nemtsov as they mourn his death

• Express solidarity with the people of Russia, who continue to struggle against overwhelming odds to build a freer, more just, and prosperous future for their country;

• Call on the Government of Canada to reaffirm its support for Russia’s democratic opposition;

• Call on the Parliament of Canada to pass a global Sergei Magnitsky law to sanction individuals responsible for domestic human rights violations; and

• Call on the government of Russia to establish a Commission of Inquiry consistent with the guidelines of the United Nations and to cooperate fully with any international investigation or assessment of Boris Nemtsov’s murder.

It was agreed, — Whereas this year marks the 70th anniversary of the disappearance of Raoul Wallenberg – whom the United Nations characterized as “the greatest humanitarian of the 20th Century” in the Russian Gulag.

Whereas the fate of Raoul Wallenberg, Canada's first honorary citizen, can not be satisfactorily determined without direct access by independent researchers to original documentation in Russian archives for the purpose of conducting primary research;

Whereas these archives include the Foreign and Military Intelligence archives, including those of the Russian Ministry of Defense, the Russian State Military Archives and the Russian Security Services, the Central Committee and Communist Party Archives, the Presidential Archives as well as in special collections, such as Stalin's personal papers;

Whereas the determination of the fate of Raoul Wallenberg has been a matter of high priority in relations between Canada and Russia;

That the Subcommittee call on the Government of Canada to request that the President of Russia and its Government authorize direct access by independent researchers to original documentation in all potentially relevant Russian archives for the purpose of conducting the necessary research on the fate of Raoul Wallenberg.

It was agreed, — That a proposed supplementary budget in the amount of $ 7,900, for the study of Human Rights Situation in Iran, be adopted.

The Subcommittee commenced consideration of a draft report.

At 1:53 p.m., the Subcommittee adjourned to the call of the Chair.