By Paul Weinberg
TORONTO, Dec 15 1998 (IPS)

The row over the visit to Vancouver by then President Suharto of Indonesia for the annual economic conference of Asian and Pacific nations (APEC) continued to reverberate in Canda Tuesday – one year after the event.

It has led to the resignations of the federal solicitor general and the chairman of a panel of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) Public Complaints Commission, as well as continued opposition party questions in Parliament, the suspension of a leading TV journalist at the state-run Canadian Broadcasting Corp. and a slippage in support for Prime Minister Jean Chretien.

The controversy involves an incident when human rights demonstrators protested against the presence at the conference of the dictator Suharto – who now has been ousted from power.

The demonstrators, mainly students, confronted RCMP units who used pepper spray and, in some cases, detained and strip searched the protesters. The students were prevented by the RCMP from taking their protest into the viewing range of the 18 APEC leaders attending the conference and, in particular, Suharto.

Subsequently, the rights demonstrators laid an official complaint before the RCMP Public Complaints Commission, regarding the conduct of Canada’s famed “Mounties.”. They accused Prime Minister Chretien of orchestrating the security crackdown in order to avoid “embarrassing” the then head of the Indonesian government, which has had strong trade links with Canada, despite Suhartos human rights record.

Further events clouded the issue when Solicitor General Andy Scott was forced to resign for jeopardizing the independence of the inquiry into RCMP actions.

An opposition Member of Parliament overheard Scott – Canada’s top policeman – telling a colleague on an airline flight that “Hughie would have to take the fall.” This was a reference to RCMP Sergeant Hugh Stewart, the leading RCMP officer at the APEC summit.

At the same time, the lawyer for accused RCMP officers entered a legal challenge on the impartiality of the chairman of the commission complaints panel, Gerald Morin, because of comments he allegedly made in a casino in his spare time. Morin eventually resigned because of alleged political interference by the commission head Shirley Heafey.

Morin also claimed he had been subjected to a covert investigation by unknown police officers.

Students and their allies among the opposition parties in Parliament, meanwhile, demanded a judicial inquiry because it would have a broader scope to investigate the actions of the Prime Minister’s Office during the APEC meeting, rather than just focus on the misdeeds of a few RCMP officers.

The ongoing scandal overe the APEC incident was featured night after night on the national news of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation through the aggressive reporting of Terry Mileweski, who daily revealed new details on the security arrangements surrounding the Suharto visit.

These were always accompanied by the arresting video clip of Sgt. Stewart unleashing the pepper spray on anyone who failed to move out of his way during the APEC conference, including both students and TV cameramen.

Milewski himself won an award for his APEC coverage but he was taken off the story and temporarily suspended by CBC administration after a complaint regarding his reporting and alleged bias was made by a representative of the Prime Minister’s Office.

This was sparked by the mysterious revelation at the inquiry of the contents of an electronic mail communication between Milewski and one of the student protestors, where the reporter appeared sympathetic to their concerns. The treatment of Milewski by the CBC, which relies on the federal government for much of its funding, has since been taken up by the Canadian office of PEN, which defends persecuted writers and journalists.

One year on, the original issues raised by the student demonstrators have been obscured says, York University professor Reg Whittaker. “It has become this Byzantine, murky affair about pepper spray and police. And so the longer they drag it out, the more it gets fixated on little details.”

Whittaker suggests that the Canadian government could have avoided the APEC controversy altogether by having the leaders’ conference held at an isolated resort in the Rocky mountains rather than at the university campus in Vancouver..

he York University professor also is critical of the decision by Ottawa to allow security guards accompanying Suharto at the APEC conference to arrive fully armed and possibly ready to shoot Canadian protestors if they came too close. “That was a really foolish decision. It created a situation in which the police had to keep the demonstrators away from the leaders.”

Political commentator Richard Cleroux says the APEC affair has not helped the image of the Canadian “Mounties”, “who come across looking like Mickey Mouse.”

Ironically, the creators of that cartoon character, the Disney Corp., is now responsible for the marketing of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

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