A bridge in Mandalay: rickety infrastructure makes Myanmar prone to greater damage in disasters. Credit: Fawzia Sheikh/IPS.

By Fawzia Sheikh
YANGON, Jan 11 2014 (IPS)

As Myanmar nurses a fragile democracy after long years of military rule, a new danger has reared its head. Climate change, say experts, has the potential to spur migration and exacerbate conflict in the country.

NGOs point out that more than five years after Cyclone Nargis killed 146,000 people and severely affected 2.4 million, inhabitants of the Ayeyarwady Delta are yet to find their feet.

Dr. Lynn Thiesmeyer, vice-president of the Environmental and Economic Research Institute of Myanmar, says the sheer number of livelihoods left in tatters made a rebound difficult.“A major natural disaster on the scale of Cyclone Nargis could pose a threat to government legitimacy and reverse progress made toward democratisation.”

Delta residents who lost farms to salinisation or lost a season’s crop with no money to plant a new one “either subsist on debt or occasional day labour,” said Thiesmeyer, who has knowledge of recovery operations and the status of disaster management plans in the region.

Another option, she said, was for family members to move to newly established Export Processing Zones, known as free-trade areas.

After Cyclone Nargis, the Myanmar government organised recovery initiatives in the form of community-based projects in many districts, but little could be implemented due to lack of resources, including money and trained personnel, she said.

“The government did ensure that everyone received radios and knew how to tune into emergency news. But escape from another storm would still be problematic given that they would need to travel by boat. What they really need is shelters,” Thiesmeyer told IPS.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs last June ranked Myanmar – with a 53 million population – as the most “at-risk” country in the Asia-Pacific region in 2011. It noted that the country has a high chance of medium to large-scale natural disasters occurring “every couple of years.”

Since Cyclone Nargis – the most devastating natural event for Myanmar in recent years – local and international NGOs have accelerated efforts to counter climate related impacts.

The pivotal question is how the next major natural disaster will now affect Myanmar’s social and economic progress, with a civilian government having come to power in 2011.

Linda Yarr, director of partnerships for international strategies in Asia at George Washington University in Washington DC, said Myanmar suffers from “many of the anticipated deleterious impacts of climate change.”

These include coastal erosion, vulnerability to more frequent and severe weather events such as cyclones, extensive and unpredictable drought in the dry zone, and heavy precipitation leading to flooding and landslides in mountainous areas, she said.

“We can’t be complacent and we need to prepare,” said Win Zin Oo, humanitarian emergency affairs director at the NGO World Vision Myanmar.

The “hard evidence” suggesting the elusiveness and complexity of natural disasters came last spring when Cyclone Mahasen was tracked to Myanmar, he argued. The country was spared the brunt of the damage that was largely borne by other countries in South and Southeast Asia.

He said the most prominent hazard within the last two years has been flooding, which hurt local livelihoods and social stability.

World Vision offers communities both disaster preparedness and disaster risk reduction (DRR), and has assisted residents affected by Cyclone Nargis, the Shan State earthquake, the Ayeyarwady flood and the Kayin State flood.

Win Zin Oo said that after the Nargis disaster, his NGO realised that aid coordination among response stakeholders is still challenging, but DRR, including community-based initiatives, may significantly curb the negative effects of climate-related events.

According to Dear Myanmar, a Yangon-based NGO focused on environment-friendly agriculture, the main roadblocks to adequate preparation include the lack of meteorological news in the country, limited advance warnings, and the failure of some residents to consider disaster forecasts seriously.

Yarr says Myanmar’s ability to adapt to climate change is also impeded by the “lack of an up-to-date census, insufficient infrastructure like roads and electrical grid, outdated agricultural practices and poorly regulated logging and mining.”

Yarr’s organisation, along with a Yangon-based NGO called ALARM, offered a programme known as the Myanmar Leadership Institute on Climate Change last February to 45 government officials from 12 different ministries and departments. Homegrown organisations and institutions are trying to boost the country’s resilience.

At the government level, Myanmar chose the coastal provinces of Tanintharyi and Ayeyarwady in December for a pilot project to integrate disaster and climate risk management into regional development plans for 2014-2015.

Dr. Win Myint, director of the NGO Environmental & Economic Research Institute in Yangon, also initiated a revitalisation project after Cyclone Nargis to support farmers with technology and rehabilitate damaged soil.

“After the cyclone, they had to survive,” Dr. Win Myint told IPS, but the challenge was to help them “escape from a poverty cycle.”

Working with the Asian Institute of Technology, administrators of the programme chose nine families in 11 villages, targeting landless, poor residents and women in particular. Some wanted to raise pigs or livestock to sell, or to fish for shrimp or grow vegetables, he noted. The NGO then offered the families training and materials to fulfil their goals.

In another example of an NGO aiding local livelihoods, Dear Myanmar has been promoting sustainable agriculture among the farming community.

The organisation offers a monthly knowledge-sharing programme that teaches farmers how to use organic fertiliser which, it argues, is better than methane producing chemical pesticides that harm soil quality and hasten climate change.

Chemical fertiliser gets washed away during severe weather and is not conducive to food security for the local population, Nyan Lin, founder of Dear Myanmar, told IPS.

The devastation brought on by Cyclone Nargis forced the Myanmar government to accept international assistance. Experts argue that it also mobilised local actors to play a crucial role in strengthening the state against catastrophe.

Despite these efforts, the final report of George Washington University’s Myanmar Leadership Institute on Climate Change offered a caveat: “Climate change is a new and unpredictable threat to the transition process.

“A major natural disaster on the scale of Cyclone Nargis could pose a threat to government legitimacy and reverse progress made toward democratisation.”

With an initial focus on oil-producing Nigeria and mineral-rich Ghana, Ottawa is bolstering its trade strategy in Africa, but some within the international development and economic communities have expressed concerns about Canada’s approach.

The Canadian government was criticised for cutting foreign aid a few years ago, and in particular when Africa amassed some of the greatest hits.

The Canadian International Development Agency ended bilateral programming in countries where aid efforts are hindered by high operating costs, including Rwanda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi and Niger. The agency also decided to reduce and concentrate its bilateral programming in five states, including Mozambique, Ethiopia and Tanzania.

Yet last month, after years of viewing the continent as mainly a foreign aid recipient, the Conservative government announced a trade mission slated for next January encompassing the extractive resource industries and the infrastructure sectors related to energy, power generation and mining.

The new-found attention is not that surprising, given that Africa appears to be in the midst of an upswing.

Between 1995 and 2010, Africa’s annual average GDP growth was 4.3 percent a year, making the continent one of the fastest-growing regions of the world, Rudy Husny, press secretary to Ed Fast, the Canadian minister of international trade, wrote in an email to IPS. Solid economic growth is expected to continue this year and in 2013, he noted.

Roughly 100 Canadian companies operate in Ghana, which offers a politically stable business climate and respect for the rule of law, according to the trade ministry. The two countries reported 321 million dollars in bilateral merchandise trade in 2011, a 61-percent increase over 2010, Husny said.

In 2011, bilateral merchandise trade between Canada and Nigeria, Canada’s largest trading partner in sub-Saharan Africa and the continent’s most-populous state, equaled more than 2.7 billion dollars, a rise of 44 percent since 2010, the ministry states.

The fledgling Nigerian Canadian Business Association aims to assist Canadian and Nigerian companies in doubling trade to six billion dollars by 2015.

Is trade, not aid, the answer in Africa?

Without a doubt, there is growing attention on “the very interesting economic growth rates in Africa and also the wealth of natural resources that is very attractive for Canadian companies,” acknowledged Sylvie Perras, the Africa-Canada Forum coordinator at the Canadian Council for International Cooperation in Ottawa.

The government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper is shifting from aid toward trade, Perras told IPS, conceding that Canadian private sector development strategies for Africa are important but must be consistent with poverty reduction and the development goals of African countries themselves.

On the whole, she said, a developing country is constrained from enhancing the potential social, economic and environmental benefits of outside investment and trade and from minimising the potential damage that this funding may bring.

This is why, she said, her organisation is pushing for the inclusion of a human rights impact assessment in all trade and investment agreements Ottawa strikes with foreign governments.

Last month, Canada concluded an investment promotion deal with Tanzania, a country which will see increased Canadian investment in several sectors including mining, oil and gas and transportation. Ottawa has also forged trade and investment initiatives with Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Tunisia, Zambia and Senegal.

As the Canadian trade minister and his delegation head to West Africa early next year to unearth opportunities in the extractive resource industry and infrastructure sector, the CCIC, Perras’ group, is also continuing to seek the strengthening of Canadian companies’ corporate social responsibility policies, especially in relation to African mining activities.

“This has very rarely been beneficial for African countries,” Perras argued. “We say that it creates jobs, or it creates revenue, but when we look at it more closely, it’s not necessarily the case.”

Mineral-heavy countries have not spurred economic development for their local populations, according to a CCIC backgrounder, as high unemployment rates, debt and poverty are widespread in mining communities.

According to a report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development issued earlier this year, the drop in Canada’s overseas development assistance since 2011, as well as a decision to zero in on fewer countries that are predominantly middle income, “may undermine the support (Canada) has given in recent years to poor countries with weak capacity, especially in sub-Saharan Africa.”

In 2011, Canada’s net overseas development assistance fell to 5.3 billion dollars, a decrease of 5.3 percent from 2010, states the peer review published by the OECD’s Development Assistance Committee.

In the report, the OECD advised that Canada and other nations must ensure that development objectives and partner country ownership are key to the programmes it supports, and that there is “no confusion” between development aims and the promotion of commercial interests.

Moreover, Canada’s Official Development Assistance Accountability Act, which was enacted in 2008, directs that aid money should consider the perspective of the poor, human rights obligations and environmental standards, Perras added.

Although Canadian foreign aid is still extremely important to Africa’s funding of health, governance, education and NGO development, conceded Lucien Bradet, president and CEO of the Ottawa-based Canadian Council on Africa, “what we have neglected in the past is being part of the economic development of Africa in a sizeable manner”.

“We are not doing a good job,” Bradet told IPS.

Canada’s bilateral trade with Africa jumped from an annual two billion dollars at the beginning of the 21st century to 13 billion dollars, but it would be feasible to increase these numbers by 15 percent to 20 percent a year, he said.

In comparison, China, India, Turkey and Brazil are boosting by 25 percent to 40 percent a year their trade and technology relationships with Africa, he noted, with China’s trade growth dramatically leaping from 10 billion dollars a decade ago to 160 billion dollars.

Economic development offers an improved standard of living to developing-country populations through investment and trade, and allows locals to manufacture, export and establish their own enterprises, Bradet said.

The more Canada facilitates these activities, the more it will be perceived as a “significant partner in Africa, not only in aid but in economic development”, he added.

Plenty of monikers have been attached to Omar Khadr, one of the most famous Guantanamo Bay detainees – child soldier, terrorist, war criminal, Al-Qaeda family member, security threat.

This image is taken from a video secretly recorded when 16-year-old captive Omar Khadr was interrogated by Canadian officials in Guantanamo. Credit: Public domain

One thing is certain: Khadr’s release last weekend to Canadian custody after 10 years has proven highly provocative. His return to Canadian soil has triggered passionate debate about how he should be regarded and whether a man born into a radical family championing terrorism can reintegrate into a society he barely knows.

The tendency to characterise Khadr as a convicted war criminal, given that his confession was made under duress, indicates there are “so many factors related to this particular case that are not being challenged enough” and that the context of children’s use in armed conflict must be reexamined, said Dr. Shelly Whitman, the director of Dalhousie University’s Child Soldiers Initiative in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Now 26, Khadr, a Canadian citizen, was a 15-year-old when captured during a 2002 firefight with U.S. military forces in Afghanistan. He threw a grenade, killing Sergeant First Class Christopher Speer, for which he pleaded guilty to murder, although his supporters argue evidence points to a death resulting from friendly fire.

Khadr, whose sentence began in 2010 and will end in 2018, also admitted to providing material support for terrorism, attempted murder, conspiracy and spying, according to a statement issued by Public Safety Minister Vic Toews over the weekend. The minister added that Khadr, raised in Canada, Pakistan and Afghanistan, was an Al-Qaeda supporter whose accomplices included Osama bin Laden and Ayman al Zawahiri.

While Khadr’s life thus far has been a whirlwind of activity, the challenges will not end once he is a free man. Whitman told IPS that he will face hurdles to find employment, struggles to catch up with education and “deep problems” from a psychosocial perspective because he experienced torture. However, she cast doubt on the negative influences of his family.

“As far as I’m concerned, this notion that because they have an association and they’ve said some things which are viewed as radical to others in this country, it doesn’t mean necessarily that he’s going to want to commit anything (that forces him) to go back to prison… Why would he do anything to jeopardise going back to that context?”

A poll conducted last month suggested the aversion of many Canadians to Khadr’s return, a problem some say is rooted in the tendency of his portrayal as a child soldier or as a terrorist.

Under the Paris Principles of 2007, guidelines to protect children from recruitment and to assist those already involved with armed groups, “the things that define a child soldier are the very things that would define a child terrorist,” Whitman said. As it stands, there are perception problems in Canada about the definition of a child soldier, a worldwide phenomenon involving boys and girls assigned a variety of roles depending on the particular conflict, she said.

Gail Davidson, executive director of Lawyers’ Rights Watch Canada in Vancouver, disagrees with both the terrorist and child soldier claims.

The United States has not presented any evidence to any court that Khadr threw the grenade killing the U.S. soldier, she told IPS, adding that it would have been classified as “murder according to the laws of war” had he, as an armed combatant, killed an opponent.

“As far as Mr. Khadr being a child soldier, we don’t know whether he was a child soldier or not,” Davidson argued. “We don’t know of any instance of him ever bearing arms or otherwise engaging in warfare.”

The October 2010 plea agreement by which the U.S. government agreed to limit his additional imprisonment to eight years if he pleaded guilty to all the U.S. offences “should be properly viewed as a confession obtained through the use of torture and not as a reliable and legitimate determinant of guilt or innocence”, she said.

During his detention, Khadr complained of being forced into painful stress positions, threatened with rape and rendition to third-party countries, hooded, and confronted with barking dogs, some of which was confirmed by U.S. government witnesses, according to a Sep. 29 press release issued by Human Rights Watch. The organisation added he was denied legal counsel until 2004.

For the most part, Khadr has received positive assessments by psychiatric experts.

Last year, psychiatrist Stephen Xenakis reported no “indication of aggressive or dangerous behavior” after 300 hours of interaction with Khadr, who has “consistently emphasized his goal to establish a constructive and peaceful life as a Canadian citizen”, according to a letter written to Minister Toews.

In several conversations, Khadr “repudiated” the beliefs of terrorist groups and demonstrated a “capacity to engage with others in a healthy way”, added Katherine Porterfield, a clinical psychologist for the defence team, in a letter to the minister in 2011.

Still, there are detractors, among them psychiatrist Michael Welner. Welner worked with Khadr for 500 to 600 hours and described him as dangerous. Citing the Canadian’s demonstrated capacity to kill, Al-Qaeda affiliations and “hardened” family members conveying “belligerence towards the United States”, Werner testified that he feared the young man’s history and associates will all “contribute mightily” to bolstering Al-Qaeda’s North American presence.

Khadr advocates are concerned that Welner’s testimony heavily influenced the Canadian government. Upon Khadr’s release to Canadian authorities, the public safety minister expressed anxiety about the 26-year-old’s romanticisation of his father’s activities (which he viewed as NGO-related) and many of the issues raised by the psychiatrist. Ottawa pledged to offer appropriate programming during Khadr’s imprisonment and strict conditions if he is granted parole as early as next year.

Other reintegration proposals are based on keeping Khadr away from the negative influences of his family, but it was never clear which feasible assurances could be offered since media reports indicate his family wishes to see him, David Harris, the director of the international and terrorist intelligence programme at INSIGNIS Strategic Research Inc. in Ottawa and a former chief of strategic planning for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, told IPS.

Overall, the saga of Omar Khadr has been impacted by “possible simple-mindedness” surrounding the question of his child-soldier status, as some have insisted on the label without fully examining the specific merits and implications of the evidence, Harris said. Certain individuals have regarded as “wholly irrelevant” the issue of criminal responsibility, he added.

These “sentimental” views neglect to a large extent the public safety implications of cases like Khadr’s and understate the “burgeoning terror issue that I fear will become an extremely prominent feature of Canadian life”, Harris said.

First Nations’ leaders are calling on the Canadian government to establish an independent commission of inquiry to investigate at least 582 missing and murdered indigenous women and girls – a wish which was not immediately granted by provincial premiers meeting last week.

While the premiers promised to revisit the issue this fall, the Manitoba government announced at the provincial premiers’ conference that there would be a national Aboriginal women’s summit slated for November.

The British Columbia government is also in the midst of its own inquiry related to a local serial killer whose victims to a great extent were indigenous women.

“There’s a crisis in our land today and it has reached epidemic proportions,” said Chief Garrison Settee of the Pimicikamak Okimawin Aboriginal community in Cross Lake, Manitoba, during the Assembly of First Nations’ (AFN) annual conference from Jul. 17 to 19. “It is alarming – it’s disheartening – that 600 missing women are still unaccounted for.”

Settee, who moved the resolution stating that indigenous women are five times more likely than their Canadian counterparts to die as a result of violence, told the 633 chiefs-in-assembly that he is speaking for “those women that do not have voices anymore” because neither the federal nor provincial governments is taking adequate action.

In their resolution, the chiefs asked Ottawa to set up a royal commission on violence against indigenous girls and women tasked with generating concrete and specific national recommendations to address the problem.

The chiefs, moreover, are lobbying for a national, integrated Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and police task force on missing and murdered indigenous women and girls. The aim is to coordinate the activities of a variety of police departments, as well as First Nations’ and government officials.

Aboriginal women were among those killed and missing on Highway 16, which runs from Manitoba to the Pacific Ocean through Northern B.C. and is known as the “Highway of Tears”, according to a Native Women’s Association of Canada briefing paper this year. The organisation’s research formed the basis of the resolution passed by chiefs during the AFN conference.

Indigenous women, too, accounted for many of the 60 missing residents of the Downtown East Side of Vancouver, which is Canada’s poorest neighbourhood, notes the paper.

Roughly half of the Vancouver victims were linked to convicted serial killer Robert Pickton, a B.C.-based pig farmer who kidnapped, sexually assaulted and killed women over several years and buried them on his property. Pickton’s brutal crimes trained a spotlight on the plight of the most vulnerable women in the country.

At the Aboriginal conference, another delegate argued that the federal government’s funding cuts to communities struggling to provide shelter, education and health care initiated the predicament of indigenous women. As a chief, he said he is hard-pressed to offer the necessary resources for his people, including young women, and they end up in cities as a result.

In reaction to the AFN’s request for the creation of a joint police task force, including government and First Nations’ officials, to probe missing and murdered Aboriginal women and girls, Sgt. Julie Gagnon, an RCMP media relations officer, pointed to the many initiatives already in place or underway to respond to crimes against indigenous people.

Last December, for example, the RCMP and AFN signed an agreement to collaborate on issues related to missing and murdered Aboriginal people, including the ability to resolve historical and contemporary cases and enhance crime prevention initiatives and communication with victims, families and communities.

The RCMP is already leading, or involved in, a number of joint task forces with other provincial and municipal police forces addressing the issue of missing and murdered Aboriginal women, Gagnon wrote in an email to IPS.

“These task forces, while spread across the country, work collaboratively to address this important issue, and are also developing best practices relating to information sharing, file management, file coordination and disclosure that can be shared with other investigative units or implemented in similar initiatives across the country,” she noted.

RCMP officers from each province and territory regularly meet to discuss operational issues of “national significance” such as this one, she added.

What is more, the Mounties are creating the National Centre for Missing Persons and Unidentified Remains within the Canadian Police Centre for Missing and Exploited Children. It is an effort to provide police, medical examiners and chief coroners with more detailed information on these cases across jurisdictions.

An experienced Aboriginal police officer working in the centre will ensure a focus on indigenous people who have disappeared. The database will launch in 2013.

As well, a national public website containing information on missing persons and unidentified remains cases, which will allow the public to offer tips on missing persons and unidentified remains, is slated for debut later in 2012.

To help capture pertinent data on missing persons and unidentified remains cases which can be shared across jurisdictions, changes were made last year to the Canadian Police Information Centre allowing for extended description fields, skeletal inventory, biological and cultural affinity.

Julie Di Mambro, press secretary for Rob Nicholson, the justice minister and attorney general of Canada, said that the federal government “attaches great importance and urgency” to the matter of missing and murdered Aboriginal women.

Canada dedicated an overall 25-million-dollar investment between 2010 and 2015 to this initiative, Di Mambro wrote in an email.

In addition to funding the new RCMP undertakings, the money will be channeled toward the development of school and community pilot projects aimed at diminishing young Aboriginal women’s “vulnerability to violence”; ensuring victim services are culturally appropriate for indigenous people; developing a comprehensive list of best practices to help communities, law enforcement and justice partners in future work; collaborating with Aboriginal communities to develop local safety plans; and creating public awareness materials to help end “cycles of violence” affecting communities.

However, government dollars and promises did not dissuade First Nations’ chiefs from approving their resolution.

The ruling includes other notable elements like designating Oct. 4 as an annual national day of remembrance for the women; selecting Oct. 18, 2012 as a national day of action on behalf of these women including national and regional activities; urging broader AFN support of the UN’s Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women inquiry procedure regarding disappearances and murders of Aboriginal women and girls; and advocating that the AFN convene a national forum and special chiefs’ assembly on justice and community safety.

What is not lost on some observers is that the violence facing native women also has internal dimensions.

Maureen Chapman, the hereditary Chief of Skawahlook First Nation in B.C.’s Fraser Valley, recalled hallway conversations during the annual meeting with women leaders “who are struggling to try to get their voices heard, who are ganged up on when they try to speak up” within their communities.

Describing the behaviour as “lateral violence within our organisations”, she advised male delegates supporting the anti-violence resolution to speak to their male counterparts because “they’ve stopped listening” to women voicing similar grievances.

With accusations that Canadian resource companies and government officials are disregarding the need for indigenous consent in development projects, First Nations leaders have lashed out by approving a resolution calling for a moratorium on mining development in the so-called Ring of Fire until proper consultation begins.

Private-sector estimates suggest the combined value of chromite and nickel in the north is approximately 60 billion dollars. Credit: Lazurite/CC BY 2.0

The Ring of Fire includes chromite, nickel, copper, platinum, zinc, gold and kimberlite deposits and is touted as the most promising mineral development opportunity in Ontario in nearly a century.

The resources are located 540 kilometres east of the city of Thunder Bay within the shared territories of a handful of Aboriginal communities around McFaulds Lake. The region is home to more than 100 bodies of water and four major rivers in the James Bay Lowlands in the northern part of the province.

“We haven’t had any meeting that is meaningful with the province,” Chris Moonias of the Neskantaga First Nation told 633 chiefs-in-assembly at the Assembly of First Nations annual conference from Jul. 17 to 19. “Right now, we’re being bullied by a mining company, a giant mining company and a desperate province.”

Canada supports the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which highlights the international human rights norm of obtaining free, prior and informed consent of Aboriginal communities related to actions affecting their rights.

Although private-sector estimates suggest the combined value of chromite and nickel in the north is approximately 60 billion dollars, it is more difficult to gauge the significance of the other commodities still in earlier stages of exploration, said Christine Kaszycki, the assistant deputy minister with the Ring of Fire secretariat in the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines in Sudbury, Ontario.

Cliffs Natural Resources is the largest of several companies with mining claims linked to the metals bounty in northern Ontario, while other key players include Noront Resources and KWG Resources.

With such intense private-sector and government interest in the remote swath of land, not surprisingly some local residents feel excluded from the conversation.

At the heart of the Ring of Fire is the McIntyre River, a tributary of the Attiwapiskat River, where Neskantaga First Nation is based, said Moonias.

“We are the only community that is directly linked to the river system,” he noted, highlighting the band’s environmental concerns. First Nations in the north have repeatedly stressed the importance of conducting appropriate environmental assessments.

Neskantaga filed a petition with the Ontario Mining and Land Commissioner asking to be thoroughly consulted before a 340-kilometre road is built through its land to gain access to a proposed chromite mine in the Attawapiskat River watershed.

Cliffs recently announced a 3.3-billion-dollar investment including the chromite mine, transportation corridor and a processing facility in the vicinity.

This month, the Canadian Council of Chief Executives issued a report stating that Aboriginal people must be considered “true partners” in resource and energy projects since many of these assets, which can yield revenue-sharing agreements, equity interests, improved employment opportunities, training and service contracts with Aboriginal-owned businesses, are located near their communities.

The report notes that Aboriginal groups have “legitimate concerns” about major resource developments revolving around land claims, the environment and their traditional way of life.

Likewise, northern residents have expressed fears about other players stripping valuable resources from their territory and relegating them to a persistent crisis of substandard housing and education, poor access to health care and chronic unemployment.

Earlier in July, several northern communities concerned about the impact of the proposed mines and infrastructure development issued a 30-day eviction notice to all companies with exploration and development camps in the region. The communities threatened a peaceful blockade on the land preventing operations from taking place.

Not all bands, however, are determined to apply the brakes to mining development in the Ring of Fire until all indigenous groups are satisfied.

During the annual meeting of chiefs, a delegate from the Marten Falls First Nation opposed to a moratorium told the audience his community, based in a territory comprising most of the mining activity, has already spoken to both Cliffs and the province about establishing a framework to discuss all of the pertinent matters.

“We made clear that if, at the end of the day, we find out that what you’re going to do there is what you’re doing now in the Athabasca tar sands, which is an environmental-chemical soup, then we’ll decide if we want to evict you,” he said, referring to the controversial Alberta oil sands project.

The assembled chiefs’ endorsement of a mining freeze in the Ring of Fire will interfere with Marten Falls’ “internal issues”, charged the delegate.

“It’s my First Nations territory and we’ll decide what to do in the end,” he argued.

Segments of the Aboriginal population have different approaches to development, with most interested in the opportunities that it affords but some more cautious about choosing the appropriate strategies to improve their way of life, said Kaszycki of the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines.

In recent years, the government has shared information and identified ways for indigenous people to participate in the lucrative mining venture, she noted, adding that the province has sought to work principally on a community-by-community basis.

Recently, though, provincial officials introduced a series of efforts, some of which are tailored to individual communities while others are regional in nature. These include specific commitments to bring to the table indigenous groups to discuss how to meet a variety of goals.

On the environmental front, the aim is for Aboriginal chiefs to participate in decisions regarding “what kinds of studies are needed, how they get implemented, what are the long-term monitoring approaches that should be taken,” she said.

Additionally, the ministry has pledged to undertake regional infrastructure planning with First Nations based on their needs, such as local access roads and energy transmission, Kaszycki told IPS.

Other provincial mandates, she added, consist of offering social supports like health care, education and training, a range of economic development efforts, and resource revenue-sharing associated with mining development in the Ring of Fire.

Questioned whether Ontario fears a blockade of mining operations, Kaszycki responded that her ministry is committed to maintaining ongoing dialogue and reaching out to the resistant parties until outstanding issues are resolved.

At press time, with an eviction notice already issued to mining companies, Cliffs, Noront and KWG had not responded to media queries.

In May, however, Cliffs promised in a press statement that a final decision on the controversial project will depend on provincial and federal environmental assessment approvals, mutually acceptable agreements with affected First Nations communities, progress working with governments to address the lack of infrastructure in the Ring of Fire, and completion of commercial and technical feasibility studies.

The arrests last week of the three remaining perpetrators of the alleged Opapa human trafficking ring, which forced 19 people recruited from Hungary to endure long work days, poor living conditions and no pay in the Canadian construction industry, has cast a light on Ottawa’s new measures to combat the crime.

While some advocates argue the one-month-old programme is the most well-coordinated anti-trafficking effort among all stakeholders, others label certain aspects contentious and unfair.

For years, World Vision Canada urged a sweeping initiative targeting the crime both within Canadian borders as well as overseas because the two components are tied together, said Carleen McGuinty, a child protection policy adviser for the NGO based in Toronto.

The international development organisation also asked for a policy addressing labour trafficking because “for every person forced into sexual exploitation, nine are forced into labour,” said McGuinty.

As well, she told IPS, it was important that the government include boys and girls, the “most vulnerable to human trafficking”.

In the end, World Vision Canada was satisfied with a final product containing much of the “language” which will serve as a first step to tackling the crime, she added.

Released in June, the four-year plan will introduce Canada’s first integrated law enforcement team to fight trafficking; boost front-line training to identify and respond to human trafficking and enhance prevention in vulnerable communities; offer more support to Canadian and newcomer victims of the crime; and improve coordination with domestic and international partners combating the activity.

Technically, human trafficking differs from human smuggling because the transported individual has given no consent and is further exploited on arrival in the destination country. However, a soon-to-be-published paper by Canadian criminologist Yvon Dandurand states that people who are smuggled into a country often have not realised they are on the verge of being victimised.

In 2005, the Canadian government specifically prohibited trafficking in persons; previously, the law included offences like kidnapping, uttering threats and extortion.

Due to the clandestine nature of trafficking and the reluctance of victims and witnesses to come forward, it is difficult to make statements about the extent of the crime in Canada in relation to the number of victims, said Sgt. Julie Gagnon, a media relations officer with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), quoting the agency’s Human Trafficking National Coordination Centre.

However, human trafficking convictions and current investigations into human trafficking are proof that this crime is occurring within the country, Gagnon told IPS in an e-mail.

As of May, the RCMP was aware of 23 Canadian cases in which human trafficking charges were laid, she wrote. Forty-three people have been convicted in these cases, including 22 convictions for sexual exploitation, she said. The Canadian courts are now reviewing another 62 cases involving about 152 victims.

Ottawa’s 25-million-dollar blueprint to battle sexual exploitation and forced labour is not “a ground-breaking plan”, noted McGuinty, the child-protection expert, “and it hasn’t been hailed as such.” Yet, it finally coordinates the activities of federal government departments, provinces and NGOs and includes round tables allowing for stakeholder recommendations, she said.

“At least everyone can work from this, and we can hold our government to account,” McGuinty said, and added that she hopes the programme will deter human traffickers by illustrating Canada’s resolve to deal with the crime.

Yvon Dandurand, a criminologist at the University of the Fraser Valley in Abbotsford, B.C. and a senior associate at the International Centre for Criminal Law Reform and Criminal Justice Policy in Vancouver, said the new federal action plan consists of many activities currently undertaken by government departments but which are now being integrated.

For instance, in response to the federal government’s new commitment to bolstering front-line training to tackle human trafficking and increase prevention in vulnerable communities, Dandurand told IPS that the Vancouver centre developed training packages for law enforcement eight years ago. But if indeed there are more cases involving victims reluctant to come forward, he added, investing more money in training makes sense.

“Depending on how this (new plan) is rolled out, it might be an improvement if things are accelerated or more resources are put into it,” he said, but it will not reduce the international dimensions of the crime.

Overall, trafficking is a “complex offence” requiring three major elements – intent, coercion, and lack of consent or deception – which is difficult to confirm, he noted. “Whereas it’s easier to prove that someone had a false passport, or that someone was sequestered and held against their will . . . and basically get evidence on related offences and get a conviction on that basis.”

A more controversial aspect of the revamped national human trafficking strategy was the government’s Jul. 4 announcement that Canadian businesses will be prevented from hiring temporary foreign workers in cases where there are “reasonable grounds” to suspect a risk of sexual exploitation or degrading work. Strip clubs, escort services and massage parlours are among the targets.

In an RCMP report on human trafficking, investigations carried out in the late-1990s found “strong indications” that women were recruited from Eastern Europe for non-sexual work but then made to perform in strip clubs and offer sexual services. Police, however, have been unable to “substantiate” the trafficking of foreign nationals in exotic dance clubs, though the possibility remains, according to the 2010 report.

The RCMP have confirmed one case in which a woman recruited from China for a position at a Canadian restaurant was later “forced to work in a massage parlour performing sex acts”, spokeswoman Gagnon noted.

Although human trafficking charges were laid in this case, the accused was ultimately convicted of other prostitution-related crimes, she added. She said the majority of human trafficking cases in Canada are connected to prostitution but do not involve foreign workers.

For the most part, it is clear that public opposition to the practice of doling out permits to foreigners intent on working in sex-related businesses “embarrassed” Ottawa, argued Dandurand, the academic. He said last week’s legal move is “more a political matter than a genuine victim-protection matter”.

Linking foreign strippers to human-trafficking victims has rattled the Toronto-based Adult Entertainment Association of Canada, which represents both establishments and workers. No one has considered how the 700 dancers, who are not prostitutes, will be victimised once they are stripped of their legal papers and lured “into the underground for these predators to exploit them . . . in prostitution rings,” warned executive director Tim Lambrinos.

“The women are not going to go home,” said Lambrinos, adding that legal action is now the only option for the association’s members. The women, many of whom send money to their families overseas, will now be “reluctant to report any abuses or improprieties because they’re here in Canada illegally”.

In the past, his association has posted notices offering toll-free phone numbers for women to contact if they are being held against their will, but he argued he has fielded no calls. It would be difficult to commit such a crime, he said, as dancers interact to a great extent with their colleagues and the public, and would be able to walk out of a club if they wish.

Mary Taylor, a former stripper of 21 years, believes the government’s new foreign-worker guideline is a positive move for both international and local dancers. The law may force club owners to improve working conditions in order to entice greater numbers of Canadian women to enter the business, she said.

In 1997, Taylor co-founded the Exotic Dancers Association of Canada, which recently became inactive due to funding challenges. She still, however, advocates for the rights of women in the trade and laments that the industry has gone from “burlesque entertainment to foreplay in public”.

As for criticism that distressed foreign dancers denied a work permit under new regulations will be forced to take jobs in a private massage parlour or “a hole in the ground”, she replied: “They can do that now anyway.”

Taylor, who urges increased government scrutiny of strip clubs and massage parlours, said she speaks regularly to dancers. In this capacity, she told IPS, she has heard stories about foreign workers in Toronto being denied their passports and locked overnight in clubs.

The RCMP’s 2010 report indicates that nations with a high unemployment rate are among the “common source countries” of trafficked victims, raising legitimate concerns that a declining global economy may drive more desperate people overseas toward risky situations rather than greener pastures.

Canada’s West Coast First Nations are feeling overwhelmed by crises affecting their land rights, economic well-being and health, prompting warnings in one territorial dispute with a local energy company that the country risks a degeneration of Aboriginal-federal government relations to a level unseen in two decades.

Enbridge Inc.’s controversial Northern Gateway Pipelines, a project which will span more than 1,100 km and transport petroleum from Edmonton, Alberta to Kitimat, British Columbia on the Pacific coastline, reached a crescendo this month in a so-called “Freedom Train” made up of First Nations people traveling from their homes in northern B.C. to the oil and gas firm’s annual general meeting in Toronto.

As of now, the Yinka Dene Alliance, comprised of the Nadleh Whut’en, Nak’azdli, Takla Lake, Saik’uz, and Wet’suwet’en communities in northern B.C., have banned the Calgary, Alberta-based company from operating in their territories.

“I think that we’re going to be making a legal challenge before it even gets built,” said Saik’uz First Nation Chief Jackie Thomas, a member of the Yinka Dene Alliance, about the pipeline plan.

“If they try to come on the land . . . I’m standing in front of the bulldozers,” she told IPS. The federal government “better think again because they’re just trying to ram it down our throat, against our will, for the benefit of all of Canada.”

Dismissing the financial promises made to the affected B.C. First Nations, Thomas argued that these benefits can never replace a way of life marked by fishing, hunting, berry-picking and traditional medicine. Following earlier consultations with outside technical advisers, she said her community refused Enbridge’s economic overtures due to concerns over oil-leak damage to waterways, food sources and wildlife.

Community hearings about the fate of the Northern Gateway Pipelines are ongoing. Although a regulatory decision about whether the plan serves the public interest or poses a risk to the environment has yet to be made, Enbridge hopes to have an answer by 2013. With a potential go-ahead to build, the pipeline should be operational in late-2017.

Roughly half of 48 Aboriginal groups based near the future pipeline site in Alberta and B.C. have signed agreements with the oil and gas behemoth in exchange for a 10 percent stake in the project, company spokesman Todd Nogier said, reluctant to identify them. The equity offering is expected to generate an estimated 280 million dollars over 30 years, he said.

Based on years of discussions with Aboriginal groups, Enbridge assembled an economic benefits package which, apart from the “centrepiece” equity stake, includes a 100-million-dollar community investment fund available to Aboriginals and non-Aboriginals in the first three decades of operation; jobs associated with the development of the oil infrastructure (including a target that 15 percent of First Nations comprise the construction workforce); procurement opportunities for certain goods and services; and environmental stewardship programmes in which the nearby communities play a key role, Nogier told IPS.

At this stage, the company is still searching for solutions to address the hold-out groups’ pipeline-related fears about environmental damage, tanker traffic on the coast, the impact on tourism and fishing activities and cultural harm, according to Nogier.

He said Enbridge aims to ensure local communities are “familiar with the levels of risk” connected to the project and the oil firm’s emergency response capabilities.

CEO Patrick Daniel has stated publicly that he hopes the remaining communities will eventually support the project.

However, Nogier conceded, “We would say that industrial projects very rarely, if ever, gain unanimity.”

The development of the Northern Gateway Pipelines comes at a time when Ottawa has pledged to support responsible resource development and secure new trade partners. The 2012 federal budget unveiled plans to proceed with more than 500 major economic projects representing 500 billion dollars in new investments across the country over the next 10 years.

“The export of oil is Canada’s most valuable export,” said the Enbridge spokesman, citing that the country owns the third-largest reserves in the world. He said the United States’ falling oil demand has spurred Canada to seek alternative markets like Asia and the Pacific Rim.

Although other pipelines have been built in Canada through traditional aboriginal lands signed over in previous decades to the government, only a few such treaties have been forged between B.C. Aboriginals and the federal government, argued William Lindsay, the director of Simon Fraser University’s Office for Aboriginal Peoples in Burnaby, B.C.

This fact means most of the land in British Columbia is unceded territory historically belonging to the First Nations people, Lindsay told IPS.

“The land claims haven’t been dealt with,” he said, and the remaining Aboriginals living in the path of the pipeline are “people of the land” who, during the last few decades, have developed “a history of protest” prompting them to stand up to perceived injustice.

National economic needs aside, the uproar surrounding the contentious pipeline plan may swell to the kind of protest witnessed 22 years ago in Quebec if the necessary “buy-in” from local communities is missing, he warned.

Lindsay’s reference is to the 1990 emergency situation embroiling the town of Oka. The 78-day violent confrontation, in which a police officer was killed and the army was ultimately involved, emanated from a dispute between the Mohawk community of Kanesatake and town officials intent on expanding a golf course and residential development on land viewed by Aboriginals as sacred.

The government had previously denied Mohawk land claims involving their ancestral burial ground.

South of the planned Enbridge pipeline marine terminal in Kitimat, down toward Vancouver Island, local groups are battling their own troubles.

In mid-May, the Cowichan Tribes of Duncan, B.C. issued a state of emergency over a record four suicides and 40 suicide attempts between January and April, said Jennifer Jones, the associate health director. As of today, the suicide attempts or alerts have risen to 52, Jones said, adding that most involve distraught youth.

Placing this year’s staggering suicide alerts into perspective, there were a total of 105 attempted suicides between 2002 and 2007; 258 between 2007 and 2011; and 75 between 2011 and 2012, she said.

Leaders blamed the turmoil on an unemployment rate of 85 percent on the reserve, overcrowded housing facilities, a belief that inherent rights like hunting and fishing have been curtailed, and a loss of culture resulting from residential schools.

On a positive note, there was quick reaction to the appeal. The Cowichan Tribes’ community is in the midst of applying for two federal grants to fund programmes raising suicide awareness, while the provincial government will ensure sufficient resources like training for First Nations suicide programs, Jones noted.

While retired psychiatrists have offered their services to the nine counselors who are “getting burned out” by work demands, young patients are reluctant to meet with outside health-care professionals, she said.

Ultimately, she said, the long-term remedy to the widespread despair will be for older generations to impart traditional “cultural teachings” by which young people can live. She pointed out, for instance, that many youth are not taught to fish or hunt and this in part stems from shrinking land access.

Moreover, Jones acknowledged stable funding can empower tribal programmes that subdue a rush to desperate measures.

Yet, she cannot help but lament the encroaching residential properties on her corner of Vancouver Island, a trend raising concerns that “Cowichan is getting swallowed up for the development that’s happening outside the reserve.”

An indigenous group in the Amazon rain forest took its anti-oil message to Canada in a case rife with accusations of social and environmental damage that highlights the issue of securing consent prior to commencing exploration operations.

View of the Amazon rain forest in San Martín, Peru. An indigenous community there is accusing an oil company of social and environmental damage. Credit: Milagros Salazar/IPS

“The communities affiliated with FENAP reject the presence of the company” and have no interest in the “additional help or benefits” that Talisman can offer at the risk of environmental contamination, Ayui said.

During three previous visits to Canada, the indigenous leader has issued this message, in some cases meeting directly with Talisman management. The most recent trip featured discussions with government opposition leaders and members who expressed “solidarity” with FENAP’s aim to shut down the Calgary firm’s venture into its homeland, noted Ayui, buoyed by legislators’ resistance to the activities in the Amazon.

The delegation was accompanied by Amazon Watch, a San Francisco-based non-profit organisation that supports indigenous people and aims to protect the rain forest. Discussions with key stakeholders and interested parties in Canada took place from April 21 to May 8.

Talisman, however, shot back at Ayui’s trespassing claim and pointed to the Peruvian government’s permission to engage in oil exploration in certain regions.

Moreover, FENAP lands are based 25 kilometres east of the oil company’s activity area known as Block 64, said media relations adviser Berta Gomez, adding that her employer has used about 115 hectares for exploration activities representing .015 percent of the total area. The oil giant started working in the block in 2004.

“We respect that some communities are opposed to oil development and we will not work there,” Gomez emphasised.

Obtaining consent

While Amazon Watch purports to represent the voice of the Achuar in Peru, it actually speaks only for the FENAP, an Achuar federation comprised of a number of communities opposed to Talisman’s activities, she argued.

Within Block 64, the energy interest has won the support and approval of the FASAM and OSHAM Achuar federations, added Gomez, referring to two new offshoot organisations. Overall, she said, Talisman has agreements with eleven organisations representing 66 directly and indirectly affected communities, more than 1,800 families and five different ethnic groups.

“We are committed to early and ongoing engagement with all stakeholders to share plans and address concerns,” including key authorities, the ombudsman and third-party representatives who act as observers, she said.

Ayui, the FENAP leader, said he has asked that Talisman President and CEO John Manzoni attend a meeting in the Amazon where his company is exploring, but the company has requested discussions be held in a nearby town, requiring the indigenous group to travel for three days.

Gomez confirmed that a March 30 meeting took place for the first time among Talisman’s country manager and corporate affairs manager and indigenous leaders against oil and gas development in San Lorenzo, Peru, with a promise to attend a local indigenous assembly, probably in May, to establish a final agreement regarding land boundaries.

The case spurs important questions about the nature of free, prior and informed consent, which is rooted in the United Nations (U.N.) Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, according to a 2011 report by Sustainalytics, a sustainability research and analysis company headquartered in Amsterdam.

The report questions what exactly constitutes the consent of affected indigenous communities – a band council resolution, a referendum, the agreement of community leaders or the approval of all constituents?

Complicating matters is the fact that the Peruvian government awarded concessions and blocks to oil companies without consulting or informing the Amazonian communities, which it has traditionally regarded as “second-class citizens”, states a report published last year by the Ottawa-based think tank, the North-South Institute.

Fostering strife among communities

Among the FENAP’s objections, moreover, is a claim that Talisman triggered social problems within the Amazon’s indigenous population.

FENAP leaders raised grievances with the Peruvian courts about Talisman’s creation of “conflicts and divisions” in connection to a May 2009 confrontation among Amazon groups that “almost ended in violence,” Ayui recalled, but there has been no response. Demands that the Peruvian Congress force the company to vacate the rain forest have also been unanswered.

In his view, the energy firm’s exploration operations have torn apart communities, as eight have opted to sign agreements granting permission to work on their land in exchange for development assistance, while 44 have not.

Based on the needs of federation leaders, Talisman offered “social contribution programs” to improve living standards, Gomez, the spokeswoman, said. Last November, she noted, Talisman signed social community agreements with 11 federations, providing $3 million in resources to fund education, health care, access to electricity, capacity building and local job-generation initiatives in 2012.

Despite the oil firm’s investment in communities, Gregor MacLennan, Amazon Watch’s Peru program coordinator, questioned its interpretation of gaining the free, prior and informed consent of indigenous peoples. He accused the company of winning approval in any way it can – even after indigenous groups initially say no – by presenting more money and resources.

For its part, Talisman has always engaged with all stakeholders in a direct and peaceful manner in full adherence to human rights principles, Gomez stated. However, she said, the oil firm also asks that “the rights of the people to choose to work with us, in an open and transparent fashion, also be respected”.

Talisman plans to maintain dialogue efforts with federations and communities opposing its activities.

Damaging the environment

Rounding out indigenous allegations against Talisman is environmental contamination. The Calgary firm touted new technologies with no risk of repeating the damage done by oil industry players operating in the Amazon in the 1970s and 1980s, but Ayui refuted the claim.

The exploratory wells have affected his community’s hunting and fishing grounds by producing waste which leaks into streams during the rainy season, he charged, and poisons birds and other animals. His people’s ancestors also died on the lands Talisman is now exploring, he added.

MacLennan told IPS that he addressed the drilling fluids issue during a February meeting with Talisman, which acknowledged the problem but explained it will take “several months” for the arrival of a subcontractor and the adequate equipment to undertake the clean-up to a specific standard, a task that includes correcting the poor waste-disposal job carried out by another oil company in the past.

Talisman meets, and in many cases surpasses, environmental regulations outlined by the Peruvian government, Gomez insisted. Waste products, or cuttings, are normally generated during drilling activities and have been “properly managed and stored according to environmental regulations and protection measurements” dictated under the oil firm’s environmental impact assessment, she said.

During the drilling of oil wells, the waste is stored in a “cuttings pit” complete with a roof to shield against rain water and a pit bottom protected with a “geomembrane” to prevent the direct contact of soil and waste, she noted, adding that the whole drilling pad is surrounded by an external ditch collecting fluid, mainly rain water, before it is released into the environment.

During Talisman’s drilling activities, known as SC3X and SN4X, there were no environmental incidents or claims from communities in the area of influence of its operations, Gomez said.

Talisman incorporates an indigenous environmental monitor from the local communities during the drilling projects. The monitor performs daily environmental inspections, immediately communicates problems, participates in monthly environmental monitoring and field environmental audits by regulatory agencies, helps to supervise the handling and shipping of waste and takes part in the abandonment activities and reclamation works, she added.

The company’s abandonment plan for the SC3X project, which details techniques for the treatment and final disposal of cuttings and an outline for re-vegetation and reclamation of the area, is awaiting Peruvian government approval, Gomez said.

Still, Amazon Watch and the FENAP are dissatisfied with Talisman’s environmental precautions and explanations. They dismissed oil companies’ tendencies to blame damage on subcontractors or on the challenges of working in the rain forest.

As the Canadian energy firm heads into a production phase within the next year, there are concerns that a potential spill due to human error would render the area “virtually irrecoverable”, MacLennan warned, spawning “an environmental disaster” destroying the livelihoods of thousands of people in the rain forest.

Canada is ending bilateral aid programmes in eight countries and refocusing efforts in five others due to “high operating costs”, a move which the umbrella group representing Canadian international development organisations say is difficult to immediately measure but will affect some of the poorest countries in the world.

The Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) will end bilateral programming where aid efforts are hindered by high operating expenditures: Nepal, Rwanda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Niger, Cambodia and China, Scott Cantin, the agency’s media relations and public affairs manager, told IPS in an e-mail.

The agency will also reduce and concentrate its bilateral programming in Mozambique, Bolivia, Ethiopia, Tanzania and Pakistan, Cantin wrote.

The changes are part of the federal government’s plans to curtail 319.2 million dollars from CIDA’s funding over the next few fiscal years. More details about how the 2012 budget is to be implemented will be released in the coming weeks.

Chantal Havard, the government relations and communications officer at the Canadian Council for International Cooperation (CCIC) in Ottawa, argued that it is “hard to assess” the direct impact of the cost-cutting exercise because the exact reductions in each country are still unclear. Yet, she added, significant staff cuts will undermine CIDA’s capacity to play a strong leadership role among other donor countries.

Moreover, many of the countries that have experienced a total funding loss or decrease – eight are located in Africa – “rank at the bottom” of the United Nations’ 2011 Human Development Index, Havard said.

“We’re turning our back on those who need Canadian assistance the most,” she said.

Peru, Colombia, Ukraine, Bangladesh and Vietnam, with which Canada has either ongoing trade agreements or is carrying out significant business activity, will see no change in their relationships with Ottawa, Havard said, pointing out that many are middle-income nations.

Although Canadian development NGOs are unaware of the exact criteria determining which countries merit slashed funding, “there’s definitely a tendency towards bringing together more and more of Canada’s trade interests and business interests with international development interests,” she said.

Overall, the Conservative government is not “ideologically” attracted to development assistance as a principle because of problems accounting for funding and showing results, said Dane Rowlands, a professor and the associate director of Carleton University’s Norman Paterson School of International Affairs in Ottawa.

Still, Canada’s development arm emphasised that it will continue to provide aid assistance to Benin and Afghanistan, and meet publicly stated commitments to Caribbean countries, despite previous media reports.

The agency will deliver “value for aid dollars” and respond to humanitarian crises in a “timely and meaningful manner”, CIDA’s Cantin said. The government will maintain sufficient funding to meet development objectives like improving the health of mothers and children through the Muskoka Initiative and curbing poverty through multilateral programmes, he added.

Over time, the countries that the Canadian government has targeted for funding reductions will not to a great degree notice Canada’s withdrawal, though this might depend somewhat on whether CIDA also slashes financing to these states via its “Partnership with Canadians” branch, said Rowlands.

The branch supports Canadian organisations improving the quality of life in poor, developing countries.

Smaller communities, however, will experience “noticeable effects” when specific projects are terminated, Rowlands said. A further danger is that Canada’s rationale for selecting these countries for cuts – high operating costs – may also influence a possible “piling- on effect” whereby donors prefer concentrating in a few countries with an easier operational environment, he noted.

As a result, some of the countries CIDA has earmarked for the “chopping block” may become “aid orphans that few donors want to deal with”, he added.

In this era of global austerity, Canada faces a low immediate risk to its international standing among established donors which also register below the 0.7 percent of GDP target for aid, Rowlands conceded, although “behind closed doors I suspect some disappointment will be expressed to Canada”.

Funding recipient states will view Canada’s slashed bilateral assistance as its further withdrawal from the development scene, but individual nations are unlikely to voice complaints due to fears of deeper cuts or a wish to “make it back on the list”, he told IPS.

Within the wider development and NGO community, Ottawa is vulnerable to a further decline in its “once reasonably positive” reputation in this regard, noted the academic, adding that Canada will be perceived as “quick to cut assistance when times are tough” and will probably continue to “drift down the donor ranks”.

Today, Canada holds the 10th spot of the OECD’s Development Assistance Committee ranking of donor nations, he said.

Yet, as the global economy slowly recovers and the government nears the next election, aid will probably increase, predicted Rowlands. By then, it will be harder to blame cost-cutting on economic weakness, he said.

And governments often turn their attention to foreign affairs as they grow “bored and frustrated with domestic issues” deeper into their terms.

The Canadian development community is concerned that the government’s international assistance commitment to poor nations is waning in the interest of fiscal responsibility and that Ottawa instead prefers to forge ties with middle-income nations for commercial purposes.

Ahead of the United Nations’ 2015 deadline to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, the federal government’s 2012 budget cuts represent a “big slap in the face” to the world’s poor and to Canadians who view themselves as playing a strong role in international development, said Fraser Reilly-King, the policy analyst for aid and international cooperation at the Canadian Council for International Cooperation (CCIC) in Ottawa.

In its defence, the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) argued that the 2012 federal budget will continue the government’s commitment to make international assistance “focused, effective, accountable and transparent”, according to Scott Cantin, CIDA’s manager of media relations and public affairs.

Canadian tax dollars will still deliver “value for money” and be directed into the agency’s three thematic sectors – sustainable economic growth, food security, children and youth, and humanitarian assistance, Cantin wrote in an e-mail, adding that more details on the plan’s implementation will be released in the coming weeks.

Ottawa’s International Assistance Envelope (IAE) will decline between fiscal years 2011-12 to 2014-15 by 7.6 percent and reach 4.9 billion dollars in 2015-16, according to an analysis by the CCIC. During the next few years, Canada will have reduced its Official Development Assistance (ODA) or aid by nearly 1.2 billion dollars.

The IAE is comprised of about 90 percent ODA, but debt relief and refugee costs outside this envelope also constitute aid, the CCIC noted.

In a continuing era of national austerity, many government departments are incurring spending decreases of between five and 10 percent, Reilly-King told IPS.

Yet, his organisation’s examination of CIDA’s share of the international assistance envelope shows that the agency “seems to be taking a much higher hit” than other departments delivering aid money such as Finance Canada or the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, he said.

Over the next few fiscal years, CIDA will lose a total of 319.2 million dollars compared to Foreign Affairs’ reductions of 29.1 million, according to the budget.

“With these cuts, Canada to some extent, is taking itself out of the equation,” Reilly-King argued.

Although quality aid delivery is critical, the volume of money is also important, he added. Without such obligations, Canada risks being regarded as not “much of a player at international meetings” compared with the United Kingdom, South Korea and Australia, which will exercise greater influence over development issues in line with their pledge to increase aid budgets, he warned.

Given CIDA’s declining resources, he doubts the development agency will still invest in small programs beyond its 20 countries of focus and may even narrow its commitment to 15 nations.

The bulk of assistance is now channeled to Bolivia, Colombia, Haiti, Honduras, Peru, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, the Caribbean Regional Program, Indonesia, Pakistan, Vietnam, Ukraine, West Bank and Gaza, Ethiopia, Ghana, Mali, Mozambique, Senegal, Sudan and South Sudan, and Tanzania.

As it is, the government changed its international development focus countries in 2009, replacing “several poor African countries” with “middle-income Latin American countries” with which Canada was negotiating free trade agreements, Stephen Brown, an associate professor of political science at the University of Ottawa, told IPS.

Should Ottawa slash the number of focus countries, it will be quite indicative of the government’s priorities regarding foreign affairs and trade, Reilly-King added. International Cooperation Minister Bev Oda has indicated that “she doesn’t see much difference between Canada’s foreign affairs and trade policy and its development policy,” he said.

Curbing government expenditure, particularly international assistance, is “an ideological project” to be viewed as an alignment with Canadian extractive industries, Brown said.

There is a school of thought that Canadian mining companies operating overseas pay taxes which the local government can then direct toward fighting poverty, noted Brown, who specialises in the intersection of the policies and practices of rich countries and international actors with the politics of poor nations.

Yet, he contended, there is no “clear, direct link” between trade and development in this case, as mining can introduce other problems like environmental damage and human rights abuses.

Ottawa’s gravitation toward trade was apparent in the budget speech. Finance Minister Jim Flaherty announced the “most ambitious trade expansion plan in Canadian history”. Flaherty said the government has signed new trade agreements with nine countries since 2006 and is negotiating many more, including those with Thailand and Japan.

In some quarters, the government’s 2012 budgetary moves are not too unsettling.

“If people are telling you that cutting back on foreign aid is going to harm international development, they’re just wrong,” said Fred McMahon, who focuses on economic freedom, globalisation and mining in his Toronto-based position of vice president of international research at the Fraser Institute think tank.

However, McMahon conceded, he is not referring to aid for humanitarian disasters but funding for development projects overseas.

For anyone who cares about poverty reduction, the media debate on foreign aid is often frustrating, he told IPS, adding that the arguments are based on how much is spent, with almost no discussion of whether these actions truly help.

Research indicates that foreign aid sent to developing countries, particularly in African nations with bad governance structures, is harmful because it may be used by local governments to reward elites or build police forces, he noted.

Trade, on the other hand, is “marvelously effective” in bolstering incomes, freedoms and democracy, McMahon said. Trade openness, sound money (low inflation) and sensible fiscal policy are most effective in increasing economic growth, with aid a positive force only for nations with these attributes, he said.

For the most part, he argued, the act of doling out money to the Global South mainly serves to make Westerners “feel better” about themselves.

Many Canadian civil society organisations working in international development are still awaiting a definitive answer about future government funding, a months-long lag critics argue has hampered overseas operations and only worsens Canada’s global reputation when viewed in light of other issues in recent years.

Canada de-prioritised eight African countries a few years after listing them as top concerns without notifying many governments beforehand. Credit: Aimable Twahirwa/IPS

The council poll revealed that CIDA’s delays and lack of project financing is slowing down or stopping international project work; forcing Canadian civil society organisations to restructure other non-CIDA funded programmes and lay off staff; keeping foreign partners in limbo by impeding their ability to hire or retain staff; and causing people to suffer and die due to the lack of urgently needed community development and health initiatives, among other negative consequences.

“Everybody’s kind of holding their breath waiting,” Julia Sánchez, president and CEO of CCIC, told IPS. “It’s going to hurt.”

Sánchez anticipates that CIDA will not fund some organisations that it has for decades and describes the worst-case scenario as one in which non-governmental organisations have already shed staff and severed partnerships on the ground when they finally receive government money. She said she has no idea when the situation may be resolved.

The controversy revolves around two calls for proposals: one pertaining to 160 groups pitching projects valued at under two million dollars (which was slated for an award announcement on Sep. 30) and another related to 50 organisations submitting proposals with a budget of more than two million dollars (which was scheduled for an award announcement on Aug. 15), she noted.

Civil society groups were reluctant to speak on the record due to the sensitivity of the matter. One source told IPS that NGOs criticising government policy face the real threat of losing funding but conceded there has been no “smoking gun” to that effect.

In response to the CCIC’s questions, the development agency indicated that the government must carry out “due diligence” on the submissions for “as long as it takes” and refused to announce new dates, according to Sánchez. She added that CIDA reminded NGOs that taxpayers’ money must be handled judiciously and that no organisation should feel entitled to receive federal financing.

When IPS made its own inquiries, an agency spokesperson explained that the number of proposals received and factors such as the size, complexity and risks associated with each project determine the review time. With each call for proposals, “lessons are learned and steps to improve subsequent calls are taken,” the spokesperson said in an email.

Behind the scenes, CCIC has heard of “a whole bunch of administrative, let’s say bureaucratic, problems” associated with a radically new, competitive system that CIDA introduced 18 months ago related to how it funds Canadian civil society groups involved in international development, Sánchez said.

Agency officials were unprepared for the volume of proposals and the “level of rigour” involved, she said, adding that the deliberation phase is also complicated by an added layer of debates about the proposals at a political level.

Against the backdrop of the NGO financing gridlock is a question about a potential contradiction between Canada’s actions and words regarding foreign assistance to the developing world.

During the Fourth High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness held last month in Busan, South Korea, CIDA announced its membership in the International Aid Transparency Initiative. Boosting aid transparency is vital to building the accountability needed for ensuring development effectiveness and results, said minister of international cooperation, Beverley Oda, at the time. The initiative aims to improve the public availability and accessibility of aid information.

Yet, the calls for proposals affecting more than 200 Canadian NGOs have spawned “serious issues about the lack of transparency” underlying the government’s way of doing business and illuminated the poor relationship between Canadian civil society and one of its major funders, Sánchez argued.

“If we can’t have transparent relationships between civil society and our development agency here… how is it that we demand that developing countries be transparent with their civil societies?” she asked.

Although Stephen Brown, an associate professor of political science at the University of Ottawa, regards the transparency aid initiative as strictly related to the publishing of information about aid activities, he understands why some development players like CCIC believe a contradiction exists between Ottawa’s support for this global effort and CIDA’s lack of openness with local NGOs.

Foreign development partner organisations have undoubtedly noticed the current funding delay but foreign governments are less likely to, added Brown, who specialises in the intersection of the policies and practices of rich countries and international actors with the politics of poor nations.

In truth, Brown said, other international actions taken by Canada have probably drawn more attention in recent years. In the foreign aid domain, the country’s tendency to keep changing priority “themes” – in 2002, 2005 and 2009 – is not constructive as “NGOs are being made to dance to that tune,” he said.

Today’s priorities are children and youth, sustainable economic development, and food security, with the cross-cutting issues of gender and governance, he said.

Further, Ottawa’s penchant for “switching countries” contributed to Canada’s failure to win election for the first time to the U.N. Security Council, Brown told IPS.

Most notably, the Canadian government de-prioritised in 2009 eight African countries a few years after listing them as top concerns without notifying many of these governments beforehand, and re- focused instead on building trade ties with middle-income Latin American nations in the name of effectively using aid money, he noted.

“If you’ve just named a partner country, you can’t tell after four years whether aid is being efficient or not,” he argued.

In the coming year, Brown predicts a greater government emphasis on private-sector partnerships. He suspects that Mongolia, where Canadian mining companies are “already important”, will join a forthcoming new list of priority countries following Minister Oda’s visit with that country’s minister of natural resources and energy in August.

The government’s explanation that it aims to improve aid effectiveness through these sorts of moves has little to do with today’s tight economic climate because Canadian financial assistance is not being spent more wisely, the university academic added.

As it stands, Brown said, Canada has frozen its aid levels despite other European counterparts continuing to strive for a foreign assistance goal that directs 0.7 percent of their Gross National Product to foreign aid, or to maintain this level.

The 2012-13 Canadian federal budget is expected to mark the second year of an announced four-year freeze, at five billion dollars, of the International Assistance Envelope, according to CCIC. The March 2010 budget had calculated that freezing the funding of this sector (which is divided into development, international financial institutions, peace and security, crisis funding and development research) would save Ottawa a cumulative 2.2 billion dollars between 2011 and 2014.

Cost-cutting aside, however, Brown argued that the lingering impression is that “Canada’s generosity is now declining”.

Excerpt:

Canadian cooperatives may grow as the global Occupy movement raises the profile of their business model through boosting interest in credit unions over traditional banks, but uncertainty remains about the degree to which the two camps will join forces from here on.

Cooperatives have grown in prominence, in part due to the Occupy movement, but how closely the two can coordinate remains to be seen. Credit: U.S. Dept. of Agriculture/ CC by 2.0

While the cooperative sector understands that the international Occupy trend illustrates a “huge appetite” for an alternative to the economic and social status quo, it is unclear to what extent co-op groups will respond to this swell of emotion, John Restakis, executive director of the British Columbia Cooperative Association in Vancouver, told IPS.

Co-ops are vocal about representing a different and successful way of doing business but are more reluctant to declare their identification with the “quite radical” Occupy movement, Restakis said.

These businesses have thrived because they are risk-averse, conservative and inclusive – a culture running counter to Occupy sentiments, he noted. Large co-op groups are more established, have a more diverse membership and lack the solidarity to take positions on issues.

Their smaller, younger and more activist counterparts, however, would be interested in forging a connection with Occupy groups because some of their members are probably part of the international phenomenon, he added.

Virtually every sector of the Canadian economy dots the co-op landscape, including agriculture, retail, housing and healthcare, and at least 10 million people (out of a population of 34 million) are members of some form of cooperative, according to the Canadian Cooperative Association in Ottawa.

As co-ops grapple with how to approach the Occupy wave, one thing is certain, according to Restakis: There is a need for dialogue between the two, despite their deep differences, because much can be learned and shared.

Occupy supporters can act as a “new generation of activists and people that are committed to social, economic justice” and can “re-tell the co-op story from the perspective of young people”, he argued.

This support would be advantageous to the cooperative sector because it challenges well-entrenched organisations to take a “cold, hard look” at their values and understand that they are part of a broader movement and not merely a business model, Restakis said.

Lacking visibility

As Occupy mania shifts more of the world’s attention to co-ops, it will inevitably shine a light on the flaws of the business paradigm but could perhaps help resolve them as well.

Recent Canadian Cooperative Association research carried out in Ontario, as well as decade-old surveys in B.C., indicates that Canadians have low awareness of co-ops even though they may belong to one such as a credit union or the well-known Mountain Equipment Co-op, Restakis said.

Weak recognition shows that the co-op model is not effective in explaining to Canadians that there is another way to conduct business outside of the public and private spheres, he said.

When co-ops in North America and Europe have made an effort to brand themselves as a different kind of enterprise, such as the Canadian insurer, the Co-operators Group and Gay Lea Foods, doing so has increased their market share and helped them economically, he added.

Canada’s cooperatives are also struggling with demographic hurdles, Hazel Corcoran, the Calgary, Alberta-based executive director of the Canadian Worker Co-op Federation, told IPS.

In the coming years, baby boomer owners of small- and medium-sized businesses will be retiring and there are fears that buyers will be too few to continue the co-op legacy.

Co-op leaders tend to be older and have not engaged adequately with youth to address business-succession concerns, added Donna Balkan, communications manager of the Canadian Co-operative Association.

To this end, the Canadian Worker Co-op Federation is implementing mechanisms to assist with promotional activities, technical issues and capital for employees interested in acquiring co-ops, Corcoran said.

One challenge in the Canadian provinces outside of French-speaking Quebec, where the co-operative movement has extensive roots, is a lack of support for business succession in co-ops, she added.

As a result, her federation is working with the Canadian Co-operative Association to put resources like funding and tax legislation into place to enable workers keen on taking over baby boomers’ businesses.

“It’s a lot harder to get access to financing, especially for smaller and newer co-ops,” Balkan told IPS. In general, cooperative organisations cannot tap into the stock market but can take out loans from credit unions or banks, she said. “It makes it harder to grow.”

Co-ops’ triumphs

The Canadian cooperative movement has also succeeded in notable ways, which the Occupy camp can highlight if it eventually forges close connections with co-ops.

For example, co-op groups play a leading role in environmental sustainability, because one of their guiding principles is community concern, Balkan said.

Outdoor retailer Mountain Equipment Co-op has paved the way in constructing new buildings with the environment in mind and drawing up internal policies on recycling, while the Co-operators insurance company has teamed up with the David Suzuki Foundation to create youth internships on environmental sustainability, she said.

Investor-owned businesses and other companies have followed suit, Balkan added, through the adoption of corporate social responsibility policies designed to give back to communities in which they operate.

In addition, the recent financial crisis has proved that cooperatives’ solid financial management skills were what allowed them to weather the global turmoil, Balkan noted. Co-ops tend to be prudent, which ultimately means they grow more slowly, produce smaller profits, and take fewer risks than firms driven by profit, she explained.

Balkan said the money co-ops earn is then invested in people, the local communities and businesses.

Another situation co-ops may help to alleviate is people’s sense of powerlessness over their economic destiny, laid bare during the weak financial climate of the last few years. As democratic, member-owned entities, cooperatives directly engage people in charting their own economic futures.

Already, the Canadian Worker Co-op Federation is pitching the worker co-op model to young people who are keen to create their own employment with others and are “looking for more democracy in the economy”, said Corcoran, the executive director.

The Toronto public school board has approved the second ‘Africentric’ Alternative School despite persistent criticism that the format attracts mainly black students and is equivalent to segregation in a country that prides itself on national unity regardless of ethnic differences.

Although the Toronto public school board has approved a second 'Africentric' Alternative school, criticism and fears of segregation persist. Credit: Brian Lane Winfield Moore/ CC by 2.0

The impetus behind the school, which incorporates the perspectives and history of people of African descent into provincial curriculum, was research indicating that feelings of disengagement among black students has led to an alarming 40 percent drop-out rate.

After the first such elementary school opened in 2009, Toronto educators approved in mid-November a plan to open a similar learning institution for high school students within the next two years.

Academic Carl James, who began this month to conduct research with the Toronto District School Board on the feasibility of the Africa-focused curriculum, told IPS that experimenting with new forms of education to determine what works for students is always worthwhile.

However, there is no solid data about how this particular effort is faring, said James, the director of the Centre for Education and Community in the faculty of education at York University in Toronto. He anticipates completing his work, which will also help the school board address feelings of detachment and marginalisation among other student groups, in three years.

Anecdotal evidence indicates that Africentric school students are more connected to their educational system, parents are more engaged in their children’s studies and teachers and the school board feel more positive about the experience, noted James, who has had discussions with black parents for years about the “possibilities of such schools”.

The school board did not respond to IPS queries about the success of the Africa-focused initiative, but the elementary Africentric school has reported above-average scores on standardised tests and a long student waiting list.

Test scores are climbing under this particular model because parents are more engaged with their children’s school, extra resources are funnelled into the program and supporters are determined that the new effort thrive, Toronto school board trustee Gerri Gershon told IPS.

But ultimately, separating kids may have little to do with the apparent success of the concept, she warned.

While “a component of the black community” may be well intentioned by advocating separate schools as an important way to address the academic-related problems plaguing many black students in Ontario schools, most black parents do not favour this route, Gershon noted.

The Toronto school board has attempted a variety of solutions to deal with different styles of student learning – teacher sensitivity training, special programs for students with behavioural issues and special education programs, said James, adding that some students have responded to these efforts while others have not.

Moreover, Gershon said that educators have tried to tailor their teaching styles to individual students, while some high schools and middle schools have more inclusively focused on black history.

The Ontario government allows school boards to develop engaging and relevant programming and community partnerships in order to address different individual learning needs – especially those at risk of leaving high school without a diploma – and also tracks student performance, said education ministry spokesman Gary Wheeler.

Indeed, Canada already has public or government-funded religious schools and same-sex schools, James wrote in an essay two years ago.

‘Alternative’ precedents

The Toronto District School Board also has nearly 40 alternative schools, including “Specialised Schools” catering to visual and performing arts, and technology, as well as specific programs for gifted students and high performing athletes, he wrote. Additionally, he told IPS, the board has paid attention to youth with disabilities.

Although much of the media focus has been on the plight of underperforming black youth, other groups have also found the educational system problematic.

The Toronto school board issued a 2010 draft report on managing achievement gaps among racial groups that reported the majority of students with high drop-out rates, weak test scores, low school attendance and high suspension rates come from aboriginal, black (African heritage), Hispanic, Portuguese or Middle Eastern backgrounds.

These students have the lowest family income levels and are more likely to live in the most socioeconomically disadvantaged areas of the city, according to the report.

The draft report noted that members of the aboriginal community have already shown interest in improving educational opportunities for their youth through the concept of an “Aboriginal school of choice”.

Yet worry is mounting in some quarters that schools tailored to a specific ethnic group open a dangerous door in Canadian society.

Breeding divisiveness

“I don’t think that we should be separating people in education in any way, shape or form,” argued Brian Dunstan, an anchor for the Sun News Network in Toronto who has closely followed development of the alternative schools. “I’m always against any type of system that separates people based on race and culture.”

While it is true that the schools teach from an Africentric point of view but are open to students from all ethnic backgrounds, attracting youth from non-African cultures is unlikely, Dunstan told IPS. He added that the school concept only breeds divisiveness.

Black youth, particularly those living in the inner city, will find that “getting back into the mainstream” of Canadian society is difficult after spending four years or longer in an educational system strictly catering to African or black Canadian culture, he warned.

Dunstan feared that black Canadians who have had limited interaction with citizens of other ethnic backgrounds under this system, particularly at a young age, will not know “how to deal with people” or immerse themselves in situations that are foreign to their comfort zone.

The country is teetering on a “very slippery slope” after four or five decades of fighting for equality and rights, he cautioned. Narrowly focused ethnic schools are a “backwards step”, he said, adding that there must be another solution such as enhancing Africentric curriculum in all schools.

Even more troubling, he noted, the Africentric school concept may pave the way to other ethnic communities’ lobbying for separate educational facilities. “Where does it stop?” Separating races in the educational system “flies in the face of everything that Canada is built on”, Dunstan said.

Gershon, the trustee, opposes dividing youth according to religion or culture, and described this kind of separation as unrealistic in a multi-ethnic society and conducive to making kids inward-looking. Yet she is reluctant to predict the potential impact of an Africentric, or another ethnically focused, school on students once they enter university or the work force.

As it stands, Gershon is in talks with the Toronto District School Board’s director of education and other trustees to make curriculum throughout the city less Euro-centric and thus more inclusive of all cultures.

She aims to integrate issues like ethnic genocide, the history of World War II in Asia and aboriginal history into the regular school format, a plan which may derail the possibility of future schools oriented toward one culture in the city.

By - - and Fawzia Sheikh
TORONTO, Oct 29 2011 (IPS)

Despite the crossfire of Canadian accusations of human rights violations by Sri Lanka at the end of its civil war and Colombo’s corresponding counter-claims, the economically battered South Asian country aims to bolster its trading relationship with Canada and increase foreign direct investment.

A Sri Lankan trade delegation met with importers and exporters this week in Toronto and Montreal in the first trade-related push regarding Canada since 2009, which saw the end of nearly three decades of war between the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the Sri Lankan army.

“We have to work hard to promote trade between Canada and Sri Lanka,” said Buddhadasa Herath, the Sri Lankan deputy consul general and trade commissioner based in Toronto.

With the conflict now over, Herath anticipates a “bright future” between the two countries, which share more than a half-century of trade. He told IPS that he has received approximately 100 enquiries from Canadian importers and exporters over the last 14 months.

Still, two elements have overshadowed Sri Lanka’s upbeat economic predictions.

One is the Canadian government’s insistence that Sri Lanka advance its reconciliation process. The other is Ottawa’s concern over the lack of accountability for human rights violations by both parties to the conflict; when the civil war wound down two years ago, allegations surfaced of abuses taking place during the last few months of fighting.

As a result, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has been uneasy about Sri Lanka’s hosting the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in 2013 and has repeatedly called for an international investigation. The current Commonwealth summit is taking place Oct. 28 to 30 in Australia.

Harper was pushed into action in part by a U.N. report issued in April that found “credible reports” of war crimes by government forces and the LTTE during the war’s dying days. The panel found valid allegations of serious infringements by the government, including the killing of civilians through widespread shelling and by denying humanitarian assistance.

Moreover, the documentary “Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields”, about a U.N. investigation into the country’s alleged war crimes, showed images of murdered and tortured bodies and semi-clad women thought to be sexually abused prior to death.

Last year, Sri Lanka established the Lessons Learned and Reconciliation Commission, but its lack of independence has been criticised.

Canada’s delayed reaction

Sherry Aiken, a law professor at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, described Canada’s response to allegations concerning the Sri Lankan conflict as “too little, too late” but “better than nothing”.

The Canadian government could have had an impact during the months leading up to the war’s end, when international human rights monitors raised awareness of the rampant abuse in the war-wracked nation, Aiken told IPS. Yet along with many other countries, “Canada remained virtually silent,” she said.

“At the end of the day, I don’t think that the Sri Lankan government is going to be particularly cowed by anything that might go on in the Commonwealth forum,” she said. There must be concerted scrutiny aimed at Sri Lanka and an international accountability mechanism established, she added.

“I don’t think Sri Lanka can be trusted to respond to its own human rights violations; it’s been a perpetrator of them.”

Ottawa’s current fixation with Sri Lanka may also emanate from the influence on government policy exercised by the significant Tamil diaspora in Toronto, said Yiagadeesen Samy, an associate professor in the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs at Carleton University in Ottawa.

In May, Canada elected its first Canadian MP of Tamil origin, Rathika Sitsabaiesan, who has been “pushing for [the war-time abuses] to be discussed in parliament”, Samy told IPS.

Others believe that Canadian foreign policy toward Sri Lanka has been relatively consistent.

In 2009, Canada called for actions by Sri Lanka similar to the ones it calls for now, argued Gary Anandasangaree, legal counsel for the Canadian Tamil Congress in Toronto, even though Canada has not been as “vocal publicly” in the intervening years.

Now, Sri Lanka’s human rights record would appear to be a higher priority in Canada’s overall foreign policy, he added.

Certain governments, such as Canada’s and the United Kingdom’s, have argued they would refrain from participating in the 2013 Commonwealth meeting in Sri Lanka if that government fails to meaningfully address the allegations made in past reports, Anandasangaree told IPS.

He applauded the message but added that it must be clearer, such as a categorical objection to Sri Lanka as host.

Herath, the Sri Lankan trade commissioner, was reluctant to discuss the economic impact of the current human rights controversy, instead referring queries to the Sri Lankan high commissioner.

The office of High Commissioner Chitranganee Wagiswara told IPS that it could not respond to questions at this time, but in Canadian news reports earlier this month, Wagiswara accused Canada of being swayed by terrorist “propaganda” as Ottawa pressed for an international inquiry.

Diversifying exports, with some difficulty

Samy doubted current contention between Canada and Sri Lanka would breed negative economic fallout, as the two are not strong trading partners. In 2010, Sri Lankan exports to Canada totalled 124 million dollars, while Canadian exports to the country averaged 339 million dollars, Herath noted.

2009, however, had seen an 18 percent decline in export and import growth, according to the trade commissioner, and total trade activities in 2010 rose by 17.2 percent from the previous year.

Sri Lanka’s main export market is currently the United States, Herath told IPS. However, the South Asian nation is keen to expand trade and diversify its “export basket” with Canada, to which it mainly sells high-quality garments, tea, rubber gloves and tires, he said.

For the first time, this week’s trade delegation featured a Sri Lankan company promoting jewellery such as semi-precious stones and another firm selling power cables for the electricity and telecommunications industries, he said.

The recent series of claims and counter-claims documented in the media, however, may have an impact from the collective Commonwealth perspective, Samy noted. The accusations have “already damaged the reputation” of Sri Lanka, he added.

The widening spotlight on the war-wracked country, some argue, has also affected tourism policies. Next year, Colombo plans to impose a fee of 50 dollars for an electronic entry permit to visitors from all countries other than Maldives and Singapore.

The Canadian Tamil Congress’s Anandasangaree argued that this move will allow the Sri Lankan government, which feels “genuinely threatened”, to scrutinise Tamil diaspora members and human rights activists entering the country.

The Congress predicts that the world’s perception of Sri Lanka as a “little pet” will eventually change. The international community has offered the government there a “great deal of deference and leeway with respect to how they handle the post-war situation”, Anandasangaree argued, but the accumulating accusations will force Sri Lanka to act “more genuinely” on peace matters.

Excerpt:

Bolstered by gold prices hovering above 1,800 dollars an ounce and a global economy slowly recovering, exploration activity for the precious metal in 2010 once again rebounded. Yet, with this surge comes the attendant scrutiny by activists, investors, and the media into the industry’s human rights and environmental records abroad.

A woman working in a gold mine in Siguiri Prefecture, Guinea. Credit: USAID

For Canada, there is much at stake under the uncomfortable gaze of mining watchdogs. The country accounts for more than 75 percent of the world’s mining and exploration company headquarters, with about 130 billion dollars worth of investment predicted over the next five years for the Canadian mining sector, according to recent industry figures.

As gold regains its shimmer, more than 50 percent of the exploration budgets of global mining outfits – primarily Canadian and Australian – are now tied to gold ventures, Jennifer Moore, Latin America programme coordinator for MiningWatch Canada in Ottawa, told IPS.

Under an intensifying spotlight, a large majority of Canadian firms have opted for Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) programmes, according to a 2009 report issued by the Canadian Centre for the Study of Resource Conflict commissioned by the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada.

U.K. academics have defined CSR as the responsibility of companies for their impact on society and the environment, and for the behaviour of those with whom they do business, the report states.

Non-governmental organisations like MiningWatch Canada dismiss “a lot of CSR as mostly PR”.

What has been troublesome is the lack of “significant gains” on key issues like free prior, informed consent for local communities; companies lobbying hard against greater revenue sharing, fair taxation and royalty distribution with overseas governments; and mining outfits operating in areas marked by weak rules and environmental monitoring, said Moore.

Without a history of mining in a particular region, it is not surprising that residents may view the activity as “controversial”, conceded Peter Sinclair of Toronto-based Barrick Gold Corp.

This is why Barrick participates in discussions with local groups, door-to-door campaigns and distribution of newsletters, and offers websites, hotlines and other mechanisms to bring community concerns to the table, said Sinclair, the company’s vice president of corporate social responsibility. Barrick also works overseas with NGOs like World Vision and CARE International.

For Barrick, taxes and royalties are a “huge part” of its contributions to foreign governments and can fund a nation’s civil service and social development, Sinclair told IPS.

He said the mining firm offers construction and operations jobs (including 9,000 positions in the Dominican Republic as the “single-biggest employer”), training, and spin-off benefits from the purchase of many local items like uniforms to the use of domestic bus services.

He added that only a handful of Barrick mines operate for fewer than 20 years. Moreover, said Sinclair, the company strives to identify community needs like water, educational facilities, health care and transportation infrastructure.

Despite these social and economic investments, mine operators still encounter their share of international roadblocks.

In one noteworthy case, a northern community in El Salvador has battled Pacific Rim Mining Corp. of Vancouver in a bid to make the Central American nation the first to ban mining. In this region, an anti-mining community leader was tortured and assassinated in June 2009.

A few months ago, a student involved in the environmental campaign and last seen “distributing fliers against metallic mining” was shot, according to an August article written by Washington, D.C.-based Robin Broad, a professor at American University, and John Cavanagh, the director of the Institute for Policy Studies.

They both conducted research in El Salvador this year. El Salvador’s attorney general, who does not belong to the same leftwing political party as the president, has been unwilling to investigate these murders, Broad told IPS.

Residents living near mine exploration activities in the northern Salvadoran province of Cabañas complained of “reduced access to water, polluted waters, impacts to agriculture, and health issues”, not to mention that the El Dorado mine would operate for only six years and that many locals were not skilled enough to obtain many of the “promised jobs”, wrote Broad and Cavanagh.

The Salvadoran community also consulted water experts and residents of neighbouring countries living near mine sites, state the authors.

Pacific Rim shot back against criticism leveled by activists and academics, however. The company, through its U.S. and Salvadoran subsidiaries, has three gold projects in the country but shut down all exploration in El Salvador in July 2008 when “it became apparent that the government was deliberately stalling our application for an environmental permit for the El Dorado property,” Barbara Henderson, the vice president of investor relations and the corporate secretary, told IPS in an e-mail.

Besides the “heavy hit” Pacific Rim was forced to take due to anti- mining sentiments, more than 300 Salvadorans were left jobless, Henderson wrote.

“Contrary to the claims of a small but very vocal minority, the vast majority of people in and around the El Dorado site are in favour of the mine proceeding and the jobs this will bring.”

She dismissed the environmental fears regarding the mining operation for failing to “hold up against the facts of the mine plan” – not to mention, in many cases, being scientifically impossible – and indicated that Pacific Rim “held dozens of community meetings” to explain the environmental implications and is still willing to have discussions.

In another instance, Barrick’s Porgera mine in Papua New Guinea was criticised in a Human Rights Watch report released in February. The cases, which stem back to accusations made in the 2009-2010 time frame, involved allegations of gang rape and other forms of violence by Papua New Guinean security guards working for the mining giant, HRW researcher Albin-Lackey told IPS.

Barrick’s internal investigation concluded the claims were legitimate and in fact unearthed additional allegations, which resulted in a number of arrests, he said.

Being unaware of the human rights violations taking place at the mine was “quite a wake-up call” for Barrick to strengthen its monitoring mechanisms and the channels through which community members can raise concerns, said Sinclair, the company’s CSR chief.

“It’s something we’ve done quite a bit of work on,” he said, including adopting a new global policy concerning this issue and seeking “external help” to deal with the matter.

Still, some activists argue that corporate social responsibility policies can go only so far. For instance, communities still lack recourse to deal with water contamination or persecution for vocalising their rights, MiningWatch’s Moore noted. She said Canadian embassies abroad should be equally responsive to local complaints of human rights violations as to Canadian corporate lobbying of foreign governments.

At the heart of the matter is Ottawa’s reluctance to adequately regulate the mining industry, which leaves companies “to their own devices” regarding the appropriate international commitment to the environment and local communities, said researcher Albin-Lackey.

In many cases, foreign governments approving mining activities are either too weak to uphold their responsibilities or are “actively disinterested in doing so”, he said, explaining that this is why the Canadian government must “step in to fill the gap”.