DIPLOMATIC NOTES
NOTES DIPLOMATIQUES

Canada’s Foreign Service Community in Its Own Words 
La communauté du Service Extérieur Canadien, en ses propres mots

Published by

Professional Association of Foreign Service Officers (PAFSO)

Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

www.pafso.com

Title: Diplomatic Notes/ Notes diplomatiques

Editors: Lillian Thomsen, Pamela Isfeld

Managing Editor: Farhana Cynthia

Book Design and Layout: Aponia

Cover Design: Aponia

Printing and Binding: Friesens Corporation, Altona, MB, Canada

ISBN (Paperback): 978-1-0678864-0-0

ISBN (eBook): 978-1-0678864-1-7

First Edition

Printed in Canada

Copyright © 2026 by the Professional Association of Foreign Service Officers (PAFSO)

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission of the publisher, except for brief quotations used in reviews or scholarly works.

Introduction

As President of the Professional Association of Foreign Service Officers, it is a real pleasure to introduce Diplomatic Notes: Canada’s foreign service community in its own words as we mark the Association’s 60th anniversary. It has also been a special privilege to help shape this volume as one of its editors, alongside Lillian Thomsen, and to do so not only as a representative of this community, but as someone whose own life has been shaped by foreign service work and by the stories we carry from it.

This book is drawn mainly from selected articles published over many years in bout de papier, PAFSO’s magazine. Together, these pieces offer something that, to my knowledge, has not existed before: a single volume that helps readers understand what Canada’s modern, working-level foreign service really does. Not the simplified public image of diplomacy, but the lived reality, which is demanding, varied, absorbing, sometimes dangerous, sometimes funny, and always deeply human.

Cet ouvrage est principalement constitué d’une sélection d’articles parus au fil des ans dans bout de papier, le magazine de l’APASE. Ensemble, ces textes offrent quelque chose qui, à ma connaissance, n’existait pas auparavant : un ouvrage unique qui aide les lecteurs à comprendre ce que fait réellement le service diplomatique canadien moderne, sur le terrain. Il ne s’agit pas de l’image simplifiée que le grand public se fait de la diplomatie, mais bien de la réalité vécue, à la fois exigeante, variée, passionnante, parfois dangereuse, parfois drôle, et toujours profondément humaine.

The recurring themes of the articles illustrate how much foreign service life has changed over the decades, as well as how much has stayed the same. In the 1980s, for example, the Cold War loomed in the background of almost every international event and decision, and our ties to our neighbours to the south were only increasing. At the same time, the challenges faced by women, LGBTQ+ and other equity-seeking members, and the issues facing spouses and families remain hauntingly similar.

For those outside our community, diplomacy can still seem distant or abstract. Yet the pages collected here tell a much more vivid and grounded story. They speak of immigration interviews and emergency response, of advocacy and analysis, of summitry and consular work, of war zones, fragile democracies, separations of human and fur families, sudden evacuations, and the quiet professionalism required to represent Canada well in circumstances that are often far from quiet. They show foreign service as it is actually lived: one decision, one posting, one crisis, one relationship at a time.

These articles also remind us that this life is never carried by members alone. Foreign service work places demand not only on officers, but on spouses and partners, on children, and sometimes even on beloved pets swept into the logistics and unpredictability of service abroad. Some of that reality appears directly in titles such as The Commuter Marriage, Coming “Home”, Growing Up in the Foreign Service and The Persian Cat Exfiltration. Those titles may raise a smile, but they also point to something serious: service to Canada abroad is rarely confined to the office. It is woven into family life, identity, memory and belonging.

That is one of the reasons this volume meant so much to assemble. Working as co-editor with bout’s editor-in-chief Lillian Thomsen, I was struck again and again by the depth of experience captured in these writings and by how difficult it was to choose among them. We were selecting from roughly 300 remarkable articles, and every inclusion meant leaving another worthy piece behind. We wanted the collection to reflect linguistic and geographic range, different types of foreign service work, and the major events that shaped generations of members. We also wanted to preserve the smaller, more intimate stories, because they often reveal the profession just as clearly as the headline moments do. [In the end, we decided to include some of the other great pieces in the annex, which is attached after the main text in the e-book and available via the QR code included with the print version.]

The result of these tough decisions is, I hope, a collection that moves across time and across worlds, organized according to the decade where the main events of each piece took place. We’ve preserved the voices of those times, which in a few cases involve language and even attitudes that might raise eyebrows today, but also show how much things have—or have not—evolved. Readers will find reflections from the Cold War and its aftermath, accounts from Washington and the United Nations, stories rooted in Uruguay, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Rwanda, Kuwait, Baghdad, Honduras, Dubai and beyond. They will see the foreign service responding to revolutions, refugee movements, border pressures, storms, conflict and political change. And they will also see the texture of ordinary working life abroad — the improvisation, stamina and judgment that rarely make it into official narratives, but without which the job could not be done.

Le résultat de ces choix difficiles est, je l’espère, un recueil qui traverse le temps et les mondes, organisé selon la décennie au cours de laquelle se sont déroulés les principaux événements de chaque texte. Nous avons préservé les voix de ces époques, qui, dans certains cas, recourent à un langage, voire à des attitudes, susceptibles de surprendre aujourd’hui, mais qui montrent aussi à quel point les choses ont évolué – ou n’ont pas évolué. Les lecteurs y trouveront des réflexions sur la Guerre froide et ses conséquences, des témoignages en provenance de Washington et des Nations unies, ainsi que des récits ancrés en Uruguay, au Bangladesh, au Cambodge, au Rwanda, au Koweït, à Bagdad, au Honduras, à Dubaï et bien au-delà. Ils verront le service diplomatique réagir face aux révolutions, aux mouvements de réfugiés, aux pressions aux frontières, aux tempêtes, aux conflits et aux changements politiques. Et ils découvriront également la réalité quotidienne du travail à l’étranger : l’improvisation, l’endurance et le discernement qui figurent rarement dans les récits officiels, mais sans lesquels ce travail ne pourrait être accompli. 

This project has been personal for me. In addition to serving as co-editor, I have two pieces in the book. One, The Ghosts of Afghanistan, was written during the fall of Afghanistan in 2021 and reflects on the aftermath of my time as a military political advisor in Kabul and Kandahar in the early days of Canada’s engagement under NATO and Operation Enduring Freedom. The other is an interview with retired diplomat Louis Guay, who, along with former ambassador Robert Fowler, spent 180 days as a prisoner of Al Qaeda in Mali. I mention this to highlight what this collection represents: the foreign service is not only a body of work, but a body of lived experience. All those experiences are intellectually demanding, some are joyful, and some leave psychological and even physical marks long after the posting ends.

That, too, is part of what I hope readers will understand. There is no other job quite like this one. There is no other profession that asks people to serve Canada in this way, by representing our nation abroad, supporting Canadians in distress, interpreting events in real time, building relationships across cultures and political systems, and advancing Canadian interests and values under pressure. This work is only increasing in importance as we navigate an increasingly unstable and multipolar world. While it is a privilege to serve in this way, it is never a simple one, especially at a time of diminishing resources. These essays capture both the honour and the weight of that responsibility.

For those who have served, perhaps these pages will feel familiar. For families, perhaps they will affirm experiences that are not always visible to others, making them feel a little less alone. For decision makers, they may serve as a reminder of the importance of a strong foreign service to Canada’s national interests. And for everyone, but especially those encountering this world for the first time, perhaps considering this great career for themselves, I hope our stories offer a clearer understanding of the intelligence, resilience, humour and heart that Canadian diplomacy requires.

Pour ceux qui ont servi, ces pages leur sembleront peut-être familières. Pour les familles, elles confirmeront peut-être des expériences qui ne sont pas toujours visibles aux yeux des autres, ce qui leur permettra de se sentir un peu moins seules. Pour les décideurs, elles serviront peut-être à rappeler l’importance d’un service diplomatique solide pour les intérêts nationaux du Canada. Et pour tout le monde, mais surtout pour ceux qui découvrent cet univers pour la première fois et qui envisagent peut-être de se lancer dans cette formidable carrière, j’espère que nos récits permettront de mieux comprendre l’intelligence, la résilience, l’humour et la bienveillance dont la diplomatie canadienne a besoin.

On PAFSO’s 60th anniversary, Diplomatic Notes feels to me like both a tribute and an invitation: a tribute to the people whose work gives Canadian diplomacy its real substance, and an invitation to see and value that work more fully. I can think of no better way to mark this milestone than by letting this community tell its stories in its own words.

Pamela Isfeld

PAFSO President

The Trauma of Uruguay

by Sidney Freifeld

Lest my “Tales from External Affairs” in earlier issues of bout de papier give the impression that life in the Canadian Foreign Service is a succession of amusing pleasantries, let me relate the most traumatic episode in my three-decades career, viz. receiving instructions, barely six weeks after I arrived in distant Montevideo, to close down the first Embassy to which I had been appointed Head.

Towards the end of a tour of duty at our Permanent Mission to the United Nations, I was appointed resident Chargé d’Affaires of the Canadian Embassy in Uruguay. My wife, Crenia and I arrived in Montevideo at the end of August, 1969, happy with the prospects of our new, although modest, post. Uruguay, justifiably, had the reputation of being the model democracy of South America, although we knew it had been going through difficult times. Montevideo, with a population of about 1,500,000 — about half that of the entire country — was considered one of the most intellectually stimulating and cosmopolitan capitals in all Latin America. Like neighbouring Argentina and Chile in South America’s cono sur, Uruguay had a racially homogeneous population of Italo-Spanish descent. In addition, it had been a haven for Europeans fleeing from the Nazi juggernaut in the 1930’s and 1940’s. While indeed there was poverty, there was much less of the extreme social and economic disparities to be found in nearly all other Latin American countries; Uruguay was not a country with a tiny oligarchy owing most of the wealth and the land, and ruling despotically over a mass of illiterate peasantry. Of all Latin American countries, it was the closest to being, or becoming, a middle-class society and, in one respect at least, it stood out from the rest of Latin America: from the early years of the twentieth century, it had been developing a social welfare state, due to the vision of President José Batlle, and however imperfectly this had functioned due to mounting economic difficulties after World War II, Uruguay had gained the image of being a Latin American “Denmark-Switzerland”.

The morés of the country were well described by a contributor to Montevideo’s influential liberal-left weekly, Marcha, in the early 1960’s: “The Uruguayan does not wish to be a very important man, or an insignificant one. He just wants to live in freedom, without making any great sacrifices, and without forcing others to make them. Here is a country whose people do not aspire to greatness, or to anything absolute, but who desire that things shall be kept in good, human proportion and that the human values shall be treated with proper respect. With such a people one does not build empires or alter the course of history.”

According to conventional wisdom, the increasingly middle-class countries of the cono sur should have been among the last to be the targets of domestic terrorism, but Uruguay became one of the first. Political scientists began pointing to it as an example of the dysfunctioning of a democracy, due inter alia to the difficulty of maintaining over-ambitious social welfare programs — e.g., civil service retirement at age fifty on a pension equal to 100% of salary — while markets and prices for its staple exports, wool and beef, were declining.

Living herself alongside giant and powerful neighbours, Uruguay had a special interest in Canadian policies.

By the time we arrived in 1969, Uruguay’s sophisticated urban guerrillas, the Tupamaros, were undergoing a metamorphosis and change of tactics. In earlier years they had carried on a Robin Hood type of derring-do — robbing stores, banks and casinos and ostentatiously turning over the proceeds to the poor. By the time we left Montevideo, we could hear Tupamaro gunfire from our residence and my British colleague, Ambassador Geoffrey Jackson, was soon to be kidnapped and held in a “People’s Prison” for a year. When I went fishing in the Plata River with the United States Ambassador, protective helicopters hovered overhead and the nearby coastline was guarded heavily. Montevideo was rapidly resembling the sets for Costa-Gavras’ film “Z”.

About six weeks after we arrived in Montevideo, the Canadian Thanksgiving holiday had come around and we spent the day at our new home-away-from-home, hanging the last of the paintings we had brought with us. I remarked to Crenia that I felt we were finally getting settled in our new post; I had finished calls at the Foreign Ministry and on diplomatic colleagues, and we had met the handful of local Canadian residents. The use of Spanish was returning after eleven years absence from Mexico.

Late on Thanksgiving morning, the telephone rang. A Canadian clerk had passed by the office on the holiday and found the telex machine clattering long messages in cypher. He had deciphered a few lines. He urged me to come down immediately to the Chancery.

Two confidential telegrams for me had arrived from Ottawa — one from Mitchell Sharp, the Secretary of State for External Affairs, and the other from Under-Secretary Marcel Cadieux. What they added up to was simple — and jolting: for reasons of austerity, the Government was contacting a number of persons of all ranks stationed at Canadian posts abroad and, as part of this process, was closing down eight posts entirely, three of them in Latin America and one of which was Montevideo. I was instructed to seek an urgent appointment with the Uruguayan Foreign Minister to inform him that we would be closing out the Embassy by January 31 at the latest, i.e., within four months. Our Uruguayan employees were to be given notice, the Department would attempt to arrange cross-postings for our Canadian staff, and I was to return to Ottawa for re-assignment. Leases were to be cancelled, contracts annulled, and furniture, vehicles and other items were to be disposed of or shipped to other posts, as would be subsequently directed by the Department.

So began the final four months of our short stay in Montevideo, during which I had to terminate our fine, loyal and shocked Uruguayan employees, negotiate transfers of our Canadian staff and totally liquidate our small diplomatic mission. My first task that morning was to seek an urgent appointment with Foreign Minister Venancio Flores and tell him this astounding news.

In October, 1969, Uruguay was a tense nation. A strike of banking employees was paralyzing the country. The old-line Colorado and Blanco parties were at loggerheads, and Congress seemed paralyzed. Tupamaro urban guerrilla tactics were becoming bolder — they had just staged a spectacular rescue of imprisoned comrades by digging an escape tunnel out of Montevideo’s main prison. To bolster exports there was a ban on the domestic sale of beef — the three-meals-a-day staple of every Uruguayan’s diet. To illustrate the prevailing mood: if, for example, Pan American Airways were to reduce the frequency of its flights into Montevideo from seven to six weekly, this would be looked upon as a portenous event; conversely, if the Blue Star Line were to add one extra call a month to Montevideo, it would be cause for rejoicing. For Canada — of all admired countries — to close its Embassy and scuttle out of the country would be ominous and foreboding. With these thoughts in mind, I went downtown to keep my urgent appointment with Foreign Minister Venancio Flores.

I thanked the Minister for granting the immediate appointment I had been instructed so urgently to seek and, in accordance with instructions, stated that, because of economic conditions in Canada, our Government had decided that it would have to reduce expenditures in the Foreign Service (amongst other measures of austerity), that it was reducing its diplomatic and consular staff around the world and that, as part of this process, it was closing eight of its diplomatic missions — of which Montevideo was to be one.

The Foreign Minister looked at me in shocked astonishment and for a few moments said nothing. Then in a sad voice he replied.

“Mr. Chargé d’Affaires, I imagine that to be instructed to come here and to tell me this must be difficult and painful for you, especially after having arrived so recently. I will say simply this. Please tell your Government that Uruguay, too, knows what it is to experience economic difficulties and to have to introduce measures of austerity. We, too, have had to close several of our missions abroad in recent years. But, just as we found that we could manage subsequently to re-open our missions, we are confident that Canada, too, will find that it is able to do the same thing.” He then went on to assure me of his Ministry’s co-operation to facilitate our closing-down procedures and to liquidate or transfer our contracts and property. Fortunately, he had not learned that on that same day, Ottawa was announcing the opening of new posts at the Vatican and in Africa.

Less than a week before I was due to leave Montevideo, the Chief of Protocol called to say that the Foreign Ministry wanted to tender a luncheon before my final departure. This was a surprise; I knew that it was not the custom for the Ministry to give luncheons or dinners for departing Heads of Mission. I urged the Chief of Protocol not to go to this trouble, but he was quite insistent. I then said that the date he proposed, and the time, was the same as that on which the Diplomatic Corps would be giving me the customary reception for a departing colleague. He said he would tell the Dean to arrange another date.

I had expected the Foreign Ministry’s luncheon to be a small and informal affair. Instead, it was held in the penthouse dining room of Montevideo’s leading hotel, was co-hosted by the Under-Secretary of Foreign Affairs and the Director-General of the Ministry, and was attended by the Directors-General of all Branches and their Heads of Division. Word must have gone out that this was a must; the Ministry was on a summer timetable and many of these officers had already moved down the coast to Punta del Este.

The Director-General of the Ministry, Sr. Marques Sere, whom I had known when he was Uruguay’s Permanent Representative at the United Nations, opened the farewell remarks and took the line that there was no other country in the world for which Uruguay had greater respect and regard than Canada. The Uruguayans were a genuinely democratic people and Canadians occupied a special place in their hearts. Canada had achieved a special place in the western world and had played an extraordinary role in multilateral organizations. The reputation of our Foreign Service was second to none. Living herself alongside giant and powerful neighbours, Uruguay had a special interest in Canadian policies. Uruguay had been going through trying times and needed the support of her friends, amongst whom she counted Canada foremost during this difficult period. It would be difficult to conceive of Montevideo without a resident Canadian mission and, after our present difficulties were over, we would surely find it possible to return. This line, au revoir but not farewell — was echoed by other officers through the luncheon.

It was a hard act to follow. I emphasized that our decision to close had been dictated by harsh budgetary considerations only, and should not be construed in any way as reflecting any diminution of our appreciation of the unique place that Uruguay occupied in South America, or of her superb performance on the international stage and in multilateral organizations, such as the United Nations, where we had co-operated closely. I emphasized that nothing would change in our relationship with Uruguay except the modalities of conducting our local business; our Ambassador in Buenos Aires and other officers at our Embassy there would be accredited to Uruguay and would henceforth make frequent visits to ensure that the happy and close relationship between our two countries would continue unchanged.

A week later, at the end of January 1970, and barely six months after arriving, Crenia and I were on a plane for the long flight back to Rio, New York and February’s Ottawa.

At the time of writing, Sidney Freifeld a former ambassador to Colombia and Ecuador, and a member of the Senior Editorial Board of bout de papier held the world’s record for fly-rod-caught spotted sea trout.

Cockroaches and Caviar

by Mary Taylor

I reached around the door and switched on the light, then waited for thirty seconds before entering my kitchen. That would give the cockroaches time to scuttle off the counter. I knew they were there. I just didn’t want to see them. The refrigerator was by the window, so once I had found my little pot I stood savouring its contents, while contemplating the dreary scene outside. In the dim light before dawn I could make out the broken packing cases strewn across the snow and the hunched figure of the guard half asleep in his sentry box. With my other pregnancies I had not experienced any particular cravings but with this, my fourth, I lusted for caviar. Luckily I was in Moscow, in Kutuzovsky Prospect to be exact, at a time when this was still an affordable commodity. And so I stood one December morning in what by any normal standards would have been called a slum, staring at the snow and supping caviar.

Even quite humble officers, quite frequently found themselves mingling with the beautiful people.

In the bad old days, known by some as “the golden age”, life in the Canadian Foreign Service was tougher but often more glamorous. Accommodation was at a premium, not only in European cities recovering from the devastation of war but also in new Asian capitals which had suddenly had greatness thrust upon them. Hospitals and medical services were sometimes reminiscent of Dickens and Foreign Service Directives had not yet been designed to mitigate such problems. So daily life was often very rough indeed. To compensate, however, there were some splendid moments, even for those who were relatively junior. In a service with fewer and smaller missions operating in a world where those with money rarely had inhibitions about spending it, even quite humble officers, whether in their own right or representing their ambassadors, quite frequently found themselves mingling with the beautiful people. But it was the cockroaches with whom one lived day by day.

We had them in Paris, supposedly because we lived in a ground floor apartment near a grocery store; but I don’t remember them in Delhi. Perhaps that was because I rarely entered the small, hot kitchen where our food was cooked over a charcoal burner. What our house there did enjoy was plenty of flies in addition to the architectural distinction of having three rooms, only one of which had an outside window. Space was often limited, especially if one had several children. Two of our babies spent part of their infancy in cupboards — with window in Paris, without in Moscow. Ironically by the time most of us acquired more palatial accommodation our children had grown up and fled the coop.

Having children increased the complications of foreign service life and in my case this started from day one. I had planned to have my first baby in a charming little clinic near our home in New Delhi. But when I called to say labour was well advanced the answer came loud and clear “no room at the inn”. We were, as it happened, in the midst of floods and on the brink of a cholera epidemic. So I was despatched to what could be charitably described as an indifferent nursing home, one in fact from which my husband had been rescued earlier by his High Commissioner’s wife, Mrs. Reid, on the grounds that it was no fit place for a Canadian patient.

Andrew was born naturally, partly because there was no qualified anaesthetist, and spent the first days of his life cradled by an adoring ayah, who only stopped rocking him to spit betel juice on the stone floor. No doubt because of this he grew up with a remarkably happy disposition, and a good thing too. Later with a rusty nail sticking out of his foot I took him to the British doctor whose services we shared in Moscow. Known for this wry humour which was not always appreciated by the more nervous members of our little community, the good Dr. Sheehan took one look. “I suppose we’ll have to amputate,” he said. It was greatly to the credit of my nine year old that he instantly perceived this to be a joke.

Home leave at that time only applied to those in very demanding circumstances, such as my husband and Bill Bauer, who shared an hotel room in Hanoi. Elsewhere one had to fend as best one could. I remember my first trip to Brittany before I had saved up enough money to buy a car. My husband had to stay in town for a meeting — how well these matters were always arranged — so I set forth with a three year old and a one year old helped by a rather incompetent teen-aged au pair. The train had barely left the suburbs of Paris before the man opposite opened his first bottle of red wine. But it was not the behaviour of the passengers in this crowded second class compartment which made the journey so difficult but the refusal of my older child to use the toilet facilities. One look at the ground flying beneath and he refused to have anything to do with it. To my amazed admiration he held out without accident to the bitter end but virtue was not rewarded. No sooner had we reached the long awaited villa than he fell into a bed of nettles, a hazard he had not encountered in Canada.

The French embassy concentrated on essentials and arranged for Air France to fly in cheese every week.

Food — or at least the lack of those types to which we were accustomed — could also be a source of hardship. Most of the year in Moscow bananas were unobtainable, not to mention lettuce, avocados and celery, none of which could survive being transported in the unheated wagon cars which brought us goodies from Helsinki. Those returning from holiday usually had their hand baggage stuffed with delicacies. Since the cheese in Gastronom was almost inedible it was worth maintaining the French connection. In admirable Gallic style the French embassy concentrated on essentials and arranged for Air France to fly in cheese every week.

But on the other hand one enjoyed fruit in tropical posts, mangoes straight from the tree or little pink bananas, which made their counterparts sold in the West seem like poor relations. In the Europe of the 60s a strong Canadian dollar meant that even the great restaurants were affordable. For the first meal — alas only one of two — that I ate in the Grand Vefour, the prices were comparable to those of the old La Touraine in Ottawa. I didn’t initially realise that I was eating in one of France’s greatest restaurants.

One Canadian ambassador was only
willing to attend a concert if assured
that royalty would be present.

The golden moments of diplomatic life often came with state visits such as that which Lester Pearson made to Paris in 1964. Despite my husband’s lowly position as a first secretary — and in the NATO delegation at that — we were invited to the reception given by De Gaulle in Pearson’s honour. It is not an evening I will forget. Although I had not splurged on a new dress I had engaged the services of a talented hairdresser, soon to float right out of my price range, to give me an extraordinary hairdo. The General greeted everyone with a few appropriate words, and as I bent my elaborately coiffed head to shake his hand I really did feel that I was in the presence of greatness. Then we wandered though the rooms of the Elysée, sipping champagne while the band played and admiring not so much the elegantly gowned ladies as the members of the academy in their green coats adorned with laurels.

On that splendid evening the music, as I remember, was no more than pleasant. But music can loom large in diplomatic life. A sufficient number of senior diplomats appear to be uninterested in it — one Canadian ambassador was reputedly only willing to attend a concert if assured that royalty would be present — that junior officers who express enthusiasm often reap rich rewards. One lovely summer night in Moscow we listened to a concert given by the British ambassador’s daughter who was then a student of Rostropovitch. At the intermission we sipped drinks on the balcony and admired the golden domes of the Kremlin glimmering in the dusk just across the river. Years later after a diplomatic dinner we heard Rostropovitch perform with his hostess, a semi-professional pianist who happened to be the wife of the local American ambassador. Once out of the clutches of their agents and as a token of gratitude to their hosts a surprising number of great performers were beguiled into providing after dinner entertainment, rather like talented Victorians. Maureen Forrester was particularly generous in this respect.

But not all musical evenings were so happy. When the Winnipeg Ballet performed its prize-winning spoof of a ballet lesson in Leningrad, this was met with total incomprehension. In an effort to show that it was intended to be funny we three or four Canadians sitting in the stalls laughed out loud. But this attempt, not easy in a large theatre, was ill-received by the woman behind us for whom ballet was obviously sacred. “That’s very rude,” she scolded tapping my neighbour briskly on the shoulder. “The poor things are doing their best.” Cultural differences can make some concerts hard to enjoy unless one is a dedicated musicologist. Few diplomats attended more than once the performance of 8th century court music, to which they were regularly invited by the Japanese Imperial Household.

In the 60s embassies were still small enough and official visits rare enough, particularly in a post like Moscow, that quite junior officers were present on many grand occasions. Nowadays one has to be a good deal higher up the totem pole to have such experiences. Life, if easier, is also duller. For ambassadors, however, the great moments still occur. Nothing will erase my memory of Jessye Norman, draped in the tricolor, belting out the Marseillaise in the Place de la Concorde to celebrate the bicentennial of the French Revolution. It may have looked corny on TV, as some of my possibly jealous friends assured me, but if you were actually there it was extraordinarily moving. As on the stage, timing is everything in diplomacy. Quite often I felt that ours was poor and we arrived just after or left just before some memorable event. But once at least we hit the jackpot. What perfect timing to be in Tokyo for the enthronement of the Emperor, the first such ceremony in 62 years. That too was an experience I shall not forget.

Mary Taylor met her husband Si in India and spent the next 35 years in the foreign service life. At the time of publication, her book on her experiences in Japan was forthcoming with Oberon Press.

Je me souviens

par Georges Léger, président
PAFSO, 1977-78

L’année 1971 a produit une récolte d’une cinquantaine de jeunes diplomates canadiens d’un cru plutôt exceptionnel, si vous me le permettez, mûri dans le riche ferment des années soixante, vivifié par les tourmentes de 1968 — les barricades à Paris, les universités en émoi de Montréal à Monrovia.

Ces premières recrues des années soixante-dix (il y avait eu l’année précédente un gel d’emploi occasionné par une de ces récessions qui sont désormais devenues cycliques) incarnaient les idéaux et les aspirations qui avaient si justement enorgueilli les Canadiens de l’époque: quatre ans après le Centenaire et l’Expo (où plusieurs de ces bizuths avaient reconnu leur vocation d’internationalistes), trois ans après la vague exaltante de «trudeaumanie» qui avait déferlé sur le pays.

Il était déjà banal de parler d’esprit de corps en se référant à la carrière diplomatique. Et pourtant, comment expliquer autrement l’attachement spontané qui lia dès les premiers jours ces farouches individualistes, qui avait si bien résisté aux collectivismes de toutes couleurs et aux mouvements grégaires? Tel anglophone francophile recruté à Paris, tel francophone arraché à ses études languissantes à Londres; ces Québécois, dont plusieurs ne parlaient qu’un anglais approximatif, prêts à tenter le défi fédéraliste que leur lançait Pierre Trudeau; cette britannico-colombienne de Victoria qui entremêlait si aisément Molière et Shakespeare; ces nouveaux Canadiens avec leur précieux bagage de langues et de cultures pour servir de catalyseur à une chimie déjà bien avancée: je m’en souviens bien.

Et ce jour où la classe de recrues de 1971 s’est trouvée confrontée à un haut fonctionnaire d’une toute autre école, qui refusa de permettre qu’on le questionne en français. Je me souviens d’un mouvement symphonique de déploiement de journaux devant des visages résolus et convaincus de leur cause: les «Devoir» d’abord, bientôt suivis d’un déferlement sympathique de «Globe», laissant notre pauvre conférencier isolé et ahuri devant un mur de manchettes. Esprit de corps? Et comment!

Je me souviens encore de ces mêmes recrues, ne pouvant accepter les règles établies arbitrairement et sans logique, prêtant un serment de lutte fraternelle contre le principe des «quatre années en grade» avant de pouvoir devenir éligible à la promotion. Une action de groupe portée devant la Fonction publique avait peu de chance de réussir, mais servit un coup de semonce contre les arbitraires de tout genre.

Cette action de défense des libertés des diplomates (action que plusieurs diplomates eux-mêmes considéraient indigne, tant l’habitude des servitudes séduit l’élite) me poussa vers l’APASE, que j’ai présidée plus tard à une époque de «fin de siècle», quand les grands problèmes étaient liés aux compensations financières. Bien sûr, il y avait l’inflation, et l’APASE s’était taillée une réputation enviable de négociateur chevronné: il suffisait de s’asseoir en face de l’Administration pour obtenir gain de cause, et des augmentations de salaires qui dépassaient souvent les espoirs — et les talents — des négociateurs.

Je sens aujourd’hui que cette vue matérielle de l’action syndicale était étriquée, qu’il aurait fallu prévoir et aborder les problèmes plus complexes et pernicieux auxquels font face les jeunes diplomates des années quatre-vingt. Non seulement le rôle des conjoints, qui déjà était à l’ordre du jour, mais tout l’échéancier d’une agence centrale en gestation. Le petit est né sans qu’on s’aperçoive que la mère était enceinte.

Une douzaine d’années ont grisonné nos recrues de 1971. En 1984, année orwellienne ad nauseam, le Ministère est plus grand et plus fort que jamais, dit-on. Mais qu’en est-il de la Carrière?

J’ai l’occasion, dans mes fonctions actuelles, de me déplacer à travers le Tiers-Monde et de rencontrer sur place mes collègues en mission dans les capitales moins connues. Je dis bien «collègues», puisque l’action diplomatique, à mes yeux, n’est pas l’apanage d’un ministère ou agence, mais comprend tous ceux qui oeuvrent pour la réalisation des objectifs de politique étrangère du Canada. Parmi tous ces collègues, ces camarades à nous, les anciens syndicalistes en pantalons rayés, je revois et je me souviens surtout de l’agent en poste, de l’authentique agent du service étranger, ce Canadien errant et sa petite famille à la merci des directives de l’Administration et des soucis des agences centrales, trop souvent dirigés ailleurs. L’APASE s’est toujours préoccupée d’abord et avant tout de ses problèmes et de son sort, sachant bien que le moral des fantassins aux premières lignes de l’action détermine, et déterminera toujours, le sort de l’armée. Il n’y a pas de diplomatie sans les diplomates, de même qu’il ne saurait y avoir une politique étrangère sans la contribution des agents politiques à l’étranger. Le capital humain est la seule véritable richesse de l’Édifice Pearson, et son placement à l’étranger le meilleur moyen d’en garantir les intérêts.

In 1981 the author left External Affairs to become the Vice-President of Petro Canada International Assistance Corporation.

The Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea: An International Triumph

by Robert Hage

The Conference is seen as one of the triumphs of the Cold War, which ended in 1991 with the collapse of the Soviet Union. In 1967, Malta’s United Nations Representative, Arvid Pardo, saw technological advances in deep-sea drilling for minerals open on the ocean floor. He called on the UN General Assembly to recognize these resources beyond national jurisdiction as “the common heritage” of mankind. In 1967, the General Assembly established an “Ad Hoc Committee to study the Peaceful Uses of the Seabed and the Ocean Floor”.

Canada, with the world’s longest coastline and second-largest continental shelf, was a natural leader. In 1969, the United States oil tanker SS Manhattan made a trial run through our Northwest Passage to determine its viability. The next year, the Liberian registered oil tanker Arrow sank off the coast of Nova Scotia. Canada argued forcefully for coastal states’ rights in preventing marine pollution by passing the Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act.

Canadian representatives at the UN lobbied for a law of the sea conference, which would deal not just with seabed mining but with the whole range of concerns: jurisdictional, environmental, scientific and military. In 1970, Alan Beesely, the leader of Canada’s delegation, introduced a General Assembly Resolution to convene the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea. It called for a Conference to adopt a comprehensive Convention on all law of the sea issues on the basis of a “package deal” which would accept or reject the results in their entirety. A “Gentlemen’s Agreement” that states would not call a vote on any question unless all efforts to reach consensus had been exhausted.

Canada’s Agenda

With such a complex agenda, Canada saw the need to establish links beyond Western nations. Canada worked with Mexico to establish “the coastal state” group. To contend with the USA and others wanting seabed mining, largely developing states formed the land-based mineral producers’ group. Ireland and Canada, which both have wide continental margins, put together a like-minded group to extend their exploitation as far as possible. The Group of 12 worked together to bridge the gap between the United States and developing nations. The principle of a 12-mile territorial sea and a 200-mile “exclusive economic zone” (EEZ) was accepted at the first negotiating session in Caracas in 1974.

Canada’s delegation included representatives from all of Canada’s maritime provinces. Canada was the world’s largest producer of nickel, one of four commercially significant seabed minerals. On the other side, Latin American copper producers wanted protection to ensure their interests were also being protected.

Early on, the Conference agreed to a new regime of “transit passage” applicable to straits used for international navigation between one part of the high seas or EEZ and another part of the high seas and EEZ. Canada maintained, and still does, that “transit passage” does not apply in Canadian waters where there are no international straits. The United States, which in the end did not sign or ratify the Law of the Sea Convention, maintained then and now that the Northwest Passage in Canada’s Arctic is an international strait. This would grant it, and others like Russia and China, rights of passage for their ships and overhead flights for their aircraft. A “right” a United States ambassador publicly questioned.

200-mile Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ)

Canada was one of the leaders in developing a Conference consensus that a coastal state must have exclusive sovereign rights over the living resources of the 200-mile zone. To make this more acceptable to landlocked states, Canada promoted the coastal states’ obligation for sound conservation and the sharing of any fish surplus. As a subsequent result, Canada became the world’s largest fish exporter. It did not, however, obtain an immediate result with fishing states regarding stocks that overlap the EEZ and the high seas, the so-called “straddling stocks”.

Continental Shelf

As the state with the second largest continental shelf (Russia has the largest), Canada devoted a great deal of attention to the determination of the continental shelf, forming a “wide continental margin group” known as “the margineers”. This broadly based group successfully defined the shelf as “those submarine areas which extend beyond its territorial sea throughout the natural prolongation of its land territory to the outer edge of the continental margin or to 200 nautical miles whichever is greater.” While this was a triumph for “the margineers”, they succeeded by agreeing to the “land-locked and geographically disadvantaged countries (LLGDS)” demand for “revenue sharing” beyond 200 miles plus the establishment of the International Commission of the Limits of the Continental Shelf.

Seabed Mining

It’s paradoxical that the origins of the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea are seabed mining. Much had to do with the United States and the regulatory machinery for seabed mining, which pitted developing countries against the industrialized seabed mining nations (USA, EEC, Japan, USSR). While Canada was the world’s largest nickel producer, it tried to stay outside the debate between the seabed mining nations and developing land-based mining states. Canada formed the land-based production group (LBG) to coordinate the interests of both developed and developing mineral producers. Neither, however, could be brought together.

United States Position

The United States announced it was not going to sign the Convention, and it would engage in seabed mining outside the Convention. Nevertheless, Conference representatives assembled in Jamaica in December 1982 to sign the Convention. Canada was among the 117 signatories. Unfortunately, the US refusal minimized the number of Western state ratifications. In 1990, United Nations officials and a select group of nation states, plus the United States, began consultations to amend Part XI of the Convention to overcome limitations on seabed production and mandatory technology. An Agreement on Implementation under the UN Convention on Law of the Sea was adopted in 1994 to change Part XI, opening the door to further ratifications. A fine example of the United Nations states determination. Unfortunately, the United States is not among them.

Canada’s Challenges: France

During the UNCLOS negotiations, Canada, like many other coastal states, declared its own exclusive fishing zones off its Pacific and Atlantic coasts, phasing out European fishing fleets from the Grand Banks, with one exception: the fishing rights of France’s islands St. Pierre and Miquelon (SPM) just off Newfoundland’s coast. During the 1988 French Presidential election campaign, the Gaullist Prime Minister Jacques Chirac had different approaches towards Canada than his opposing Socialist President Francois Mitterrand. On April 15, 1988, the Island’s politicians, fishers and a television crew set sail into Canada’s fishing zone in front of two Canadian patrol boats. The politicians and fishers achieved their objective. They were arrested and taken to St. John’s, Newfoundland and put in jail in front of the TV crew. The bail magistrate was away for the weekend.

All hell broke out in France. Chirac said Canada’s approach “was brutal,” ordering Air Canada flights blocked or grounded and Canadians delayed at France’s borders. The French press drew attention to the challenges of this happening during a French election, maintaining “a solution appears unlikely for many weeks.” As often happens after a crisis between democratic states, a negotiated solution was found. Newfoundland agreed to a boundary settlement (which ultimately favoured Canada) and gave SPM fishers an interim cod quota.

Spain

Spain got its turn with Canada in 1986 when it and Portugal joined the European Union, and they both decided to move their fishery from the African coast to the Grand Banks of Newfoundland. When cod stocks collapsed in 1992, they shifted to “Greenland halibut,” the largest remaining fish stock “straddling” Canada’s economic zone and the high seas. Unbeknownst to the Spanish captains, Canada was intercepting their voice messages to their Spanish ports reporting they were overfishing their quota and hiding the extra catch on board.

Fisheries Minister Brian Tobin was very much aware of what was going on and convinced Prime Minister Chretien to pass legislation in 1994 to allow Canada to set quotas over its continental shelf beyond the 200-mile limit and arrest vessels violating these quotas. On March 10, 1995, Canadian fisheries patrol officers, accompanied by the RCMP, seized the Spanish fishing vessel “Estai” beyond Canada’s 200-mile zone. The ship was taken to St. John’s, Newfoundland, where the crew was released, and the captain was charged with violating Canadian conservation laws (79% of the catch was undersized turbot).

The European Commission and its new member, Spain, demanded negotiations with Canada. At one point, Spain demanded an “exchange of engagement” between Canadian and Spanish military vessels. Fortunately, the French Ambassador to the European Union, Charles de Gaulle’s grandson (also named Charles de Gaulle), intervened to negotiate an agreement. The solution to a crisis again prevailed.

Canada agreed to enhanced fishing quotas for EU vessels in exchange for the Union’s agreement to control and enforce its members’ fishing activity. The same year, the Canadian-inspired UN Conference on Straddling Stocks agreed to a Convention which established principles for the conservation of these stocks around the world. (Foreign Affairs wanted to be certain the Estai’s crew would be taken to Spain. The only plane it could find was in Atlantic City and was used by the Trump Plaza Hotel. It landed in St. John’s, painted in brilliant colours with the word “Trump”. Fortunately, the crew found another plane.)

Ratification

While Canada was a leader in UNCLOS negotiations, it was far behind in ratifying the Convention. An east-coast fishing lobby campaigned for Canada to assert “custodial management” over the whole of the Grand Banks. It did not succeed. Under instructions from Prime Minister Jean Chrétien, Foreign Affairs Minister (and international lawyer) Bill Graham ratified the Convention on November 6, 2003.

The UN Convention on the Law of the Sea Carries On

Over the past years, $20 billion a year in national subsidies have expanded high seas fishing fleets, causing illicit or unregulated fishing. The lack of high seas conservation rules means at least one-third of the world’s fisheries are overexploited. The UN Convention on the Law of the Sea is in place, but lax coastal and flag state enforcement, overfishing on the high seas, along with plastic pollution, have encouraged international action.

In 2017, the United Nations convened a UN Oceans Conference with 4,000 participants issuing “Call for Action: to save the oceans from overfishing and pollution”. In March 2023, the United Nations initiated “The Agreement under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea on the Conservation and Sustainable Use of Marine Biological Diversity of Areas beyond National Jurisdiction (the BBNJ Agreement) known as the “High Seas Treaty”. France and Costa Rica co-hosted the 2025 UN Ocean Conference to accelerate action to bring the Treaty into force.

On reflection, Malta launched the study of seabed mining in 1967, leading to the 1972 UN Conference on the Law of the Sea. Malta has now joined 31 other countries requesting a precautionary pause on deep-sea mining: “The seabed is one of the biggest habitats where different species live. Natural resource mining is an ever-growing threat.” At the closure of the Third UN Oceans Conference in Nice in June, 2025, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said: “The ocean of our ancestors, teeming with life and diversity, can be more than legend. It can be our legacy.”

Robert Hage was a Canadian diplomat for 38 years, notably as Canada’s Ambassador to Hungary and Slovenia, Director General for Europe and Director General for Legal Affairs. He also served in Canada’s Embassies in Washington, Lagos, Paris and as Deputy Head of Canada’s Mission to the European Union in Brussels.

Remembering the Indochinese Refugee Movement

by Michael Molloy

The Indochinese refugee movement was the largest refugee resettlement initiative ever undertaken by Canada, running from the fall of Saigon in 1975 until well into the 1990s. It was spawned and sustained by a wide range of push factors. Following the Communist victories in Indochina in 1975, there were summary executions, the forcing of perceived enemies into “re-education camps” and so-called New Economic Zones, the unrelenting oppression of “class enemies”, ethnic cleansing of the large Chinese minority, nationalization of businesses and the Cambodian genocide. Compounding the situation were natural disasters and wars between Vietnam and both Cambodia and China.

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Loading the last Canadian Hercules flight from Saigon Ton Son Nhut Airport, 24 April 1975.

It’s impossible to get an accurate count of all who perished in the jungles and minefields of Cambodia attempting to reach Thailand. Additionally, UNHCR conservatively estimates that at least 250,000, mainly Vietnamese and Sino-Vietnamese “boat people,” lost their lives attempting to reach safety in neighbouring countries.

This movement added close to 200,000 new citizens – Vietnamese, Sino-Vietnamese, Laotian, Cambodian and members of various Indochinese minorities – to Canada’s population. Given the suffering that many experienced in making their escape, the conditions in the refugee camps, the struggle to adjust to a new culture, climate and, often, language, and the cumulative trauma of all these, they have adjusted remarkably well. They and their descendants are found in all walks of Canadian life.

Given the suffering that many experienced in making their escape, the conditions in the refugee camps, the struggle to adjust to a new culture, climate and, often, language, and the cumulative trauma of all these, they have adjusted remarkably well.

The apex of the movement for Canada occurred in 1979 and 1980. The government made an initial commitment to 5,000 Indochinese refugees in the 1979 annual refugee plan, partly influenced by the favourable publicity garnered by the acceptance of 600 refugees stranded on the Hai Hong (see Dara Marcus’ article “Canada and the Hai Hong” bout de papier Vol. 28, no. 1). The escalating rate of arrivals of boats in neighbouring countries, more than doubling from 26,000 in April to 56,000 in June caused the ASEAN countries to close their shores. Boats were pushed off or towed back to sea, and thousands perished. With the possibility of asylum rapidly disappearing, the Secretary General of the UN called an emergency meeting in Geneva to respond to the crisis.

In June 1979, the new Conservative Government increased the Canadian commitment to 8,000 and asked that another 4,000 be sponsored by Canadian groups and institutions. In response to the Secretary General’s appeal for greater effort by the international community, Secretary of State for External Affairs Flora MacDonald and Immigration Minister Ron Atkey went to Cabinet to argue for a much larger effort, and when MacDonald addressed the emergency meeting in Geneva on July 21, 1979, she announced a commitment to resettle 50,000 refugees. This was comprised of the 8,000 already pledged, 21,000 to be sponsored under a new, untested Private Refugee Sponsorship Program, and a matching 21,000 to be settled by the government. When the Liberals returned to power in 1980, Immigration Minister Lloyd Axworthy added 10,000, bringing the commitment to 60,000.

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Malaysian fishing boats used initially to ferry visa officers, their files and overnight luggage on the four-hour trip to the refugee camp on Pilau Bidong - slow, smelly (fish and exhaust), noisy, uncomfortable.

The response of ordinary Canadians took everyone by surprise. In June 1979, 388 groups sponsored 1,609 Indochinese refugees. By the end of the year, Canadians had overshot the 21,000 target as 5,456 groups filed sponsorships for 29,369 refugees. When the program ended in December 1980, there were sponsorships on file for just under 40,000 refugees. While most churches in the country took on a refugee family, it was the religious communities with strong memories of persecution and war, notably the Mennonites, the Dutch Christian Reformed Church and Canada’s Jewish community, that took the lead. Canadians were inspired by remarkable leaders like Ottawa’s Mayor Marion Dewar, who called a meeting expecting dozens of citizens and had to find seating for over a thousand people. In Toronto, York University Professor Howard Adelman invited a few friends home to draft a letter to the government and ended up founding Operation Lifeline to coordinate sponsorship activity throughout Ontario and beyond. Across the entire country, local leaders stepped forward to promote and coordinate the sponsorships and to organize arrangements and services for the incoming refugees. (Interestingly, the City of Windsor was a year ahead of the curve as Mayor Bert Weeks had a Vietnamese refugee committee up and running by December 1977.)

The response of ordinary Canadians took everyone by surprise. In June 1979, 388 groups sponsored 1,609 Indochinese refugees. By the end of the year, Canadians had overshot the 21,000 target as 5,456 groups filed sponsorships for 29,369 refugees.

The refugees and the several hundred thousand ordinary Canadians who welcomed them and helped them to adjust to life here are, of course, the main elements of this story.

What is much less known is the story of how the refugees got here. That is the story of how, in 1979 and 1980, 20 or so young Canadian visa officers, led by three remarkable young managers, operating in remote, hot, humid, smelly, hard to reach camps throughout Southeast Asia, identified, interviewed, selected, processed and transported 60,000 refugees to Canada on 181 charter flights with never a seat left empty. It is the story of the two impressive reception centres that the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Employment and Immigration Commission (CEIC) organized on military bases in Edmonton and Montreal to receive, orient and document the refugees and give them a few days’ rest after their journey. It is the story of how a little group of clerks, supported by a stove-sized computer and a system inspired by the Berlin Airlift, matched 32,000 refugees with 7,000 sponsors. And finally, it is the story of how CEIC employment and immigration staffers played a critical role in coordinating the sponsorship movement, settling 25,000 government-assisted refugees and dealing with the myriad problems that eventually arose after arrival.

It is the story of how a little group of clerks, supported by a stove-sized computer and a system inspired by the Berlin Airlift, matched 32,000 refugees with 7,000 sponsors.

The book

Three years ago, with the 40th anniversary of the fall of Saigon approaching on 30 April 2015, a group of those young immigration, employment and visa officers, now in their 60s and 70s, decided it was time to tell their part of the story under the auspices of the Canadian Immigration Historical Society. Drawing on almost 1,000 documents from Library and Archives Canada and from the UNHCR Archives in Geneva, the CIHS writing team (Peter Duschinsky, Kurt Jensen, Michael Molloy and Robert Shalka) has teased out the story of the upheavals in Southeast Asia between 1975 and 1980. They have described and analyzed the events, the policy considerations, the political and bureaucratic decisions, and the operational innovations that made it possible to move so many people from so far away so quickly to Canada. The story of how it was done is told in the words of over 40 former CEIC, RCMP and National Health and Welfare employees, one stalwart Foreign Service wife and a doughty Scottish sea captain. These stories, sometimes shocking, sometimes funny and always quietly inspiring, make up two-thirds of the book tentatively titled Running on Empty: The Canadian Employment and Immigration Commission and the Indochinese Refugee Movement 1975–1980. It should be published later this year.

The conference

Originally, the book was slated for release in April 2015, but the writing team took a detour. York University’s Centre for Refugee Studies (CRS), which grew out of the Indochinese program, heard about the CIHS book project and suggested the two organizations co-host a conference on the Indochinese movement. The conference The Indochinese Refugee Program 1975 to 1980 and the Launch of Canada’s Private Refugee Sponsorship Program was funded by Citizenship and Immigration’s Multicultural Branch and was launched with a one-day workshop that examined Canada’s current Private refugee sponsorship program.

Stories of dangerous sea voyages or treks through jungles, pirate attacks, hunger, thirst, privation and the horror of losing children along the way left the 100-plus participants in shocked silence.

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Personal effects of Embassy officers who had been previously evacuated offloaded from the aircraft. The two men on the left are Embassy drivers.

The conference, held between 21 and 23 November 2013, heard first-hand accounts and testimony from three refugee panels, plus panels comprised of former visa officers and other federal, provincial and municipal officials, sponsors, community organizers, and media representatives. Keynote speakers included Udo Janz, the Director of UNHCR’s New York office and Senator The Honourable Thanh Hai Ngo.

The refugee panels, featuring representatives of the Vietnamese, Sino-Vietnamese, Laotian and Cambodian communities, were particularly gripping. Stories of dangerous sea voyages or treks through jungles, pirate attacks, hunger, thirst, privation and the horror of losing children along the way left the 100-plus participants in shocked silence. The panel on first contact between newly arrived refugees and their sponsors demonstrated that in most cases, the sponsorship program worked well. The conference also heard a sobering account of what happened when a sponsoring group was not up to the task. The final refugee panel about settling here demonstrated the importance of family, hard work and the resilience of the human spirit.

The conference proceedings were videotaped along with 21-hour-long interviews. These can be found at www.indochinese.apps01.yorku.ca/conference. The conference website also includes a 30-minute documentary and a series of shorter thematic mini-documentaries compiled from the proceedings.

Follow up

In January 2014, a post-conference workshop designed an ambitious program to stimulate further research and make information on the Canadian experience with the Indochinese refugees more widely available. The first priority was to establish a presence on the internet www.Indochinese.aps01.yorku.ca. Work has begun on a docudrama based on the experiences of one of the conference participants.

The Centre for Refugee Studies is developing materials for use in high schools focusing on the Indochinese refugees and how Canadians assisted them. The materials should be online before the 40th anniversary of the fall of Saigon.

Consultations are underway with York University Library to create an online archive of documents and other materials relating to the Indochinese refugee movement and the Canadian response. The documents collected by CIHS in researching the book will constitute the nucleus of the new archive. The Society remains very interested in collecting documents and memorabilia from the Indochinese refugee movement, and if you have such materials and are looking for a home for them, contact us through cihs-shic.ca.

As the original Indochinese refugees age, the CIHS-CRS partnership is making plans for a workshop in the fall of 2015 to bring together representatives of institutions that collect immigrant and refugee oral histories. The objective is to encourage institutions across Canada to collect and preserve the firsthand accounts of the refugees as well as those of sponsors, host families, and others.

A special edition of Refuge: Canada’s Journal on Refugees on the Indochinese movement will be issued before the end of 2015. In addition, an edited volume examining aspects of the Indochinese movement not covered in CIHS’s book is planned.

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Helicopter chartered by UNHCR to ferry Singapore based Canadian visa officers to the Anabas Islands. Left to right: David Ritchie, fellow Singapore visa officer John McEachern, then-Corporal Ben Soave of the RCMP, who retired as Chief Superintendent.

At the time of publication, Michael Molloy was a Senior Fellow at the University of Ottawa and president of the Canadian Immigration Historical Society. He was involved in the Czechoslovakian and Ugandan Asian refugee movements, helped design the refugee elements of the 1976 Immigration Act and was Senior Coordinator of the Indochinese refugee movement in 1979 and 1980. Postings included Tokyo, Beirut, Minneapolis, Geneva, Amman, Damascus, Nairobi and Toronto. He was Ambassador to Jordan (1996–2000) and Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process (2000–03). He co-authored a book on the Canadian Immigration Department and the Indochinese refugee movement.

The Persian Cat Exfiltration

by Roger Lucy

This is a tale we heard from the station manager of a Western airline, in the aftermath of the Iranian Revolution of February 1979.

Despite the best efforts of the diplomatic community to evacuate their nationals before the Revolution, and despite its disruptions to life, business, not to mention fears that the fall of the Persian Empire would culminate in a bloodbath of foreigners, there were still many Westerners left in Iran after Khomeini took power. Nonetheless, the Revolutionary Komiteh (Committee) decreed that all non-diplomatic foreigners were to leave.

Extra flights were laid on to supplement the scheduled flights now resuming service into Mehrabad airport. The embassies’ skeleton staff of essential (read: expendable) personnel worked flat out to shepherd their remaining nationals out of the country.

One nameless evacuee was a cat fancier and, of course, Persia is renowned for its cats. While in Iran, he had acquired a pure-bred Persian cat, a beast of ancient and exquisite pedigree, whose bloodlines could reputedly be traced all the way back to the time of Cyrus the Great. The cat’s owner was desperate to take his cat with him, but to do that required, of course, all sorts of paperwork. Despite their desire to see the ferengis’ speedy departure, and the general collapse of most bureaucratic institutions, what passed for the competent authorities in the former Empire were still insistent that all exit documentation and customs paperwork be meticulously in order. To require is one thing, to obtain another. With the media full of the daily toll of executed politicians, soldiers, and officials, few were willing to put their signature to any document that might imply they had been in any way helpful to a Westerner.

By whatever means it took, our intrepid cat fancier obtained every document, stamp and signature he required. Documents, baggage and cat carrier in hand, he repaired to his country’s embassy compound to spend his last night in Iran, awaiting the convoy of buses that were to take him and his compatriots to Mehrabad Airport. The night was an unquiet one. Virtually the entire arsenal of the Iranian army had been looted, and an emancipated population, used to long nights of rioting, now spent them trying out their liberated assault rifles with repeated feux de joie, interspersed with their customary chants of Allah Akhbar, Marg Bar Shah, marg bar Amrika (God is great, death to the Shah, death to America).

In the cold grey smog of dawn, the buses came and took the evacuees to Mehrabad airport, past the chanting trigger-happy mobs, through the checkpoints of all the local komitehs which had sprung up along the route, and at last disgorged them in front of the departure lounge. This was the fiefdom of yet another komiteh, one with the self-appointed task of ensuring that those leaving Iran were not taking anything with them that anyone might conceivably deem an irreplaceable national treasure, or worst still, try to smuggle out Iranian rials, a currency so debased by revolution that, as my East German colleague observed, people were even willing to exchange them for Ostmarks.

Through all this, our cat-man forged undaunted, until he finally reached the check-in counter, handing baggage and cat cage into the care of the airline. Unencumbered at last, he proceeded through several more passport, customs and security checks, knowing that the hardest part was over. The station manager was a good friend of his and would ensure that his prize moggie would smoothly make all its connections so that they would soon be reunited in a land where peace, order and good government still meant something.

Well, man proposeth and airline baggage handlers disposeth. The cat was in its cage, atop a baggage cart wending its way to the aircraft. The cart hit a pothole, the cage bounced off, hit the ground and sprang open. The cat shot from its cage and vanished as cats are wont to do when cat cages are around. A couple of baggage handlers saw this and were devastated. At heart, Persians are a generous people, and, if ignorant of the preceding saga, they did know that some cat lover would be very disappointed if all that appeared at the other end was an empty cage. Of the cat nothing could be seen, and her subsequent fate is unknown, but it was not a good time in Iran for those of Imperial heritage, be they human or feline.

Fortunately, there is no shortage of cats in Mehrabad airport; in fact, the place is famous for them. They infest the place, scavenging rodents, food scraps and the odd unwary passenger. They bear little resemblance to those simpering long-haired Persian cats you see in toilet paper ads.

These beasts are big; they are verminous, and to call them feral would imply that at some point in the distant past, their ancestors had once been domesticated. One of them happened to be lounging beneath the wing of an Iran Air jet, and with great skill and dexterity, and without suffering fatal lacerations, the baggage handlers were able to snatch it up and stuff it in the cat cage. And off the airport cat went, to its new life in the west.

Our source could not tell what the cat fancier’s reaction was when he opened the cage at his destination to greet what he thought was his cherished pedigreed pet. Some things are best left unknown.

Roger Lucy joined External Affairs in 1971. He served in Chicago, Tehran, Oslo and Port of Spain. He made several contributions to bout de papier, mostly relating to diplomacy in the Dark Ages.

The Washington Scene: Getting The Americans Interested In The Six

by Gar Pardy

Jimmy Carter was not having a successful presidency. Elected by the slimmest of margins – 50.1% of the popular vote – in November 1976, now two years into his mandate, he still remained an outsider to many Americans. More troublesome, he was taking on the air of an ineffective one at that.

The promise of a sharp break between the sordidness of Watergate and the future gave Mr. Carter his slight edge with the American people. In some ways, he represented something more than a change of Administrations; rather, he personified regime change at a time when the term had little currency.

I arrived in Washington in the summer of 1978 on a cross-posting from East Africa, after three years of coping with salubrious Kenya and murder-ridden Uganda under Idi Amin. It was a welcome change, and the new job was an interesting one – intelligence liaison with the CIA and the Department of State. It was the start of a four-year university-level course on the world.

There was a miasma about the city suggesting the promise of the Carter presidency was in trouble. Not unlike today, the economy was unresponsive to the normal nostrums; reliance on foreign oil seemed impossible to counter; and less than a year after arrival in the capital, President Carter, in a nationwide speech, unconvincingly, sought to offload the responsibility to the American people.

There were successes, but these were largely in foreign affairs. A historic treaty with Panama was negotiated and ratified by Congress to return the Canal to Panamanian sovereignty at the end of the century; the Camp David Accords started a process in the Middle East for reconciliation between the Israelis and the Palestinians underwritten politically by Egypt and Jordan; a second round of strategic arms limitation talks led to an unratified agreement with the Soviet Union; and most significantly, President Carter gave voice to the view that the morality of human rights had a role to play in American foreign policy and the management of the international community.

...the Ayatollah backed the action of the students, and it was only then that the policy community in Washington realized that it was in the midst of a major crisis.

Events in Iran, however, created a worrisome backdrop. Carter visited the country early in his presidency and, contrary to his views on morality in foreign affairs, lavishly praised the Shah, seeing him as a force for stability in the region. It was not a view shared by most Iranians who harked back to the illegitimacy of his coming to power by British and American machinations in 1953.

1978 was a year of regime-shaking civil conflict that the Shah and his main instrument of control – SAVAK – brutally tried to counter but had little success. In the process, the Shah lost his limited legitimacy, and before January 1979 was out, so was the Shah. The Shah’s nemesis, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, in exile in Iraq and France for the previous 14 years, triumphantly returned to Tehran on February 1, 1979. He was a man with a plan, and within a year he was not only the supreme religious leader of the country and Shia everywhere, he was also Iran’s supreme political leader as well.

In Washington, these events were carefully followed, but there was little understanding or appreciation of how fundamental was the change in Iran. The initial issue was how to deal with the Shah in exile in Egypt. Rifts in the Administration were clearly evident. Cyrus Vance, the Secretary of State, wanted to cut all ties with the Shah and did not want to see him in the United States, even for critical medical treatment. Vance and his colleagues at State emphasized that the United States needed to recast its relationship with Iran in the aftermath of the Shah’s downfall and that diplomacy had to dominate confrontation.

Over at the White House, Zbigniew Brzezinski, National Security Adviser to the President, had a decidedly different approach to the world. Born in Poland between the wars, Brzezinski had built a reputation as a realistic interpreter of the Eastern Bloc, especially the dominated countries of Eastern Europe. In the process, he became known as the Democrats’ “Kissinger,” favouring peaceful engagement with the area over détente. In Carter’s government, he was seen as a wily opponent of Vance, who still saw détente as a guiding principle in the management of East-West relations. Their strongly held views became polar points in the Administration and often led to ambiguous policies, which played out in counterproductive responses during the hostage crisis.

The news on November 4, 1979, that Iranian students had taken control of the American embassy did not occasion serious concern in Washington. Prompted by the decision by the United States on October 22 to allow entry by the Shah for medical treatment, the takeover was considered similar to what had happened earlier in February 1979 when students took control of the embassy but left after a few days. This benign view was soon overtaken when, unlike in February, the Ayatollah backed the action of the students, and it was only then that the policy community in Washington realized that it was in the midst of a major crisis.

The CIA in those days was hors de combat. Stansfield Turner was appointed by Carter as his Director of Central Intelligence in early 1977, and it was soon apparent that it was not one of his better ones. The Agency was still coping with Seymour Hersh’s 1974 allegations in the New York Times dealing with covert activities, including assassination efforts involving foreign political leaders and the undermining of foreign governments. These activities were collectively known as the Agency’s “family jewels”. As well, Hersh alleged that the Agency was collecting intelligence on the political activities of American citizens. Mainly based on Hersh’s allegations, Congressional investigations (Church and Pike Committees) provided substantive confirmation of the Agency’s illegal activities and recommended major changes in the management of American intelligence activities at home and abroad.

The exfiltration operation has now been celebrated in books, films and a Hollywood movie.

In the midst of these externally imposed and wrenching changes, Turner decided there was a need to reduce the size of the Agency, especially on the Operational side. Over 800 officials were fired (known as the Halloween Massacre in Agency lore). It was years before the Agency returned to overconfidently believing it had a significant role to play in American foreign policy.

It was clear from the very start that the United States did not have a coherent understanding or appreciation of what the overthrow of the Shah represented for American policy. The takeover of the American embassy complicated what was initially a foreign policy matter and turned it into a major domestic issue. Iran under new and radical leadership was one thing; Iran capturing and torturing 52 American officials was a crisis of an entirely different order.

The overwhelming concentration in Washington was concern for the 52 hostages held by the Iranians. Vance and officials at the State Department sought action at the United Nations and the International Court of Justice, but even when successful, there was no reaction from Tehran. At the White House, Brzezinski was promoting direct military action to rescue the hostages, an idea he continued to promote and organize until it led to the disaster in the southern desert of Iran on April 24, 1980, with nine dead rescuers and two crashed aircraft.

There was little action within the Administration on the six Americans now safely sequestered at the home of John Sheardown and the official residence of Ambassador Ken Taylor. The prevailing assumption was that they were out of harm’s way and would be accommodated within any larger effort concerning the 52.

It was clear by early December 1979 that this assumption was not only erroneous but dangerous as well, not only for the Americans being sheltered by Canadians but for their Canadian rescuers.

The press by this time was counting bodies, and it soon became evident both to Jean Pelletier, the Washington correspondent of La Presse in Montreal and the New York Times that the numbers being used by the State Department in describing the hostages did not add up. Pelletier even sought confirmation from the Canadian embassy as to whether Canada was sheltering some of the hostages. Fortunately, both La Presse and the New York Times agreed that publishing the story at that time could well lead to increased dangers for the hostages and their Canadian friends.

In Ottawa, these developments rang the alarm bells, and in early December, it was decided that the Americans had to be convinced that the six hostages with the Canadians in Tehran had to be dealt with urgently before they joined their colleagues as hostages in the American Embassy. Pat Black, the Under Secretary for Intelligence and Security at Foreign Affairs, called in early December and asked that I approach appropriate persons within the Agency and lay out for them the need for urgent action on getting the six Americans out of Tehran. He mentioned that Flora MacDonald would be meeting with Vance in a few days during a NATO meeting in Brussels, and she intended to raise the matter as well.

It was not only a hugely humanitarian and personally dangerous effort by Canadians in Tehran; it was one of the finer efforts by Canada’s Foreign Service in a long, long time.

Frank Carlucci was the Deputy Director of the CIA and was highly regarded as the person in the Agency who could get things done and done well. I met with Carlucci soon after the call from Black and laid out the case on the need for urgent American action to exfiltrate the six from Tehran at the earliest possible moment. Carlucci appreciated the dangers the six, along with the Canadian staff, were now in, realizing that it would only be a matter of time before the situation in Iran became public knowledge. Within a week or so of this meeting, Tony Mendez was selected by the Agency to organize and carry out the exfiltration of the six from Tehran.

The exfiltration operation has now been celebrated in books, films and a Hollywood movie. Each in their own way, some more accurate than others, captures the operation in all of its detail. The Hollywood movie unfortunately eliminated the role John and Zena Sheardown played in the drama, and as it becomes part of the American mythological historical record, it is appropriate that Canada and Canadians stand their ground on the role that was played by so many. It was not only a hugely humanitarian and personally dangerous effort by Canadians in Tehran; it was one of the finer efforts by Canada’s Foreign Service in a long, long time.

In the immediate aftermath of the rescue operation on January 28, I accompanied Frank Carlucci to Ottawa, where he expressed the appreciation of the United States government to Flora MacDonald. It was a cold, snowy day in early February that he met with Ms. MacDonald just prior to the February 18 national elections. Kind words were offered, and Ms. MacDonald rushed off for last-minute electioneering. As we put on our winter clothes outside her office in the Pearson building, I helped Carlucci’s security man with his large jacket. Unexpectedly, the coat was much heavier than anticipated, and it fell to the floor with a muffled clunk. I picked it up and looked questioningly at the security official in the full knowledge that the matter of Americans carrying weapons in Canada was a perennial issue. The security man looked at me with a slight smile on his face and simply said, “lifesavers.”

As a postscript to these events, in late January this year, a general in Iran’s Revolutionary Guard criticized the 2011 storming of the British Embassy in Tehran, saying students and activists should “avoid actions driven by emotion.” The general went on to say that Iranians must deal with their enemies “more intelligently” and “avoid shallow and emotional actions” that damage Iran’s image abroad. Insha’Allah.

Gar Pardy is retired from the Foreign Service and comments on foreign and public policy issues from Ottawa.

Getting About in Bangladesh

by Christopher W. Westdal

“Driver, That Man Assaulting your Windscreen is the Canadian High Commissioner”

To disarm critics, I often allow that I enjoy living in Gulshan (Dhaka’s diplomatic oasis) because it is so close to Bangladesh, I can visit anytime.

I visited recently. On April 18, I visited an “eye camp” at Magura, 125 miles from Dhaka. I left the airport at 8:00 a.m. on Biman (“The more you fly Biman, the more you know Bangladesh”) flight 461 to Jessore. I thought it auspicious that in the departure lounge, the Civil Aviation Minister and the Managing Director of Biman, waiting to fly elsewhere, wished me bon voyage. I thought it appropriate that I replied that I was confident, as I was in such good hands.

Their send off was not auspicious. My reply was not appropriate.

The flight, by Fokker F-27, took 25 minutes. From Jessore, we drove an hour and a half back toward Dhaka to reach Magura. We were riding in one of those minivans which trap all available hot air and fail to circulate it. One of those minivans with shock absorbers designed for motorcycles, with horns designed for the deaf and apparently pointed inward, with seats made for midgets and seat cushions covered with grungy, skin-adhering black plastic, designed apparently to introduce buttocks to metal underframes from the first instant.

But we could bear an hour and a half, three hours in all, even though it was 103 degrees.

The eye camp was impressive. One hundred and twenty-eight cataracted eyeballs were cut open (three before my swooning eyes) to have their opaque lenses removed, all in one day, the second day of the week-long camp. (The rest of the week is spent preparing for and then recovering from the surgery.) On the seventh day, the camp is a scene of joy — sight, albeit initially murky, is returning to the blind. I was impressed by the efficiency of the operation, by the obvious dedication of the staff and the local community volunteers and by the productive working relations established with local upazila and union officials who had made available the primary school teachers’ training centre in which the camp was held, organized local volunteers and covered the cost of feeding the patients for the week. I was also impressed by the fact that for this upazila, according to its senior officer, the expenditure involved in holding the eye camp could not have been afforded in previous years; it was only possible now that, through General Ershad’s decentralization program, the government in Dhaka was providing larger annual grants to upazila councils.

“I turned ghostly pale . . .”

I was not impressed by the sense of timing of the press photographers there to record my historic visit — they began to take pictures about the same moment I turned ghostly pale, broke into a clammy sweat and stumbled as quickly as possible from the operating theatre where I had learned close-up rather more than I ever wanted to know about eye surgery.

The visit leads me to recommend that one looking for a good charity could do much worse than, say, Operation Eyesight Universal or the Royal Commonwealth Society for the Blind. These organizations perform miracles of pure unambiguous benefit to the blind, their families and their communities.

After the obligatory “light” lunch (warm Pepsi; 32 pounds of rice; eight curried triathlon-star chickens; four pounds of swimming lamb bones; a small pond of dal; one pound of “sweets”, well named) and the similarly obligatory “discussion” (eight eagerly silent local officials gathered around a High Commissioner with a rapidly exhausted supply of questions about eye camps and observations about eyes or other subjects at hand, none of which seems to elicit a hint of recognition or a shred of response) — after these ritualistic components of any field trip, we set out for Jessore, driving for one and a half hours, away from Dhaka.

The direct Jessore-Cannes and Jessore-San Francisco flights had apparently departed uneventfully and the next on the TV monitor, in fact the only flight listed on the monitor, was to Dhaka, flight 466, “On Time”. We said our farewells and passed through security to the departure lounge. We were soon rushed through to the VIP “Enclosure”, a small dark curtained chamber at the end of the lounge, abutting the washrooms. After a half hour, we were advised that the flight was “delayed”, the plane we were to fly had been held on the tarmac in Dhaka “by storms”. After an hour and a half, the reason changed to “mechanical difficulty”, but as this explanation was being offered the plane suddenly landed. Now the plane would “take off shortly”. Spirits revived. Another half hour in the enclosure . . . then a new “mechanical difficulty”. But they’re trying “to rent a Flying Club plane to bring spare parts”.

We should have ignored this gambit and set out for Dhaka by road then. Now the Flying Club plane is “unavailable”. Fifteen enclosed minutes later it is “non-operational”. Finally, at six o’clock, after three hours waiting, the truth is conceded. The flight is now officially “cancelled”. Biman will try again tomorrow morning. The dejected crowd spills out into suburban Jessore. Some will opt for a night at the ‘Metropolitan’, Jessore’s finest E-light (as they say there) hotel. Warned, we will not. We climb into the microwave-van and drive back toward Magura, the eye camp and then, an estimated six hours away, Dhaka. We’ll be home by midnight — “no problem” (as they also say here, though I’ve never known why).

The first three hours go well enough. The vehicle gives its victims an intimate introduction to the contours, all of the contours, of the surface of the road and the driver, anxious to please, ensures that this introduction is achieved as quickly and forcefully as possible, but the sunset is spectacular, the temperature is falling mercifully and we seem to be making good time.

“Spare part putting on”

Then there is a flat. “No problem; spare will be putting on”. Then the spare is flat. “No problem; spare fixing will be.” I’d never planned to become familiar with that particular bit of roadside, but I didn’t mind. The activities of dusk were relaxing and instructive to witness. Rickshaws being pulled slowly home. Labourers emptying the fields. A big broad skyfull of stars. And every so often, a thundering overloaded truck or bus or two bearing down fast to remove the bricks from all of us.

With speed I thought miraculous, the driver returned by rickshaw with an inflated spare. I did not ask to inspect its tread. Once it was “putting on”, we were under way anew.

The timing of our arrival at the first, short ferry at Daulatdia couldn’t have been better. The ferry was loaded and ready to go, with space left just enough for us. We crashed on — there is no other way — and congratulated ourselves on our good luck. The hour spent waiting for the spare would have had to be spent waiting for the ferry even if the tire hadn’t been flat going. The crossing was uneventful. We did not want our shoes shined. We did not want fruit juice from a pail, or ice cubes to chew, or watermelon or soup, or chandni-chawk (a tasty assortment of nuts, biscuit factory sweepings, bolts, bonebits, brown items and other chewables). We did not want our hair cut. We did not want to buy combs or hairpins or ballpoints.

After our supply of change and small notes had been exhausted, we played hide and seek among the vehicles with the ferry’s licensed supplicants, marvelling at the dramatic improvement in the mobility and depth perception of the halt, lame and blind which is apparently induced by the nearness of expatriates. Then came the ritual of ferry docking. First, the ferry crashed into the dock (day or night, wind or calm, rain or shine, the ferries here crash into the docks). Then the vehicles crash about on board amongst themselves and there is much frenzy with many more people than required offering instructions. Then the vehicles crash, one by one, onto the ramp and up through the cut in the bank to the road. Then there is a spell of general chaos as the road-bound vehicles fight their way through the closed ranks of their ferry-bound cousins. And then we’re back on the road again. It’s 10:30 p.m. We left Dhaka fourteen and a half hours ago.

After a four or five mile stretch of washboard on which our determined driver passes each of the vehicles which had preceded us off the ferry, a total of nine (I counted) terrifying overtakings, we arrive at Aricha Ghat to take our chances on a ferry across the Jamuna. (The driver’s recklessness was in vain. The first ferry had been last on — last off. This one, we learned many hours later, was first on (us) — last off (us again). But how was he to know? It differs every time. It depends on the nature of the crash with the dock and on which ramp cable or winches happen to have been destroyed recently).

We are greeted by bad news. There are no ferries on this side. Two are expected “soon” (a term I’ve learned to discredit here), but one will stay put for the night and the other will not leave until two in the morning. Further, what is normally a 30-minute crossing these days takes more than an hour because the ferry has to find its way through a maze of recently emerged dry-season sandbars.

Watching Ferries Wait

The prospect of spending three hours in what is fast becoming the middle of the night watching two ferries wait to cross the Jamuna prods me to action. I ask for the officer-in-charge. He is “bathroom going” but ten minutes later he appears, a swarthy brute who describes himself as the superintendent. I enquire how many trucks are waiting to cross. One hundred and twenty-six. Why is the second ferry going to wait until 2:00 a.m.? What business of mine is it? At this point our driver explains that, despite the decrepit van in which we have arrived, I am the Canadian High Commissioner. Well, the second ferry is reserved for night coaches . . . but, well, the superintendent has to check. He walks off into the night.

The superintendent returns to announce that the ferry will depart immediately. An immediate three-quarters of an hour later, the ritualistic cacaphony subsides and we are on board. I spend the hour of the crossing trying in vain to sleep. At one in the morning we arrive on the eastern shore. We are last off. We come to a halt halfway up the bank. Nothing moves. After a few minutes, this site’s supplicants discover me and line up outside the window. I have no taka. They will not leave. Nothing moves. My patience is . . . strained. I descend from the van and weave my way through the crowd to investigate. At the top of the bank I find an impasse. A Dhaka-bound bus and a ferry-bound truck have physically disputed the width of a passage between parked trucks and neither is backing down. And of course all the ferry-bound vehicles have closed in behind their contender as have the Dhaka-bound behind theirs. Gridlock. Pure middle-of-the-night-starlit-stupid-pigheaded-Aricha gridlock. There follows a brief bout of admirable diplomatic initiative.

18 Hours Later

The Canadian High Commissioner offers the bus driver a voluble piece of his mind while attempting physically to push the bus backward while the Bangladesh Director of the Royal Commonwealth Society for the Blind, my travelling companion on whom it is dawning that I am getting agitated, explains hurriedly to the driver that the Canadian High Commissioner, that frenzied soul assaulting his windscreen, is agitated.

The bus reverses. The grid unlocks. We hit the now empty road (a 1:00 a.m. to 5 a.m. curfew is in effect), talk our curfew pass-less way past two groups of skeptical policemen, and reach home at two in the morning, 18 hours after leaving.

Spending 18 hours doing 45 minutes work is useful once in a while. It reminds me and, through this account, others who need to remember that getting things done around here, making things work, or getting things built, or running large complex aid programs or just getting home from an eye-camp visit on a very beaten track like the road from Jessore to Dhaka, ain’t easy.

You may wonder how (and worry that) I find time to record these minor adventures in such detail. I wrote the first half of this letter at home by candlelight (power failure) waiting earlier this evening to be phoned by Burma Airways to be advised when they might imagine their flight to Rangoon might leave.

At the time of writing, Mr. Westdal was Canadian High Commissioner in Dhaka, where he served from 1982-85.

Pardy’s Corner:
The Commuter Marriage

by Laurel Pardy

Three of us sat warming in the spring sun, idly sorting through the shards of departmental gossip and family news.

“I heard Gordie was offered Ginawago,” offered Grace.

“He’ll turn it down. He and Willardson don’t get along,” countered Jeene.

“Kowpat is open. Mardien is coming out early. Gordie could go as number two,” I speculated.

The coffee cooled and the smoke curled as we turned this possibility into cud.

It was Grace who dropped the bombshell. “They offered us Jumpoff. Marco accepted. I’ve decided not to go.”

Caution and curiosity kept us silent. Not knowing why Grace had reached this decision, there didn’t seem to be anything appropriately neutral to say.

While waiting for Grace to offer some explanation for this state of affairs, my mind turned back a quarter of a century to when work and study had forced me into a long distance relationship.

Long distance loving — the wrench of partings, the passion of reunions, the agony of waiting for letters. I remembered wryly the night I broke my toe on the door jamb as I rushed to a 2 a.m. phone call and the anxious, dangerous drive over the icy airport road before I could throw myself into his arms.

That is the stuff of young lovers, not staid middle-aged married ladies. Marriage was supposed to do more than cut down the phone bill; it was to allow us to share our lives together and fulfil those “whither thou goest” vows.

What had happened to make voluntary separation a serious option when confronted with a foreign service posting?

Grace explained her reasons.

“My oldest boy starts university in September, my daughter is about to produce my first grandchild, and Marc Jr. has one more year of high school. Besides, they offered me the position of buyer for all three stores come July. I can’t turn it down.

“Marco retires in five years but I can work another ten. If I quit now . . .”

We nodded our heads in understanding and commiseration.

No longer is this dilemma the purview of “career-oriented younger spouses”, fresh out of university and disciples of the feminist movement. As the posting season wends its inexorable way through the spring calendar, more than a few of the “older wives” will also be considering commuter marriage as a serious option.

There are as many reasons as there are commuter couples. Conflicting career commitments, child care and education requirements, medical reasons. More recently for the middle-aged middle class, there is fear for a financially secure future. Pensions are proving not to be enough, marriages are ending after decades of apparent solidity, education and medical costs are rising, facilities for the elderly are scarce and of uncertain quality, widows are on welfare after years of comfortable living.

Being half a separated couple is worse than being single. When separated, each partner becomes, in effect, single without the rights and privileges pertaining thereto. If one of the partners has the care of the children, they become, in addition, a single parent with all those trials and responsibilities.

No one wants to make this decision. It is fraught with risk for the relationship. I feel that anyone making it must be able to answer, “Yes,” to the question, “Is my staying here more important than my marriage?”

Is there any way to avoid some of the pitfalls of separation? A search of some of the available literature on commuter marriages turned up some trends, if not any solid statistics.

There seem to be some factors that increase the success rate of long distance relationships. The more of these indicators for success that exist in a commuter arrangement, the better the prognosis.

Some of the positive factors are:

mutual agreement that the reason for the separation is valid

a shared reason for separation, for example, child care

that it is the only satisfactory solution available

that the separation is a temporary situation which will be followed by a life together

that both partners continue to regard this as their primary relationship and find it adequte to their needs

when both remain satisfied with the situation and the reasons for its existence (frequent, honest reassessment)

when no children are involved

when the distance between the partners is not too great, for example, Ottawa-New York is better than Ottawa-Lima

frequent reunions, phone calls and a continuance of courtship patterns (remembering special dates, gifts, love letters, etc.)

Long distance relationships in the foreign service have to defy several of the general predictors for success. The channels for physical reunion, voice communication and other tangible means of continuing the relationship remain limited by long distances and high costs.

Another difference for foreign service people is that it is not a traditional part of the career and no protocols have been established for managing it. For example, the family support network that kicks into gear for military spouses does not exist. In fact, this has been one of the unresolved conundrums within the foreign service for years — how to get all the benefits of a paternalistic service without the restrictions.

To be classed as a viable option for foreign service people the outcome would have to be an employee who remains rotational and a relationship that continues.

I suspect that commuter marriage as a long term answer to the difficulties of foreign service life is probably short lived, at least to the individuals involved. It is such an imminently awful solution that most people will try it only once.

But the numbers who try it are on the increase.

At the time of writing, Laurel Pardy was a writer, married to Foreign Service officer Gar Pardy.

Baghdad: Life in a War Zone

by Erik Wang

[picture]

Staff of Canadian Embassy, Baghdad, November, 1987.

“This isn’t our war — should we really be here?” The question was voiced by an Embassy staff member one morning last March after an Iranian missile had struck our residential neighborhood about 500 meters from the chancery, demolishing five villas and killing eleven Iraqi residents. It was a question we couldn’t help asking ourselves from time to time as the war between Iran and Iraq intensified into the “war of the cities”, with repeated missile attacks on Baghdad and Tehran.

In August, the two exhausted belligerents agreed to a UN-brokered cease-fire and to negotiations towards a peaceful settlement under the auspices of the Secretary-General. After eight years of war, Iraqis greeted the cease-fire with spontaneous celebrations, singing and dancing in the streets, fireworks and feu de joie from the multitude of weapons, big and small, which had become such a normal feature of life in Iraq.

For much of the war, visitors to Baghdad were often struck by a sense of normalcy.

The sense of relief was fully shared by foreigners in Baghdad. They had also shared with the local population some of the risks and privations through the darker days of the war.

How did the war affect our day-to-day life in the Canadian Embassy?

For much of the war, visitors to Baghdad were often struck by a sense of normalcy. The city of 4½ million inhabitants went about its business without disruption, at least on the surface. Buses ran; trains and planes arrived and departed. Businessmen came and went. The Baghdad International Trade Fair was held annually with only slightly diminished participation by countries and firms, including many Canadian firms, determined to maintain a presence for the longer haul in the potentially rich Iraqi market. The Iraqi authorities made every effort to maintain a “business as usual” atmosphere in spite of the constraints of the war effort, which absorbed the bulk of Iraqi manpower and foreign exchange earnings.

Concerts and poetry festivals were staged; major development projects moved forward.

At the same time, however, there were frequent reminders that Iraq was at war. Poets from around the world (including six Canadian poets) who gathered in Baghdad for the Mirbed Poetry Festival last year were rudely awakened one night shortly after their arrival by a missile striking the bank of the Tigris river a few hundred meters from their hotel. Some left on the next flight home. Most reacted in accordance with the dictum: there is nothing as exhilarating as the sensation of being fired at and not being hit. Canadian poet Henry Beissel was inspired to take pen in hand and compose a lyrical tribute to the courage and steadfastness of the ordinary Iraqi.

Our locally-engaged staff felt the full, sometimes devastating impact of the war.

The war intruded on daily life in less dramatic ways. The local economy was severely stretched and food supplies were frequently scarce, with priority for the one million Iraqi men under arms. For a few weeks, butter might disappear from the market. Then, no potatoes; and after they reappeared, suddenly, no tomatoes. There was no rationing system and the shortages were usually brief but unpredictable. As a result, one kept one’s larder full and depended heavily on periodic orders from the freeport in Copenhagen. Periodic visits to nearby Kuwait — a difficult eight-hour drive past the war zone by Basra and across the desert — were joyful occasions to stock up on all the consumer goods unavailable in Baghdad. The Canadian Embassy staff in Kuwait won our affection and gratitude for their unfailing support on our shopping expeditions.

The war inevitably meant restrictions on movement. Embassy staff had to apply for permission from the Foreign Ministry four days in advance in order to travel outside of Baghdad. Routes were prescribed and many areas were closed to foreigners including, of course, the front with Iran, as well as large areas of the mountains in the north where Kurdish guerrillas were active.

On one occasion, I had obtained permission to visit Erbil, the capital of the Kurdish Autonomous Region of Iraq to call on the Governor and other officials. While travelling by car accompanied by my daughter and driver, I was stopped at one of the numerous military check-points and told that I would need additional military escort for the last hundred or so kilometers in to Erbil. After a few minutes, an escort formed up ahead of and behind my car. With progressive reinforcements en route, by the time we arrived in Erbil, we were being protected by 54 battle-ready Iraqi troops riding in three trucks, three jeeps with heavy machine guns and one armoured personnel carrier. They were on full alert. The escort officer, a young Lieutenant, apologized for the inconvenience and explained that (unknown to us) Kurdish insurgents, backed by Iran, had ambushed a convoy on this road the previous day and killed eleven Iraqi soldiers. He said he had received “strict instructions not to lose the Ambassador and his daughter”.

One became accustomed to the presence of soldiers on guard duty throughout Baghdad, at the ready with their Kalashnikovs in front of major public buildings and outside embassies and residences. They were well disciplined, and incidents seemed to be rare, but it was clear that these weapons were for use, not decoration. From time to time, the military set up check-points on major thoroughfares to look for deserters or draft evaders. On one occasion, our registry clerk happened to be walking through a populous shopping area not far from the chancery when gunfire erupted from a check-point. A young man in civies came running along at top speed, weaving in and out of shoppers, with two soldiers in hot pursuit with guns blazing. Luckily, no one was hit and when the fugitive ducked down a side alley, people picked themselves up from the sidewalk and continued on their way largely unperturbed.

From time to time, the Foreign Ministry organized diplomatic outings for heads of mission and wives. They were always accompanied by heavy security. On one occasion during a parade and folk festival in the town of Baquba, the corps was seated in the reviewing stands when terrorists attacked the Iraqi Governor and associated Baath Party dignitaries in the adjoining stand. Bullets flew in all directions as Iraqi soldiers returned the fire, and participants took refuge under seats and behind pillars. A number of by-standers were killed in the cross-fire. The assembled officials and diplomats escaped with bruised shins and injured pride.

Tight censorship and war-time restrictions imposed on information had an inhibiting effect on our contacts with ordinary Iraqis, who were generally discouraged from mixing with foreigners. Officials were discouraged from accepting diplomatic hospitality except when approved on a selective basis for official purposes. Concern about security sometimes went to extreme lengths: there was no information published about the weather in the Government-controlled media. Such information might be of some use to the enemy. News from the front and outside world was carefully filtered in accordance with the government’s perception of its possible impact on public morale and the war effort. Foreign magazines and newspapers were unavailable locally and our subscriptions arrived anywhere from one to three weeks late. We depended heavily on short-wave broadcasts from the BBC, Voice of America or the CBC, when we could bring it in.

In spite of this restrictive climate, all Canadians in Iraq could cite instances of the kindness and friendship of individual Iraqis. I travelled as much as I could throughout Iraq to gain a better understanding of its culture, problems and potentialities. I was invariably received and welcomed in the best traditions of Arab hospitality.

Our locally-engaged staff felt the full, sometimes devastating impact of the war. From the early years of the war, the men of prime military age had departed into the army, some never to return. All members of our dedicated local staff of twenty-two had sons, relatives or friends at the front. There were heart-breaking moments when we grieved with them on the loss of a loved one. News of a major offensive would always cast a shadow of apprehension.

Windows were blown out of several
of our staff quarters.

Baghdad was only 110 kilometers from the front lines to the east. On still nights, when conditions were right, one could sometimes hear the faint rumble of artillery to the east. There were Iranian air raids on Baghdad in the early years of the war, but as Iraqi air defenses became stronger, and as the Iranian air force ran out of spare parts for their American-made aircraft, these became rare in later years. It was the missile which brought the war to Baghdad and Tehran in a very emphatic way.

The “war of the cities” consisted of sporadic bouts of missile bombardment on capitals and other major cities. Up until the beginning of this year, it was a one-sided affair, to Baghdad’s disadvantage. From 1983, Iran had struck intermittently at Baghdad with a medium range missile of Soviet origin known as the “Scud-B”, thought to be of 1950’s vintage and to have been acquired by Iran second or third hand from Libya or Syria. Although Iraq also had the Scud-B in its inventory, Tehran was beyond range of this missile.

The Scud-B was originally designed for use with a nuclear warhead in circumstances where it did not need to be particularly accurate to achieve its purpose. Given this inaccuracy, probably compounded by its somewhat shop-worn history, it was difficult for us to discern any clear targeting pattern or to predict where the next one might strike. They tended largely to fall in the south-east quadrant of the city where there were oil refineries and military camps as well as residential areas. There were, however, unsettling exceptions, and clearly no neighbourhood was immune to attack. Most Embassy staffs lived and had their chanceries in the central or (in the case of Canada and others) western part of the city. The missiles fell usually late at night, presumably because the Iranians preferred to bring them out of safe-keeping for the launching procedures under cover of darkness. Because the Iranians seemed to have limited stocks and few launchers, we rarely received more than one missile on any one night. After a few days or weeks, there would be a pause or moratorium of weeks or months before they resumed. The thundering impact of several hundred kilos of high explosives could be heard throughout Baghdad but unless one was unlucky enough to be at the point of impact or within fifty meters, one could roll over and go back to sleep.

Most Embassies felt that, at this tempo, the risks were tolerable. The East Europeans had a policy of not posting staff with children to Baghdad during the last three years of the war. Otherwise, it was largely business as usual in the diplomatic corps, enlivened from time to time during missile bouts by active consultations as to whether any particularly threatening pattern was developing.

The lack of symmetry in missile capabilities was finally overcome by Iraq when it was able to produce and unleash, at the end of February 1988, a longer range modified version of the Scud-B capable of reaching Tehran. During the period of seven weeks between February 28 and April 19, Baghdad and Tehran experienced missile exchanges of unprecedented intensity. Thirty-eight fell on Baghdad during this period, often two or three per day, while three times as many fell on Tehran and other Iranian cities. In Baghdad, several Embassies including the Canadian, had near misses. Windows were blown out of several of our staff quarters. The wife of our communicator escaped serious injury, or worse, thanks to the protective film and blast curtains which the Department had authorized us to install on all windows of our chancery and staff quarters. A large picture window shattered and collapsed into the room in which she was standing, but the film and curtains held.

The Canadian Embassy, like other embassies, had temporary and partial evacuation measures in place, including “safe-haven” bungalows rented for our staff in a tourist village one hundred kilometers west of Baghdad, beyond Scud-B range. In close consultation with Ottawa, we trimmed down our personnel and dependents to the extent possible, while maintaining basic consular and other Embassy services. Many foreign companies evacuated their personnel to camps outside of Baghdad or to Jordan or other neighboring countries, or brought them home on extended leave. Most western airlines suspended services to Baghdad. Tensions were mounting and a number of embassies were actively considering total evacuation when, after 52 days of intermittent missile attacks, Iraq and Iran decided to accept an undeclared moratorium on the war of the cities. Fortunately, no diplomatic personnel had been killed or injured. There had been a tragic toll of casualties amongst Iraqi (and Iranian) civilians. Four months later, Iraq and Iran accepted the UN cease-fire.

At the time of the cease-fire, we were down to a modest community of sixty-one Canadian souls in Iraq, including 20 staff and dependents at the Embassy. Our community had been shrinking gradually through the war years, as the economy went more and more onto a war footing. Several Canadian companies, including Bell Canada International and General Motors of Canada, maintained throughout at least a minimum presence.

Iraq has now embarked on an ambitious program of post-war reconstruction and development. Canadians familiar with the market will be well positioned to participate in an economy which has enormous underlying strength and resilience, based on rich oil reserves. If the cease-fire with Iran can be converted into a durable and comprehensive peace, the future prospects for Iraq should be glittering.

This is part of the answer to the question: “Should we really be here?” Canadian businessmen depended heavily on Embassy support and assistance in their dealings with Iraqi state enterprises through these years. Not only in terms of trade potential but also taking into account Iraq’s important place in the Arab world and vital role in regional stability, it seemed very much in Canada’s interest to continue to maintain that presence. All Canadians who served in the Canadian Embassy in Baghdad through difficult times over the past eight years can take satisfaction from knowing that they contributed to that objective.

Erik Wang was Canadian Ambassador in Baghdad from 1986 to 1988. At the time of writing, he was Inspector General with the Department of External Affairs. Erik Wang passed away in 2012.

What I Have Learned
about Washington

by Allan Gotlieb

The following speech was given to the National Press Club in Washington on December 20, 1988, just before Mr. Gotlieb ended his 7 year assignment as Canada’s Ambassador to the United States.

A Washington insider defined what it takes to be a successful diplomat here these days. He said a diplomat needs to be one part pundit, one part lobbyist and one part saloon-keeper. He argued that, while diplomats are paid to carry out all three of these functions, it was really only the last one for which they were appreciated locally. I have spent seven years now at the intersection of Canadian and American affairs, the cross-roads of Interdependence A venue and Indifference Street. To keep traffic moving through this thoroughfare, I have had to learn some new rules about diplomacy. What I learned are the following propositions on the really NEW diplomacy as practised in Washington.

Proposition Number One

The exercise of political power in Washington is so extraordinarily complex that the only way one can understand or describe it is through a metaphor. Everyone has his own. This is mine.

Imagine RFK Stadium. Only imagine also that the field is a magnetic field. Each player is an atom or unit and carries an electrical charge. All of the particles are moving about, seemingly at random. Some particles have more power than others, but all have some. Some particles attract. Others repel. The field is full of players, hundreds of them, thousands of them. Several teams take the field at a time, several kinds of games are in play at once, players from one team, without changing uniforms, occasionally play for another. There are no referees. The cheerleaders, dressed in power suits and Gucci loafers, send in plays from the sidelines. Political Action Committees, (PACs), dressed as trainers, dispense the steroids of modern politics - money- to the players on all sides. Meanwhile, the crowd’s attention is riveted on the media, not the field. The media sometimes describe what happens on the field, sometimes play their own games.

Who are the particles? First the President, the Cabinet, the 4000 political appointments made direct by the President and the 350,000 federal civil servants. Then the 535 Members of Congress, the 18,800 Congressional staffers, the 47,834 lawyers, the employees of the 11,000 associations and seventy-five think tanks located in Washington, the 4,196 PA Cs, the 9127 lobbyists who have registered in the last year, the 18,348 lobbyists who have not registered in two years and last, but not least, the 4,326 journalists located here - a cozy community of some half a million people, all shooting off electrical power charges. The biggest charge is given off by the President. But there are many other particles of heavy voltage in the game - the House Speaker, the Senate Majority Leader, the Secretary of State, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, the committee chairmen, the subcommittee chairmen, the principal staffers and so on. Occasionally the power-particles form into large harmonious patterns. Other times, the field becomes one huge supercollider. It is the modern diplomat’s job to identify the particles whose charge can affect his country’s interest, develop a healthy respect for each and all of them, connect with them and then try to align them in such a way as to make them as benign as possible.

Proposition Number Two

The United States is the only country that has two executive branches of government.

Whatever the Constitution says about the doctrine of the separation of powers, the reality is that power is not separated but shared, and shared more or less evenly, depending upon the popularity of the President himself, the size of his electoral margin, the length of his coattails, if any, and so on. After the U.S. election, the media were full of punditry about the President-elect’s lack of mandate. At the same time, paradoxically, the media were also saying that both the President and the Congress had their own, quite distinct, mandates. Liberalism and conservatism had both won. You will appreciate that many foreign diplomats found all this perplexing. Imagine the difficulty their governments, and their peoples, at home, had in fathoming it. But it all becomes clear when you see that in the United States, you elect two executive branches. Here, as in other countries, the executive proposes and the legislature disposes. But here, often, the Congress proposes as well as disposes.

Proposition Number Three

To find the true locus of power, look to the Chairman of the Congressional Committees and Subcommittees. If a Chairman is astute enough and persistent enough, he or she can write the law of the land.

The Presidency of the United States is, of course, a uniquely powerful institution. On the cosmic issues of the age - war and peace, hunger and pestilence, - the President personifies the power of America and exercises it, assuming that a measure of consensus exists among Americans on the issue in question. But on the less cosmic issues, the real bread and butter of politics, foreign ambassadors soon learn that to perceive the exercise of power clearly, you need a microscope, not a telescope. Washington is full of the lore of the powerful Congressional bosses. Buildings bear enduring witness to the power they had-the Rayburn Building, the Cannon Building, the Hart Building.

But, what some diplomats miss is that the Congress has transformed itself. The reforms of the seniority system, the impact of television and the explosion of PA Cs and private funding have had the effect of decentralizing power in both Chambers. These changes have also had the effect of making the Senate the cockpit of democracy and the House, the body of sober second thought. If you are worried about the control - or decontrol -of pipelines or of gas, for example, go right to the focal point of political power, the Chairman of the relevant Congressional Committee or Subcommittee or to his staffer.

Proposition Number Four

In Washington, a foreign government is a special interest, and not a very special one at that.

Returning to the metaphor of the playing field, a foreign diplomat is not some distinguished invited guest, with seats in the stands, looking down at the play. A diplomat, instead, is one of the particles on the field and not one of the bigger ones. He carries no great electrical charge. A diplomat has no votes to deliver. Nor can he contribute financially to his favourite team. He can hire veterans of the game to guide him in its complexities. But, in the end, if he is to do his job, he must go out on the field and play the game himself.

For example, in the dying hours of the 100th Congress, the legislature was working on the Omnibus Drug Bill. It was a bill whose goals we fully endorsed. We are concerned in Canada about drug abuse and have our own strategy to counter it. But there were some elements of the bill that caused us serious difficulties. Essentially, the bill tried to impose U.S. regulations on Canadians in Canada, for example, by requiring Canadian contractors doing business with the U.S. government to meet U.S. regulations for drug-free workplaces. We sympathized with the goals of the bill, I repeat, but we did not think it appropriate that the U.S. Congress legislate for us, extraterritorially, on how to handle the problem.

We took our problem to the State Department. State referred us to the Department of Transportation. DOT gave us a good hearing. They sympathized and acknowledged that we had a problem. They agreed to help, but they also had some serious problems of their own with other parts of the bill. Effectively, our number one priority was their number ten priority. We could either rest on tradition and propriety and risk seeing our interests being damaged. Or we could go out on the field to protect them. It was not a difficult decision. We had to go out on the field ourselves.

But, as soon as we did so, we were surrounded by the swirl of battle. We made our case to sympathetic players wherever we could find them. Some did not want to hear what we wanted to say, although all listened courteously. Most recognized we had a problem. But, as we were to discover, few were playing the same game we were playing. Ultimately, and with difficulty, we did succeed in finding the players with their hands on the right ball. They took our point and drafted the relevant parts of the bill in such a way as to preserve the bill’s objectives while meeting our legitimate concerns. It was a fairly happy ending. But had we stuck to traditional diplomacy, the outcome would have been a lot less happy, for both sides.

Proposition Number Five

U.S. domestic policy is often more important to foreign governments than U.S. foreign policy.

As much as any other single factor, this proposition explains why diplomats are found wandering the further reaches of the Administration and all over Capitol Hill. This is, obviously, more true for this country’s nearest neighbours but it is also true, in varying degrees, for many others. It is obvious that U.S. fiscal policy and its eventual impact on the dollar would be of interest to every country. Less obvious is the fact that other U.S. domestic policies are also of extreme interest and relevance, such as transportation deregulation, uranium enrichment programs, interstate banking law, environmental regulations, securities regulations, gas pipeline regulation, even oil drilling in national parks.

The choices facing a diplomat are stark. Lobby on these issues and you may well be accused of interference in U.S. domestic affairs - a big diplomatic no-no, by the usual reading of the Vienna Convention. Or don’t lobby, and see your country’s interests suffer. Machiavelli and Palmerston and Metternich would scarcely recognize the practice of this type of diplomacy. Nor, for that matter, probably, would even George C. Marshall, John Foster Dulles or Dean Rusk.

Acid rain is another example. For several years now, the debate has raged. The game has been centred in the Congress which has been trying to revise domestic clean air legislation. The whole context of this activity has been domestic. The debate is over which region of the country will pay for what reduction in S02 emissions. It is handled almost exclusively as a domestic, regional conflict.

But if U.S. air is cleaned up as a result of domestic legislation, foreign air – Canadian air - is a major beneficiary. Pollution does not respect boundaries. Nor does clean air.

Nor can diplomats. Probably a day does not go by when I or my colleagues do not discuss this issue with Congressmen, or staffers, or interest groups, or the Administration. More often than not, we talk to all of them. Always we press our interlocutors for action. No other field of public policy in which I have been active has been so controversial. Testimonials to my wisdom lie side by side in the Congressional Record with censures of my interference, including one Congressman’s request for my recall. Meantime, back in Canada, the Government is excoriated for its impotence and I am criticized for reluctance to work the U.S. system. How the U.S. acts on this problem is, of course, of direct and significant interest to Canada. Were I to observe antique diplomatic niceties, I would not be doing my job.

The fact is, these days, the flip side of one country’s domestic issue is another country’s foreign policy. In such circumstances, there no longer is any discernible line between domestic and foreign affairs.

Proposition Number Six

It’s never over till it’s over and, in the U.S. system of government, it’s never over.

This proposition, otherwise known as “the Yogi Berra insight” means that there are no final decisions. Defeat, delay, reorganization and re-engagement are intrinsic to, not to say endemic in, the power games on the broad field of action. Particles collide, reform, re-align themselves and collide again. The particles are never in repose, never at rest. How many times have I proclaimed victory in a fight to save a particular product, e.g. softwood lumber or fish or steel, only to find the fight was not over. A particularly good example of this peculiarly Washington reality occurred in Canada’s attempts to safeguard the use of asbestos for some, safe, applications.

The story began in the early 1980’s. At the time, EPA was the lead agency and it wanted to ban asbestos outright. We agreed that asbestos did present severe health hazards in some applications but we were adamant that it was not unsafe in all applications. Canadian industry hired a very high priced lobbyist who devised a strategy for them. This strategy eventually paid off. Canadian asbestos producers celebrated. Too soon, Congress intervened, the regulatory agencies regrouped and the decision was reversed. Those who favoured an outright ban celebrated. Too soon, again. Other power particles invaded the field and deadlock ensued. Five years later the battle is still going on. Perhaps the only clear winner has been the lobbying firm. They keep on celebrating.

Proposition Number Seven

Alliances must be built issue by issue. Or, in Washington, countries have no permanent friends, only periodic allies.

With the possible exception of Israel, no country can count on friends in the U.S. Congress to protect it from harm. Even Israel has been surprised recently. But remember the Yogi Berra insight. On a given CanadaU.S. issue, for example, uranium imports, I go to see numerous Senators and Congressmen. I can describe one such Congressman - a composite of my imagining. Typically, when I call on him, he tells me his great-grandmother was a Canadian; he still has cousins in Canada; he spends a week or two at a northern lake each year, if he can. He even has a little Canadian flag in his office. On acid rain, we have no firmer ally. He loves Canada. But when I try to talk to him about uranium, forget it. He wants to have his yellow cake and eat it, too. His constituents’ interests come first, last and always.

While this composite describes a fictional Congressman, there are scores of real life examples. Persuasion is utterly impossible in circumstances where a Congressman’s choice is between his constituents and mine. The game has to be played differently. We assess who, in Congress, wins and loses if, for example, uranium quotas are imposed. We try to identify Congressmen whose constituents’ interests dovetail with our own and to work with those people. Sometimes we prevail; sometimes we don’t. And, in our case, the stakes are often enormous.

Lobbying by foreign governments on an issue by issue, ad hoc, basis is a long, difficult and, ultimately, quite unpredictable business. This uncertainty was one of the reasons Canada wanted a bilateral free trade agreement with the USA.

Proposition Number Eight

Institutionalization in bilateral relations is an idea whose time has come.

I used to share what was a widely held view in Canada that institutionalization of relations between Canada and the United States was not a good thing. It implied, somehow, a constraint on the political handling of disputes, a bar to the injection of the political impulse. Mark me down as a convert. Institutionalization is perhaps the best way open to foreign governments to get the power particles in Washington to align themselves long enough to get some things done. Here I am thinking of regular formal meetings of Heads of State, Foreign Ministers and so on.

Institutionalization in the form of the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the United States will take some contentious trade issues out of the middle of the field and put them into a more quiet corner. The issues will remain part of the Washington power game. But, removed from the game’s hurlyburly, binational panels and commissions will, we hope, deal with problems that arise between us in a calm, more predictable and, to the extent possible, apolitical way. Bringing the rule of law to an otherwise powerbased bilateral trade relationship is obviously of special interest to the smaller country.

Proposition Number Nine

Every country is famous for 15 minutes.

It is a fact that one of the groups of particles on the Washington power field that foreign governments must address is the media, print or electronic. A diplomat must recognize that the media are powerful particles in the U.S. process. They are, also, permanent, a quality they share only with the House of Representatives. When the media come onto the field of action, they influence and sometimes even determine the U.S. national agenda. Sometimes they are active participants in it. So an Ambassador cannot do his job without focussing on them. There are hundreds and hundreds of media stars in the game - a thousand points of blight, as it were.

And as with politicians, there is not much that diplomats can give the media stars, beyond helping them to validate their celebrity. On the scale of independent-mindedness, moreover, reporters are exceeded only by statisticians. Consequently, foreign governments don’t get far in charming them. And it is usually feast or famine, so far as coverage is concerned. And when the media do interest themselves in events abroad, they do so from the American angle. Earthquakes and typhoons possibly excepted, it is not what is happening abroad that interests the U.S. media the most, but how those events affect the U.S. agenda.

A good example is the recent Canadian election. This year there was an unprecedented amount of coverage of the Canadian elections. This was not, however, because of some touching, fraternal interest in the democratic processes in the Great White North. Nor was it because of a sudden attack of conscience after years of neglect. It was because the Canadian election affected the U.S. agenda. The central issue of the Canadian election was a decision on the nature of our relationship with the USA. That is what provided Americans with the essential point of reference.

Now that the Canadian election is over, and the outcome was benign, Canada is, once again, erased from the media mind. It is the journalistic equivalent of a computer virus. Every time you meet a foreign country, your monitors are empty. “No country is so provincial” to quote Gunnar Myrdal in another context, “as a large country”.

Proposition Number Ten

To succeed, you have to excel at the power game. Or, that’s entertainment!

I started by saying the Washington field of action is infinitely complex. There is a lot at stake in the games that are, at best, imperfectly understood. The key is to get to know as many players as quickly as possible. Doing so is not easy. No one has a lifetime to form friendships. Patience is not its own reward. Nor is liquor necessarily quicker. Diplomats do not keep saloons. If they are smart, they keep salons.

How do you get your phone calls returned if you are unknown to the players? What do you do if you are not married to a columnist of the Washington Post? How do you carry conviction with your interlocutors if they have no knowledge of your credibility?

Friendships and relationships of common interest and trust are forged through socializing. This means when issues come to the crunch, an Ambassador has his phone calls returned. It also gives him the opportunity to pre-brief key figures so that those 2:00 a.m. Congressional decisions are reached in the knowledge of the interests of his country. It is also true that, in Washington, gossip is not gossip. It’s intelligence!

In conclusion, there is one over-arching piece of advice I would give to my newly arriving foreign counterparts. “If you want to be a successful diplomat in Washington, forget what you have ever learned about traditional diplomacy. Get up, get out on the field, and play the American game.” And remember - there is no friendlier people anywhere than the American people, none warmer, none more open, more hospitable, more fair-minded. Count yourself fortunate to be here and savour every moment of it.

Allan Gotlieb was Canadian Ambassador in Washington from 1981 to 1988. After joining the foreign service in 1957, he served abroad in Geneva. Subsequently, he was head of the Legal Division of the Department of External Affairs and Under-Secretary of State for External Affairs after having served as Deputy Minister of Communications and Manpower and Immigration. At the time of writing, he was chairman of the Canada Council as well as council for Stikeman Elliott in Toronto, Ontario.

Pictures from a Soviet Exhibition

by Geoffrey Pearson

[picture]

Author, fourth from the left, accompanying Canadian parliamentarians in their meeting with rising star - Mikhael Gorbachev, August 1983.

As Russia struggles to build a democratic system, images of the former, communist system are recalled or invented to justify new or old approaches. Gorbachev called the Brezhnev era a period of stagnation and corruption, but he did not question Marxist doctrine. Western observers then and now mostly believed that the doctrine led inevitably to bureaucratic tyranny and imperial outreach. Russian nationalists, on the other hand, look back with pride at Soviet authority and the fear it inspired abroad. Missing from these images are the people who were there, the rulers and the ruled. My own experience in the USSR before and after the death of Brezhnev in 1982 left me with a sense that Tolstoy and Gogol were better guides to life in that vast and varied empire than were Sovietologists. Both communism and capitalism are Western constructs that the Russians assimilate to their own experience of order and freedom, and so they will deal with democracy. What counts is security and the opportunity to do as well as the climate, both physical and political, will allow.

Tolstoy and Gogol were better guides to life in that vast and varied empire than were Sovietologists.

Certainly, there were true believers in the goals of communist doctrine, but they mostly contented themselves with implausible explanations of why these goals had not yet been met, explanations which few citizens appeared to take seriously. Public and private life were two different worlds, as our Russian cook admitted to us after one of her monthly meetings with the people who wanted to know what kind of household we were running. It was none of their business, she implied. We detected some common and genuine emotions, however — pride in Soviet military power (until Afghanistan), fear of a new war, and envy of Western standards of living. Humour salted the daily barrage of propaganda, although no-one dared attack the rulers by name. The Western image of an aggressive and reckless people out to conquer the earth seemed to me to be a caricature equal to that of the Pravda cartoons of Uncle Sam ready to pounce on Mother Russia.

No doubt these and like questions will be raised as historians ponder the late Soviet years and why the whole edifice collapsed as soon as Gorbachev began to tinker with the foundations. In the meanwhile, here are some sketches of those in power as I went about my diplomatic rounds.

Leonid Brezhnev:

I first met Brezhnev in 1966 while in Moscow with an official delegation. He had been two years in power as the First Secretary of the Party, and was full of vigour and self-confidence, expensively dressed with a gold lighter in hand. The contrast with his unkempt and impetuous predecessor, Khruschev, impressed us. I did not meet him again until November 7, 1982 at the Soviet national day reception, five days before he died. He was barely able to stand, and very red in the face. As I filed by with my fellow Ambassadors, and when he heard the word “Canada” from the Chief of Protocol, he looked at me vacantly and murmured, “Trudeau”. It was a sad, but perhaps appropriate ending to the Brezhnev era that, at his funeral, the coffin slipped and tumbled into the grave as the assembled heads of state and government looked on, Mr. Trudeau amongst them.

Andrei Gromyko:

Andrei Gromyko had been Foreign Minister for 23 years in 1980 and I expected a short, pro forma interview when I entered his office on the seventh floor of the Stalin-era building which housed the Ministry (the same floor that the Secretary of State occupied in Washington — a coincidence?). Not at all. After the usual preliminaries, I reminded him that Canada was still seeking compensation for the damage caused by the fall of a Soviet satellite in the Canadian north a year or two earlier. He professed ignorance of the subject and said he would look into it. To my surprise he then began to reminisce about how he had learned to speak English after I had remarked on his command of the language. He had studied English as a student at an agricultural college in Minsk and had been able to improve his knowledge when he went to Washington during the war. He had been stumped, however, when President Roosevelt used the word “discombobulate” at a meeting in the White House and had had to consult the Random House dictionary which he kept on a stand in his office before reporting the comment to Moscow. He told one or two other stories in this vein and I feared that my demarche about the satellite would be forgotten. But a few weeks later, agreement was reached on a settlement of the Canadian claim. Although I seldom saw Gromyko again (some Ambassadors spent years in Moscow without ever being in his office), I continued to regard him with respect. He was a man of his word, despite his ignorance of “discombobulate”.

Mikhail Gorbachev:

Gorbachev was a rising star in 1983 as I completed by stay in Moscow, the youngest member of the Politburo by several years and a possible successor to Andropov, the ailing General Secretary who had succeeded Brezhnev. Accordingly, his visit to Canada in May of that year was an important event and, while I did not accompany him, I had several meetings with him before and afterwards. His portfolio was agriculture, but unlike most of his colleagues, except Gromyko, he was ready to discuss any and all subjects without referring to notes or surrounding himself with a coterie of advisers. I recall two occasions in particular. At the airport on his return from Canada he made a brief speech to those assembled to meet him, inserting a joking reference to one member of the party who had stayed in Canada to pursue opportunities for increased trade. He hoped, Gorbachev said, that his colleague would not be persuaded to defect. This sally produced a nervous silence from his audience and then, as the great man smiled, a spate of hollow laughter. Was it a coincidence that a year or so later this same official was jailed for corruption?

His visit to Canada, I am convinced,
was a turning point in his career.

The second occasion was a meeting with a delegation of Canadian parliamentarians, who had no sooner taken their seats than Gorbachev launched into a fifty minute speech on the state of the Soviet economy. Later, in response to a question about east-west relations, he talked about the war when, as a boy of ten, he had had to cope on the farm after his father was wounded in the battle of Kursk. Gorbachev spoke to visitors in direct and simple language, conveying that air of authority and self-confidence that is the mark of leadership. His visit to Canada, I am convinced, was a turning point in his career, helping him to define the policies two years later that led to the end of the Cold War.

A.V. Romanov:

Gorbachev was a striking contrast with A.V. Romanov, the Leningrad Party boss who was also amongst the group of younger leaders thought to have a good chance at the Party leadership (in fact, it was the 72 year-old Chernenko, a Brezhnev crony, who succeeded Andropov in 1984 only to die in office a year later). It was not easy for Ambassadors to meet the regional Party leaders, but Romanov was an exception. He received me in the historic Smolny Institute, Party headquarters since 1918, seated at an immensely long table in a room of ball-room size. At his side was the mayor of the city, himself a future member of the Politburo, but allowed to say little in the presence of the boss. Seated along the wall behind him were ten or so men who reminded me of the henchmen I had seen in gangster films.

I learned nothing new about Soviet policies from Romanov, who read a prepared speech, but he spoke afterwards about the age-old rivalry with Moscow. The highway between the two cities was in bad shape because Moscow had not done its share of repairs. He preferred to fly. He had noted while in Canada for Expo 67 (I was always surprised to find how many of the people I met had been to Expo) the quality of highway 401. As usual, we compared hockey players. Romanov was reputed to have helped himself to the Romanov crockery in the Hermitage museum for his daughter’s wedding. Perhaps he had delusions of grandeur, a malady that Gorbachev did not suffer from until much later. At any rate, Romanov never made it to the top.

Alexander Yakovlev:

Yakolev had been Ambassador to Canada for seven years when I went to Moscow in 1980. He was then the Dean of the Diplomatic corps, a position he disliked; it involved too much protocol. He was not a career diplomat, and it was said that he had been exiled for displeasing the Party hierarchy on some matter of Party doctrine. In any event, he did not act like a Soviet diplomat. He was down to earth, eschewing both communist jargon and diplomatic niceties, a feature that attracted Prime Minister Trudeau who would receive him alone at 24 Sussex Drive. Before we left, Yakolev recommended to us the names of Russian writers who wrote about life in the Soviet Union without political intent or bias. He was not an admirer, however, of North American culture and often spoke critically of the commercialization of politics and the arts in the USA and its influence on Canada. He was also a fierce critic of American foreign policy.

I don’t think he had known Gorbachev before he went to Canada, but there can be no doubt that his subsequent rise to power after 1985 was a direct result of Gorbachev’s visit to Canada in 1983, a visit that brought them together for most of the ten days he was here. They must have shared a common distaste for the atmosphere of the late Brezhnev period, and a desire for change.

I went to see Yakovlev in 1986 during a visit to Moscow. He was now a member of the hierarchy and thought to be Gorbachev’s chief adviser on the new policies of perestroika and glasnost. He told me that the goal of these policies was to democratize the system by giving the people a larger voice in decision-making. He spoke about their skepticism of the regime and of the need to turn it around if economic reform was to lead anywhere. There must be greater “control from below”. Yakovlev was giving priority to political change over economic renewal, a priority that most of us in the West had not understood at the time. Nevertheless he remained a typical Soviet official in another sense. Human rights in the Soviet Union was no business of the West. Why was the Voice of America stirring up trouble in the Baltic republics, for example? There would be change in the Soviet treatment of minorities, including the Jewish minority, and we should leave well enough alone. He obviously had no inkling of the cataclysm of revolt that was to sweep the Soviet Union four years later; but then, neither did anyone else. He and his boss were believers in incremental and rational reform. They were and are the Mensheviks of the second Russian revolution.

Officials of the Foreign Ministry:

One of the seven identical skyscrapers erected in Moscow during the Stalin era, the Foreign Ministry became a familiar place for diplomats anxious to conjugate the verbal nuances of Soviet rhetoric. One was greeted by a junior official at the door, escorted past the grim-faced militia man, and ushered to one of the three (out of six) elevators that were actually working. I once asked my escort on the way up to one of the top floors why the elevator never seemed to go beyond floor twenty, although there appeared to be twenty-two floors. He confessed ignorance (“I don’t know” was one of the first Russian phrases I learned), perhaps not surprising in light of information published later that these floors housed elaborate listening devices installed at the time of construction.

The official I dealt with most at the Ministry was a veteran who had served in London and New York and was listed by American spy watchers as a KGB agent. Perhaps he was, but his obvious loyalty was to Gromyko and his habit of mind was one I soon recognized to be diplomatic rather than interrogative. Once when I informed him that I had been instructed to seek an interview with Brezhnev’s assistant, rather than with the Ministry, over some looming crisis in east-west relations he said to me: “Who does your government think is running foreign policy in Moscow?” On another occasion he interrupted my routine delivery of a complaint about Soviet policies on human rights (a favourite subject for Canadian politicians) with the question: “Do you know what day this is?” It turned out to be the fortieth anniversary of the German surrender at Stalingrad. “Look at these hands”, he said, “they are covered in blood”. He had been an eighteen year old soldier at Stalingrad, and was not about to let the memory of that terrible time pass without ceremony. A bottle of brandy appeared (it was mid-morning) and the rest of our “exchange of views” took on quite a different flavour. I decided to return to the subject of human rights another day.

Most members of the Soviet foreign service were highly professional, like their boss. They were especially well trained in languages and in the big, technical issues like arms control and treaty law. The older members often lapsed into Marxist jargon, but this was rarely the case with their juniors. They were genuinely concerned with the danger of war in the early eighties, as indeed we all were, and I suspect they were not too comfortable with the imbroglio in Afghanistan. Many of them, including Kozyrev who was a middle level official at the time and is now the Russian Foreign Minister, have carried on in the new regime. Freed from the constraints of both dogma and empire, they are an important asset in the struggle to re-invent the Russian future.

But will they embrace parliamentary democracy and the market system? Not, in my view, if they believe these to be a threat to Russia’s status as a great power. All of them, from Brezhnev to Yeltsin, have enjoyed the authority that goes with power. They will not yield easily, either to people’s deputies or to Macdonalds.

Geoffrey Pearson served in Paris, Mexico, India and was Ambassador to the USSR from 1980-83. At time of writing, he had retired from the Foreign Service and was living in Ottawa. He passed away in 2008.

Day One of the Revolution

by Robert McRae

Monday, November 20. Vaclav Havel announces the creation of the Civic Forum. Two hundred thousand people take to the streets. It is the end for the hard-line regime in Czechoslovakia.

There was an air of expectancy that first morning of the revolution in the Havel’s apartment. Of course no one there, among the few of us present, could predict what would happen later that day. It was Monday morning, November 20, 1989. I was sitting in a chair in front of the desk at which Vaclav Havel would soon announce the creation of Civic Forum. This was to be an umbrella opposition group in communist-ruled Czechoslovakia. Its surprising strength would bring the regime to its knees.

Civic Forum was created in reaction to the brutal police attack at a peaceful demonstration a few days before. The demonstration had been intended to mark International Students Day on Friday, November 17. By Monday morning, the sheer violence of the attack on the students was becoming clear. There were countless critical injuries and there was a rumour of at least one death. Public outrage, spreading across the country, suddenly crystallized.

Its surprising strength would bring
the regime to its knees.

It had been a long road. Over twenty years since the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia and the crushing of Dubcek’s Prague Spring. And over ten years since Havel, the so-called dissident playwright, had founded Charter 77 with a few other defenders of human rights. Havel had spent five of those years in prison. Now it was a year and a half since the first sizeable demonstrations against the regime. That was in the summer of 1988, the summer my family and I arrived in this hardline communist state.

At that time, Havel and the ragged band of Charter signatories were a controversial lot for both their countrymen and for the diplomatic community. Many in both camps wondered what possible impact this small group of dissidents could possibly have on a totalitarian state. Within days of our arrival, Havel had responded in an opposition journal, arguing that he could theoretically imagine a situation where a series of events might turn Charter 77 into a definable and visible movement with a large following. The point was that the Charter’s strength derived from the truth it articulated. The mirror’s existence far exceeded the number of people holding it.

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Just for the Havel of it - bringing the regime to its knees.

Now, as I waited in the Havel’s apartment, we were on the verge of that transformation. Thousands, even hundreds of thousands of people, would rush forward to hold a mirror so all would see the regime for what it was, without equivocation. This had come about because the need to live in truth experienced by a growing number of people was converted into the courage to do so. Havel had earlier articulated the commitment that inspired a revolution. “I base my actions on a fairly simple human philosophy: namely, that I have to say what I think. I have to speak the truth. I have to fight for the things I know to be right.” The brutality unleashed by the regime on the students of Prague clarified the mind of an entire nation along the same lines.

So there we were, a gaggle of journalists and a couple of diplomats in the Havel’s apartment on that fateful Monday. A desk had been pulled into a corner of the room where Vaclav Havel would sit. I had been there regularly since I had arrived in Prague in the summer of 1988. Pierre Guimond, a colleague from the Embassy, was sitting beside me. Vaclav came through the door. The Swedish Ambassador followed him. Havel announced that he would not go to Sweden to receive the Olaf Palme Award, which had just been awarded to him, even if he was given a passport by the regime. He felt he had to stay in Czechoslovakia at this time of difficulty. The Swedish Ambassador hinted that his Foreign Minister might come to Prague to present the award.

Vaclav Havel announced the formation of Civic Forum. The cameras of foreign journalists clicked, microphones were thrust forward, there were TV cameras from American networks. The whole atmosphere was one of tension and hurry, and I half expected the police to come in and break up the meeting. Havel laughed lightly, saying it was his first press conference. He knew better than most that anything like this before would already have been broken up. There was the air of expectation now, that something was happening, that things had broken loose, a vertigo almost. General Secretary Jakes was still in power, and anything was possible on the side of the regime, including more violence and mass arrests.

Thousands, even hundreds of thousands of people, would rush forward to hold a mirror so all would see the regime for what it was.

Havel talked about Civic Forum’s declaration, the need for political change and the need to find out who was responsible for Friday night’s brutality. Universities had been closed down by students’ strike committees and many were occupied by the students, and sheets proclaiming the strike were draped out of upper floor windows.

The photographers shot and whirred, and the journalists wrote. They had just come from the Berlin Wall and expected more of the same in Czechoslovakia. Certainly there was something in the air, hope tinged with foreboding. Yet this was the regime that had applauded the Chinese “solution” of last June (the Tiananmen Massacre).

As I sat listening to Vaclav, I didn’t know what the regime or the Czech and Slovak people would do. The pattern of the past had not been encouraging. Very small groups of people had risked showing their displeasure with the regime, and had paid an inordinately high price for it. All Czechs and Slovaks grumbled, of course, and there was a constant stream of jokes about the uneducated, boorish leadership. Violence and intimidation had worked in the past, and the beating dealt out on Friday night was no doubt intended as a lesson.

The photographers shot and whirred,
and the journalists wrote. They had just come
from the Berlin Wall and expected more
of the same in Czechoslovakia.

In January, 1989, I had sent a telegram arguing that the story of that year would be the decline, perhaps precipitous, of the regime’s public authority. This conviction had come on the heels of the week of demonstrations in January 1989 marking the 20th anniversary of Jan Palach’s suicide. I had argued that the fall of the regime would come as the result of some miscalculation, an over-reaction to dissent. Perhaps that was what had occurred on Friday night. Perhaps a corner had been turned after all. Only the reaction of the people would tell.

Still, as Havel joked that this was his first press conference, I knew he half expected, as I did, that the police would intervene sooner or later, that he would be arrested again as so many times in the past. Yet he was cheerful and determined, flying without instruments in a storm.

I could not help but think of the last year, about being present at his trial in February 1988, and before that, when I first met him. It was a very long road to me, but only the last chapter to him. It had already been more than a year of tremendous highs and lows, of enthusiasm and disillusionment.

Havel grasped immediately, sooner than any of us, the importance of Civic Forum. For the first time, all of the opposition groups would be brought together under one umbrella. Even more important, a number of groups from the “grey zone”, a zone between the regime and the opposition, would also join. This included representatives of the Forecasting Institute of the Academy of Sciences, actors, singers, musicians, members of the coopted Socialist and People’s parties, scientists, and so on. The declaration proclaiming the creation of Civic Forum contained recognizable Charter 77 language about individual freedoms. There were also specific demands for an enquiry into the police violence on November 17.

Rita Klimova was sitting beside Havel interpreting. She had been brought up in Brooklyn as a child by Czech parents before returning to Czechoslovakia. It was wonderful to hear Havel’s very precise and highly charged pronouncements being rendered in a Brooklyn accent. Rita would become Havel’s Ambassador to the USA two months later. Also present was Michael Zantovsky, who had gone to school at McGill University. He would become the President’s spokesman, and then succeed Rita in Washington as Ambassador. Ivan Havel and his wife Dasa, a Slovak, stood behind Havel, barely able to contain their excitement. Havel himself wore no tie or suit jacket, simply an open white shirt with the sleeves rolled up. The business of opposition was about to start in earnest.

The Civic Forum Declaration was printed in the newspaper of one of the coopted parties under the regime, the Socialist Party. This was Svobodno Slovo, or Free Speech. For the first time in forty years, the title of the newspaper meant something. It hit the streets of Prague on Monday morning. The effect was to be explosive.

When Havel’s press conference ended, I waved goodbye and went out into the street. All over town university buildings were draped with banners proclaiming the strike. The buildings were barricaded and students were occupying them, often sitting defiantly in the windows a few floors up. It brought back to me the excitement of the 1960’s and the feeling that sometimes one had to do the right thing regardless of the consequences. I was given a copy of the student demands, surprised momentarily to see that it was a computer print-out. They were establishing strike committees at the universities and high schools across the country. They had resources and organizational talent, two important ingredients that the opposition groups did not always possess.

I went back to the Embassy and wrote my report on Havel’s initiative and on what was happening in the streets. I had earlier arranged to meet some journalists at the Hotel Jalta just before the scheduled 4 p.m. demonstration. The Jalta was located just about half way up Wenceslas Square. The journalists had rented a room at the hotel four floors up, with a balcony facing the square. I arrived early, a half hour before the time, in case the police chose to close the square off, as they had done in the past.

By 4 p.m. there were already more than 10,000 or so people, more than I had ever seen at any previous demonstration in the square. The atmosphere was electric as dusk fell and turned to twilight. People kept streaming into the square. There were thousands of students, but there were thousands of ordinary men and women too. From my view from the balcony, they swarmed in from all sides, noisy and shouting and carrying Czechoslovak flags. This was no meek gathering of the morally pure. That had been typical of the almost Gandhi-inspired demonstrations of the past. This was a surging crowd that had a life of its own and was looking for action.

Some portable loud speakers had been set up at the foot of the statue of King Wenceslas. The voices were almost impossible to understand because they echoed off the buildings. It didn’t matter at all to the crowd. The huge square filled up. There was a dense moving mass of people the whole length of the square, half a kilometre long. The sound of a crowd of 200,000 people is both moving and frightening. It is pure power, the power of the general will made manifest and irresistible, both spiritually and materially. The roar from this mass deafened the handful of us on the balcony.

The light became twilight and the lights in the square glowed softly. The crowd throbbed and moved like the sea, chants starting in one corner and moving down the square like a wave, breaking and echoing off the buildings. I stood there with the journalists, hardly able to believe my eyes. Or to contain my excitement. I was seeing this through the lens of a year and a half of repression and brutality. I told them, “Well, that’s it. It’s all over.” The regime was finished. I knew that the resentment against the regime, against communism, was so deep, that once the door was opened the whole nation would rush through. The elaborate construction of lies, backed up by fear, would collapse. Living the lie for fear of falling into the abyss was the essence of the regime. The people in the square below were not afraid any more.

I told them, “Well, that’s it. It’s all over.”
The regime was finished.

Those who were not afraid any more would show others and then no one would be afraid of the communist bullies any more. Those fearless people in the opposition had tried to show the way during their years in the wilderness. Now, in that crowd below, I saw the whole process multiplied and condensed. It would not be stopped, short of massive force. I did not believe that force was an option for the communists, not after what had happened only weeks before in East Germany. Gorbachev had clearly signalled that the days when Warsaw Pact armies were used for internal policing were over. This was not to say that the regime’s leadership might not have wanted to use force. They simply realized at one point that week that without the help of the Soviet troops stationed in Czechoslovakia, they could not be sure of crushing a revolution.

“It’s all over.” It was quoted by the journalists from the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star. What I meant was that the repression would stop. Innocent people would be released from jail. Innocent people would have their rightful jobs back. The children of these people would be able to go to school like any normal child.

In that huge jubilant crowd there were students and people from all walks of life and all ages. Many held candles as a symbol and memory of the Friday night massacre. As the minutes went by and people began realizing what was happening, the crowd began to feel its strength. Slogans were chanted that must have been heard all down the square. They cried “Down with” followed by the names of various regime figures, including the General Secretary of the Communist Party, Milan Jakes. The statue of King Wenceslas, sitting nobly on his horse, was covered with Czechoslovak flags and signs that called for free elections and pluralism. As the night wore on, the crowd took out their keys and began shaking them, making a loud cacophony. Unable to hear clearly what had been said in Czech to inspire this odd gesture, I asked one of the Czechs what this was all about. He said, “They are tolling the death of communism.”

Although people tried to speak to the large crowd through the improvised loud speakers, this didn’t work well. The crowd had its own life, the slogans rising and falling, or drifting down the length of the square and disappearing in a far corner. Then someone shouted, “To the Castle.” This was where the office of communist president Husak was located. It was also the closest thing to a traditional, if geographical location of Czech sovereignty. The entire crowd poured out through the bottom of the square into several streets, but mostly onto Narodni street in the direction of the Vltava river.

I recognized several people in the crowd as I marched with them. There was a lady to whom I said hello that was an underground Catholic activist. She had ten children at home and she was carrying a candle. I found myself in a crowd that moved onto Charles Bridge as others moved onto other bridges up and down the river below the Castle. Armed personnel carriers moved onto the bridge from the other side. They had large metal screens mounted on the front to push back the crowd. They came half way across the bridges and stopped, dimly lit in the darkness by the soft lights on the bridge. Confronting the small tanks on a 14th century bridge was eerie to say the least.

The armed personnel carriers blocked the crowd. We were packed onto the bridge like sardines. Looking behind, all I could see was a river of people that stretched back through the streets into town. The armed personnel carriers had six wheels and there was a turret mounted with a large gun and a couple of machine guns. There were shouts from the crowd to sit down and we all sat down. The idea was to wait out the confrontation. This tactic had not always worked well in the past. It had been used on Friday night, when the police attacked the crowd after waiting for two hours. We were sitting ducks on the bridge, and I swore at myself for getting into such a situation. But then there were other shouts, some close to me, that called out for a return to Wenceslas Square, or to the Old Town Square. The looks of the agitators close to me told me that these were StB (secret police) agents that had infiltrated the crowd.

As the night wore on, the crowd took out
their keys and began shaking them,
making a loud cacophony.

The result was confusion. Some sat. Others stood up and turned, wanting to retrace their steps. No doubt because most didn’t like the idea of confronting military vehicles on a bridge, everyone eventually stood up and walked back towards town. The StB strategy of divide, if not conquer, worked, but for the last time. A part of the crowd headed in the direction of the Old Town Square, while the rest headed for Wenceslas Square.

Groups of protesters roamed about, mostly young people, relishing their freedom, calling for the end to communism and carrying Czechoslovak flags draped over their shoulders. In the Old Town Square, a crowd of perhaps 50,000 to 100,000 gathered. Some had climbed the statue of Jan Hus. They were cheering and shouting slogans. The statue was covered in home-made banners, using bed sheets, that demanded free elections. Jan Hus would have been proud. Other young people were dancing Czech folk dances in the middle of this huge crowd that filled the square like a sea. It seemed that no one was particularly disappointed that we had not made it to the Castle. We all knew that a corner had been turned. Nothing would be the same again.

At time of writing, Robert McRae was Counsellor in London. He also served in Prague and Belgrade and was a former Executive Assistant to the Under-Secretary.

Joe Clark Wants Soup

by Ken Neufeld

Prime Minister Joe Clark lost his luggage on an official visit to the Middle East, and it may have cost him his job. The incident seemed to paint the Prime Minister as hapless, and Clark was turfed out of office by a hapless-intolerant electorate after only 10 months at the helm.

THE NEXT TIME JOE CLARK lost his luggage, neither he nor the media noticed. It was 1987, and Joe Clark had been downgraded to Foreign Minister in the Brian Mulroney government.

The other protagonist in this story is me, in Arusha town, the administrative guy for a great big Canadian government-funded effort to help Tanzania grow wheat.

Arusha in those days was a sleepy town on the shoulder of Mount Meru, not far from Mount Kilimanjaro, eking by on the remnants of its glory days of safari fame, coffee plantations, and as the capital of the East African Community. Arusha had even starred in a movie called Hatari, improbably featuring John Wayne lassoing a rhinoceros. But by 1987, the East African Community (Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania) had self-destructed after Idi Amin seized the Ugandan state in a violent coup d’état. Relations between Tanzania and Kenya got so bad over the disposition of EAC’s assets that they closed their mutual border for years. The socialist policies of the Tanzanian government had severe negative impacts on the agricultural and tourism sectors, and neither tourists nor coffee beans were easy to find anymore. Alongside the few remaining safari operators and coffee growers, you would also have found an unlikely community of Canadian scientists, farmers, and mechanics.

By the end of the 1960s, Tanzania had come around to the idea that its best path out of poverty was self-sufficiency. One means to achieve this, believed President Julius Nyerere, was “import substitution”. Seems to make sense at first glance – don’t spend scarce foreign currency on buying stuff from abroad when you can grow or make it at home, employing your own citizens who would thereby learn all kinds of new skills and before you know it, a virtuous cycle. The idea was particularly attractive for agricultural products as farming is what most Tanzanians did, and the country appeared to have plenty of unused land. In fact, 230 kilometres southwest of Arusha, there is a high plateau with fertile soil and a climate suitable for dryland wheat production – the kind you might find in southern Saskatchewan. President Nyerere told his friend, Prime Minister Trudeau (the Elder) about the land around Mount Hanang and his wheat dream; maybe Canada could provide some advice. The eagle-eyed reader perched in 2022 will have spotted a couple of flaws in this import substitution idea. Things grown or made locally by inexperienced and under-capitalized companies and farmers tend to be of poor quality while also being more expensive. In Tanzania, these problems were compounded by the government’s policy of nationalizing a significant percentage of the means of production. Nevertheless, the wheat dream launched itself on the path to government-owned and operated farms.

By 1970, there were scientists from Agriculture Canada looking at the wheat question from every angle, bouncing about the bush with shovels, soil sample bags, and rain gauges. They confirmed that the soil on the plateau was exceptionally rich and could certainly grow wheat. The climate is dry, but rainfall averages and its annual distribution were not dissimilar to the dryland farming regions of Saskatchewan. Not that the place looked like Saskatchewan, what with an extinct volcano looming above thorny acacia trees shading impala and ostrich. The high plateau looked unused to the untrained eye as it was not farmed in the way we might have understood agriculture at that time. In fact, the land was home to the Barabaig people who migrated from the Nile Valley 1,000 years ago. They certainly had not been pining for wheat fields in their yard, but nobody asked them.

Fast-forward to 1987, and a visit to the Hanang Plateau is a mind-blowing experience. Seven farms, each cultivating 10,000 acres, are producing tens of thousands of metric tonnes of wheat a year. Every farm was like a village run by a Tanzanian manager supported by two Canadian farmer-advisors (not scientists but farmers contracted off their farms in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta). The seven farms in turn were supported by a larger village with a huge service centre and agriculture experts. In total, something like 5,000 people lived and worked at the Hanang Wheat complex. Huge tractors and combines roamed the enormous fields, scaring up ostriches and the occasional leopard on their circuits.

Back in Arusha, a large research station developed wheat varieties adapted to the local conditions, studied wheat pests, and logged climatic data. The research station and the farms were in turn supported by an administrative office in the centre of Arusha. In all, between the farm advisors, mechanic advisors, road builders, scientists and their families, there were well over 100 Canadians living at Hanang and in Arusha. From my office in what used to be the East African Community Headquarters, I ran the administrative office for the Canadian side of this massive program, and that is the fate which put me on a collision course with Joe Clark’s luggage.

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From Dar-es Salaam to the wheat farms was 1,000 km and took a week on horrendous roads.

Arusha is nearly 700 kilometres from Dar es Salaam, where, unbeknownst to us, the Canadian High Commission was busy organizing Joe Clark’s participation in a conference of the coalition of African countries surrounding South Africa (the Southern African Development Community – SADC). These countries, opponents of the racist apartheid regime of South Africa, collaborated on a wide range of issues, trying to promote their own economic growth and integration while attempting to exert pressure on South Africa to reform. Canada and many other wealthy countries supported SACD’s objectives in principle and with financing, which bought them an invitation to these meetings. Joe Clark was to represent Canada and deliver some platitudes.

The problem, which quickly became evident, was that there would be many platitude-deliverers at the conference, all of them supported by an army of minions. Arusha was barely a city back then with limited capacity to host even a modest conference, and this was a big one with presidential delegations from many African countries and big shots from donor countries and the United Nations. The Tanzanian government would provide a hotel room for Joe Clark and one advisor, but the other 30 Canadian delegation members were on their own. Suddenly, us wheat project folks were in the Government of Canada spotlight for our office space, housing, and vehicles right in Arusha town. Before we knew what hit us, Joe Clark’s visit became a sort of high school field trip with his entourage billeted in Canadian houses all around town.

Joe Clark wanted to have lunch with the Canadian Community to press flesh and say thank you. Being an Alberta boy, he was intrigued by the farms and was a bit taken aback by how many Canucks were in the woodwork. All our plans for a big Prairie-style barbeque lunch were squelched, however, when minion Vaughan Johnson told us in no uncertain terms that Clark wanted soup. Just soup, maybe a slice of bread. So soup it was, made by farmers’ wives and even one by me.

Vaughan Johnson was a legendary Department of Foreign Affairs protocol officer assigned to make sure the Foreign Minister’s world tour went smoothly and that he got soup for lunch. He arrived in Arusha a few days before Clark landed at the Kilimanjaro International Airport in a Government of Canada Challenger jet, and from that time on, he and I were tied at the hip. He was kind of like Mr. Wolf in the film Pulp Fiction; able to handle any situation without breaking a sweat and priding himself on never getting alarmed. The kind of guy who would not lose his boss’s luggage. I was about to put his sang-froid to the test.

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Joe Clark ordering soup.

Joe Clark was visiting quite a few countries on this trip and meeting a lot of presidents and prime ministers. So, when he landed, the first things out of the hold of the Challenger jet were two big aluminum cases stuffed with gifts symbolic of Canada, such as Inuit art, maple syrup, high-tech communications devices, and maybe some extra suits, who knows. Mr. Johnson agreed to my proposal that the most appropriate place to keep these items was my house.

A 70,000-acre farming operation needs a lot of machinery, and Tanzania did not manufacture any of it. In those days, development assistance (or foreign aid as it was also called) tended to be tied to the donor. While this seemed to make sense to politicians and to taxpayers, it led to huge inefficiencies and bizarre situations. Most of the machinery on the farms was paid for by Canada, and that meant it had to be purchased in Canada and shipped halfway around the world to a country which did not have dealers who could service this machinery. We had Massey Ferguson combine harvesters, Versatile swathers and tractors, Champion graders, grain wagons from Regina, International trucks, and just about anything else you could think of. We also had to supply all the spare parts, filters, tires, special lubricants, and a thousand other things needed to keep these machines going. In hindsight, it seems insane.

Months or even years later, ships full of stuff would arrive in Dar es Salaam and be sent to Arusha by train and then transferred to trucks for delivery to the farms a couple of hundred kilometres west of Arusha. The most urgent stuff would sometimes get left at my place, and then anyone driving out to the farms could take it, so it wouldn’t have to wait for the next big convoy.

My assistant Ali took over the handling of the shipping and forwarding while I was distracted by the Clark visit. Ali dropped by my place to see if there was anything for the farms. “Well,” said my cook, Rafael, “maybe those big aluminum cases sitting in the corner of the living room?”

A couple of hours later, Vaughan and I arrived at the house on our way to the airport to prepare for Clark’s departure. With a sense of foreboding, I asked Rafael in Kiswahili where he had moved the aluminum cases. He told me Ali had picked them up a while ago and was on his way to the farms, 12 hours drive away. Vaughan did not speak Kiswahili, but he may have picked up a jump in my stress level. True to his reputation, he did not have a meltdown when I told him what had happened. There was not really a telephone system in Arusha, but we did have two-way radios. By some miracle, I was able to locate the truck still at the research station, taking on additional cargo. We recovered the cases, and off we went on the 55 kilometres to the airport with just enough time in hand to get everything ready for take-off – if nothing else went wrong.

My heart rate was nearly back to normal when the back right tire blew. By now, it was dark, and we were in a rural area known for bandits. Fortunately, I had a lot of experience changing flat tires after years in Tanzania and figured I could impress with my mechanical prowess, get the new tire on, and still get to the airport before either the bandits or Clark’s convoy showed up. Which was all well and good, but the jack was missing, and we were out of radio range of the cavalry. It seemed to me at this point that Joe Clark’s luggage was determined to get lost, stolen, or missing by any other means and that my name was to live on in infamy. But then my friend Mama Kuku, the chicken farmer, happened by and saved the day, Joe Clark’s luggage, and Vaughn Johnson’s reputation, with her hi-lift jack.

Ken Neufeld is now retired but still making soup. His career meandered through a CUSO placement at a Girls’ Secondary School in Iringa, Tanzania, the Wheat Project, CIDA, DFAIT, and GAC postings in Haiti, Peru (twice), Bolivia, Tanzania (again), Mozambique, and Afghanistan, with periodic stints in Gatineau and Ottawa for re-education. He is also blissfully married to Cheryl Frankiewicz.

La saga des certificats de naissance et de citoyenneté

par Jean Prévost

Donner naissance à l’étranger, ou tout au moins dans les pays dont les conditions sanitaires sont adéquates, peut s’avérer une expérience riche en anecdotes.

Mon épouse Cécile avait donné naissance à notre premier garçon, Samuel, à Baie-Comeau, qui était la ville de son enfance. À l’époque (1982) encore une petite ville peu connue sur la Côte Nord, elle (la ville, pas mon épouse) deviendrait rapidement connue un jour pour avoir engendré un Premier ministre des plus controversés. Mais là n’est pas le but de mon propos, puisque les historiens sauront bien juger un jour (l’ex-PM, j’entends, pas mon épouse).

Ayant accepté un poste à Mexico en 1985, alors que Cécile était encore enceinte de six mois, nous eûmes à décider si elle demeurerait au Canada ou si elle opterait pour l’une des nombreuses cliniques de Mexico. Après tout, cette ville ne voit-elle pas naître plus d’enfants que tous les hôpitaux canadiens réunis? Et demeurer au Canada à l’automne, seule dans un appartement n’était pas la solution, d’autant que notre aîné, alors âgé de trois ans, déplaçait de l’air.

Après nous être dûment renseignés auprès du médecin du poste, qui nous rassura sur le professionnalisme des soins disponibles sur place, nous optâmes pour le « beau risque » (non, pas celui de René Levesque concernant le petit gars de Baie-Comeau — l’ex PM, pas notre fils Samuel), c’est-à-dire de venir à Mexico y compléter la grossesse et accoucher.

Tout se déroula à merveille, le hasard ayant voulu que nos effets personnels arrivent au moins une bonne semaine avant l’accouchement, ce qui permit à Cécile de se changer les idées en déballant, tâche emballante s’il en est, la multitude de boîtes contenant les accessoires de bébé et autres menus articles dont tout ménage a besoin pour survivre.

Je passe par-dessus les émotions que nous eûmes à vivre le jour où « l’enfant s’annonça » et qu’il nous fallut nous rendre rapidement à l’hôpital Humana de Los Angeles (situé à Mexico, et non en Californie). Tout se déroula le plus naturellement du monde, si ce n’est que nous ne pûmes voir notre fille, Laure Élise, que 24 heures plus tard, les médecins ayant diagnostiqué « quelques problèmes, rien de grave, rassurez-vous ».

Plus d’un mois plus tard, rassuré sur l’état de santé de la mère et de la fille, et désireux d’entamer les étapes pour l’obtention du certificat de citoyenneté canadienne pour notre fille, on m’informa qu’il me fallait un certificat de naissance en bonne et due forme. Formalité normale, pensai-je alors, et qui m’ayant pris une bonne demi-heure à l’Hôtel de ville de Baie-Comeau dans le cas de notre petit gars (Samuel, pas l’ex-PM), je croyais benoîtement que la procédure serait peut-être un peu plus longue à Mexico, mais qu’avec l’aide de l’ambassade, ce ne serait qu’une formalité.

Disons qu’il me suffit de huit visites au bureau de quartier de la mairie pour obtenir ce précieux document. La première fois, je n’avais pas en ma possession tous les documents requis. La seconde, la mairie n’avait pas de formulaire de certificat de naissance. La troisième, le fonctionnaire ayant autorité de signer n’y était pas. La quatrième, il y était, mais la photocopieuse était en panne. La cinquième, la photocopieuse fonctionnait, mais on manquait de papier du bon format. La sixième, tout concordait, et il me suffisait de présenter le reçu (tiens, du nouveau, personne ne m’avait parlé de reçu avant, et quel reçu donc?) que je pouvais obtenir au comptoir des finances dans l’édifice voisin qui était malheureusement fermé, les heures de ce service ne coïncidant pas avec celles du service qui octroyait les certificats de naissance. La septième, muni du précieux reçu, je croyais sentir la victoire à portée de la main, mais il manquait un renseignement qu’on avait oublié. Les astres étant bien alignés, la conjoncture favorable, et mes nerfs reposés, je me pointai une huitième fois sans trop me faire d’illusions. On me sourit avec la gentillesse proverbiale des Mexicains et je pus finalement obtenir le nombre limite de copies légales du parchemin tant convoité, quelque chose me disant que je devrais éviter dans la mesure du possible d’y retourner à tous les mois.

En possession de ce document, mon épouse et mois complétâmes les formulaires pour l’obtention de la citoyenneté canadienne pour Laure Élise. Nous eûmes alors à faire face à une autre série d’épreuves, concernant cette fois le nom légal de notre fille. C’est que Samuel avait été enregistré au Québec, ce qui permet un certain nombre de permutations dans le choix du nom de famille, le nom de mon épouse (Bourdages) suivi du mien. C’était sans compter sur le certificat mexicain, qui inscrit obligatoirement le nom du père avant celui de la mère. Désireux de rectifier cette anomalie, nous soulignâmes que nous souhaitions que notre fille possède, à l’instar de son (grand) frère, le même agencement de nom(s). Le service de la citoyenneté est situé sur l’Île du Cap-Breton, en Nouvelle-Écosse. « Mais vous ne pouvez pas, puisque le certificat de naissance dit ... ». Résumons nous pour dire qu’au bout de quelque mois de cet imbroglio québéco-mexicano-fédéral-néo-écossais, et de deux renouvellements de son passeport canadien temporaire, la précieuse citoyenneté canadienne fut octroyée à ma fille, dont les parents l’avaient certes fort méritée. Quant à son nom, disons qu’il dépend du côté de la carte de citoyenneté que l’on regarde.

À la naissance de Félix Antoine, en 1987, l›expérience aidant, il me suffit de ... sept visites au bureau de quartier de la mairie de Mexico. Et sa citoyenneté lui fut accordée en quelques mois seulement!

Jean Prévost travaillait dans la Direction de la planification stratégique du service des délégués commerciaux. Il a eu des affectations à Tunis, Mexique, Lima et Abidjan.

Une partie de hockey
à Moscou

par Reine Fournier

C’était en 1985 à Moscou.

Une équipe de hockey canadienne, composée de jeunes joueurs prometteurs à qui on voulait donner de l’expérience internationale, participait à la Coupe Izvestia et disputait un match contre l’équipe de l’Armée rouge. Naturellement, tout le personnel de l’Ambassade était là.

À notre arrivée à l’aréna, nous découvrons qu’une section complète avait été réservée pour l’Ambassade, alors que nous n’en remplissions à peine le quart, et les deux sections voisines, à droite comme à gauche, étaient complètement vides alors que toutes les autres sections affichaient complet. Et, tout au milieu de notre section, certainement par coïncidence, un spectateur russe, qui tenait une Pravda à la main.

La partie commence et les amateurs de hockey russes réagissent à une partie de hockey comme les amateurs de tennis. Ils suivent le jeu, en applaudissant les bons coups, mais dans un silence quasi complet, alors que le personnel de l’Ambassade était muni de cloches, de drapeaux, et ne ménageait pas les encouragements bruyants.

Toutefois, il s’est vite avéré que l’équipe canadienne n’était pas de taille à affronter l’équipe russe. Le personnel de l’Ambassade continuait à crier ses encouragements aux joueurs canadiens mais à voix plus basse, passait des remarques désobligeantes sur la piètre qualité du jeu de nos athlètes. Genre, à voix basse, « ma grand-mère patine mieux que lui! » et, à voix haute, « vas-y, t’es capable! ».

Notre spectateur russe ne ratait pas un mot, pas une farce, et se cachait la figure dans sa Pravda pour rire. Et plus il riait, plus nous trouvions cela drôle.

À la fin de la deuxième période, l’équipe russe menait par environ 10 à 2. Un spectateur de notre groupe déclara alors que nous ne gagnerions jamais cette partie avec nos joueurs sur la glace et qu’il valait mieux la terminer pendant qu’ils étaient hors de la patinoire. Un autre Canadien se mit alors à décrire une partie fictive où les Canadiens comptaient à tout coup. Les cloches sonnaient, les drapeaux s’agitaient, les bravos retentissaient et personne dans l’aréna ne comprenait ce qui se passait. Les spectateurs tournaient la tête dans tous les sens pour essayer de découvrir ce que nous applaudissions. Excepté, naturellement, notre ami russe qui, à ce point, riait tellement qu’il ne pensait plus à se cacher derrière sa Prada. Sa figure était toute rouge, les larmes coulaient sur ses joues. Et sur les nôtres aussi. Il y avait peut-être 25 000 spectateurs et donc 25 000 spectacles aussi drôles les uns que les autres.

Le fou rire nous reprenait à tout moment au cours de la troisième période et à la fin de la partie, notre ami russe sortit d’un côté et nous de l’autre. Il riait encore et il nous adressa un signe de la main, comme pour nous laisser savoir qu’il n’avait jamais passé une soirée aussi réjouissante. Puis, il est sans doute aller faire son rapport. Après tout, il était le seul Russe à savoir que nous avions gagné la partie.

À la veille de «Tiananmen» en Chine

par l’ambassadeur Fred Bild, Ambassade du Canada, Chine

Les nouvelles à la radio ce matin sont presque entièrement consacrées au refus nord-coréen de coopérer en matière d’inspection nucléaire. La nervosité liée à la crise semble avoir grimpé encore d’un cran.

Le pouvoir au peuple?

La province de Shandong est fière d’avoir réussi, selon l’expression de son représentant, «à rendre le pouvoir au peuple», c’est-à-dire au plus bas niveau de l’organisation rurale. Tous les trois ans, les citoyens locaux procèdent à des élections de délégués dans les assemblées de villages. Les élus sont fréquemment des villageois autres que ceux prévus par les autorités; ceci se fait par inscription directe de leurs noms sur les bulletins de vote. Une fois l’assemblée constituée, elle élit le comité du village qui, à toutes fins pratiques, est l’exécutif de la communauté. En cette période de rapide croissance économique, ce genre de comité exécutif peut disposer de pouvoirs considérables, compte tenu du fait qu’en pratique c’est le comité même qui dirige les petites «entreprises municipales» qui prolifèrent maintenant partout en Chine rurale. Ces membres élus siègent aussi aux conseils d’administration de nouvelles entreprises économiques.

Je passe ma première heure au bureau à préparer un voyage en Shandong, à l’invitation du Ministère des Affaires civiles, et plus particulièrement le Bureau responsable du développement de la démocratie de base («grass-roots democracy»). Monsieur Zhong, qui a obtenu une partie de sa formation au Canada, est un individu hautement motivé et entièrement dévoué à la cause. Il nous assure qu’il nous présentera des exemples moins réussis, ainsi que des villages modèles. Nous aurons liberté complète de poser toutes les questions que nous voudrons. «Plus elles seront embarrassantes, mieux ça sera. «Simplement par votre présence, vous nous aiderez», insiste Monsieur Zhong, «vous êtes le premier ambassadeur étranger à faire ce genre de visite. Votre intérêt sera une indication probante pour mes supérieurs que notre travail est pris au sérieux; cela pourra me valoir des ressources supplémentaires.»

Je note que pour l’instant on ne parle pas d’étendre ce système d’élections aux instances supérieures, les comtés ou les provinces, là où l’influence du parti est prépondérante. Mais, notre voyage d’une semaine devrait nous donner quelques indices à ce sujet.

Notre visiteur nous quitte et, au moment même où nous réfléchissons à ses propos, les nouvelles de l’extérieur nous rappellent à la réalité: le conflit inhérent qui existe en Chine entre la démocratie de base et la priorité absolue donnée à l’objectif de «stabilité» politique. Nous approchons du 5ème anniversaire des événements tragiques qui sont maintenant désignés par l’abrégé «Tiananmen». Les journaux étrangers font état d’arrestations de dissidents, de restrictions spéciales touchant les étrangers visitant des universités à Pékin, ainsi que des annulations de dernière minute d’événements publics (expositions artistiques, concerts) dans un rayon d’un kilomètre de la place Tiananmen. De surcroît, dans un pays où les médias sont étroitement muselés, le passe-temps préféré de tous est l’inévitable trafic de ragots. La dernière rumeur qui court a trait à l’échauffourée qui serait en préparation pour le lendemain du 4 juin entre les soi-disant «Maoïstes» et les «Conservateurs» au sein de l’équipe gouvernante du pays, les deux camps anticipant la disparition prochaine d’un dirigeant d’un âge avancé.

Et le commerce Canada-Chine

Mon prédécesseur à Pékin, Earl Drake, est en ville. Il effectue des consultations auprès du Conseil chinois sur l’environnement, groupe d’experts sino-internationaux à très haut niveau. Il est toujours agréable de confronter les perspectives d’il y a 4-5 ans avec celles d’aujourd’hui. Nous échangeons quelques idées sur des projets en cours pour la visite du Premier ministre Chrétien au mois de novembre. Earl participe à l’organisation de la réunion annuelle du Conseil Canada-Chine pour le Commerce qui coïncidera avec la visite Chrétien.

Nous partons ensemble déjeuner au Ministère des Affaires étrangères. Mis à part les félicitations mutuelles pour l’excellence de nos relations bilatérales et les préparatifs de cette grande visite, on parle beaucoup de la Corée du Nord. Notre hôte chinois, comme de coutume, conseille la patience et le dialogue souvent. Selon lui, il reste plusieurs possibilités de compromis; en effet, les Chinois ont raison de croire que dans les semaines à venir une entité pourrait intervenir, même si elle n’est pas temporairement «mandatée». Vers la fin du repas, je n’ai que quelques minutes pour réitérer une demande que nous avons déjà faite il y a plusieurs semaines pour l’ouverture d’un consulat à Guangzhou.

L’après-midi est consacré à des réunions avec: (a) la société MacDonald Detwiler, dont la technologie spatiale de pointe s’avère remarquablement concurrentielle sur le marché chinois; (b) des intérêts miniers canadiens qui ont de la difficulté à comprendre le cheminement de la politique aurifère chinoise qui est en pleine évolution; et (c) la Compagnie Power, dont quelques hauts dirigeants viennent de passer une nuit sur la Grande Muraille.

«C’est la première fois», leur a-t-on dit, «que des étrangers peuvent ainsi séjourner sur la Muraille.» J’ai envie d’ajouter, «depuis Genghis Khan, bien sûr», mais je me contente de leur narrer une randonnée de trois jours, il y a deux ans, avec ma fille sur des parties complètement en ruines à un autre endroit de la Muraille. En fait, l’événement spectaculaire auquel ils viennent de participer a été organisé par le Ministère du Tourisme pour environ 80 personnes et comprend un repas “barbecue” aux chandelles, tenues, sacs de couchage et boissons à volonté servis par du personnel digne d’un hôtel cinq étoiles. En rien comparable à notre périple de trois jours où nous devions même traîner notre propre eau et notre propre nourriture. En revanche, nous avions trouvé une solitude idyllique dans une nature des plus pures, et cela à 120 km de la capitale du pays le plus peuplé au monde!

Ce qui reste de l’après-midi est consacré à des vétilles diverses : répondre à des plaintes de gens qui se sont vu refuser des visas, l’échéancier des protestations sur la soi-disant pratique chinoise d’extorquer à des fins médicales la bile d’une certaine espèce d’ours (un reportage à l’étranger a causé une avalanche de lettres), demander des explications sur la disparition d’un écolier canadien, préparation d’une participation canadienne à un symposium international sur la procédure criminelle, et retoucher de nos notes pour une présentation à la télévision chinoise sur les réformes économiques en Chine.

Deux réceptions (... et la démocratie)

À la fête nationale de l’Italie, le président de l’École normale supérieure de Pékin me propose une augmentation des échanges universitaires avec le Canada et le président de l’Université du Commerce international et de l’Économie me suggère que nous élargissions notre coopération actuelle aux champs des sciences économétriques. Parmi les étrangers, le principal sujet de discussion semble être les mesures accrues de sécurité qui se font sentir de plus en plus ces derniers jours, c’est-à-dire juste avant la date fatidique.

À la deuxième réception, celle offerte par l’Association chinoise de Droit international, je suis abordé par un membre du Comité permanent du Congrès national du peuple qui a appris que l’Ambassade se proposait d’honorer Wang Tieya, la plus grande autorité chinoise de droit international. Comme mon interlocuteur semble principalement intéressé par la liste des invités, je lui donne une idée de ceux qui y seraient conviés. Quand il me demande le nombre total des invités, je ne puis m’empêcher de me rappeler le principal sujet de conversation à la réception précédente et je réponds un peu geignard, «Je suppose que ça dépendra de l’endroit où l’on nous permettra de tenir notre réception.» Mon interlocuteur disparaît dans la foule.

Un membre du Ministère des Affaires étrangères m’accoste pour me dire à quel point le Premier ministre Bob Rae avait fait bonne impression lors de sa récente visite économique en Chine. Pékin; ce qui, semble-t-il, avait attiré l’attention de ses hôtes, fut l’étendue et la diversité de ses intérêts, et surtout la vigueur qu’il avait démontrée en faisant la promotion des programmes de radio, TV et film de sa province. Nous nous attardons quelque temps sur la gamme des pouvoirs provinciaux au Canada, mon collègue constatant que les chefs des provinces canadiennes actuelles semblent jouir d’une autorité bien plus considérable que dans la plupart des autres ensembles fédéraux. Il me lance une dernière question: «Et quand aurons-nous le plaisir d’accueillir le Premier ministre du Québec, la seule des grandes provinces canadiennes qui ne nous a pas encore fait honneur à ce niveau?» «Après les élections, sans doute», lui dis-je.

At the time of publication, Fred Bild was serving as Canada’s Ambassador to China.

Looking Back on the Cold War

by James H. Taylor

I look back from time to time on my working life and ask myself what it was all about. I was in the foreign service for 40 years from 1953–93. Much of what I did in those years had something to do with one or the other of two great themes: the Cold War and decolonization. Perhaps there was really only one theme, “the end of empire,” because the end of the Cold War ended the Russian empire.

By 1989, we had become used to the Cold War. We were pretty sure by then it was not going to turn hot. It hadn’t always been this way. The first 15 years, up to the Cuban missile crisis in 1962, had been a nervous time. The original imitation Stalinist regimes imposed on the satellite states of Central and Eastern Europe by the Russians were hardly reassuring. Western Europe then was still weak and disarmed. There were large communist parties in France and Italy. The communist takeover in Czechoslovakia in 1948, and Soviet encouragement of aggression by North Korea in 1950 seemed to pose a world-wide threat. These events had provoked first the creation of NATO and then the rearmament of the Western alliance. There was endless tension around Berlin. In the summer of 1948, at the time of one crisis over Berlin, I was told at the School of Infantry, “You’ll be in the trenches by September.” Stalin died in 1953, but Khrushchev, who denounced him, seemed in some ways even worse. Whereas Stalin had been a steady menace, Khrushchev was dangerously erratic. With him came further rounds of pressure in Berlin (provoking contingency planning in NATO which involved envisaging the use of nuclear weapons) and finally the Cuban missile crisis in 1962. In the end even the Russians had had enough. Khrushchev was thrown out and succeeded by a troika, from which Leonid Brezhnev was emerging as the principal figure when I went to Moscow in 1967.

Brezhnev’s era (roughly the late 1960s to the early 1980s) had its record of crises – for example over the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, the imposition of martial law in Poland in 1980–81, and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. But it was also a period of growing stability and certainty in East-West relations. Internally in the USSR, the period came to be known by the Russians themselves as “the era of stagnation.” The Soviet Union, far from being the dynamic leader of the Soviet bloc, was in economic decline, plagued by grave social problems, and dragging the countries of Eastern Europe backwards with it as the West prospered. For a long time, Western publics, and even Western governments, were bemused by the Soviet Union’s military power, and tended to exaggerate the Soviet Union’s economic strength. The one thing the Russians were really good at was producing excellent cheap weapons. The ubiquitous Kalashnikov is the classic example. But most other Soviet industrial products were junk, unsaleable in Western markets. It was only gradually that Western opinion came to realize that the Soviet Union, in economic terms, was “Upper Volta with missiles.” Maybe this was one reason why the events of 1989 took the world by surprise: how could a supposed superpower fall apart so quickly?

[picture]

Richard Nixon meets Leonid Brezhnev June 19, 1973 during the Soviet leader’s visit to the U.S.

Credit: Robert L. Knudsen

With the passage of time, it became clearer every year from the mid-1960s onwards, that the Soviet Union and its empire were held together in the last analysis by force or the threat of force. That was evident from the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968 and the Polish crisis of 1980–81. In the West, we could have concluded that, if ever a leadership came to power in Moscow that ruled out using or threatening to use force, what remained of the ties between the countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union would not be enough to counter the attractions of the increasingly prosperous West. The whole Soviet empire, including parts of the Soviet Union itself, would split apart.

Throughout the Brezhnev years, however, such an outcome seemed inconceivable. We appeared in the 1970s and early 1980s to be headed for something different: a slow evolution of a Europe that would remain divided in two camps, even if it became relatively stable and peaceful. It was hard to imagine that any Soviet government would ever give up the chief prize of its victory in the Second World War, the permanent division of its principal enemy’s territory, and control of all the intervening land between Germany and Russia across the historic invasion routes from the West. True, this meant for the Russians not only keeping the German people permanently divided, but also finding a successful formula for dealing with the unending national rebellions of East Germans, Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Hungarians and Romanians – in the end every one of the Soviet Union’s putative allies in central and Eastern Europe but the Bulgarians.

Yet it seemed at the time that the Russians were succeeding at this interminable task. The Hungarian formula for revolt suppression of 1956, with Soviet tanks firing on crowds in the streets of Budapest, could not safely be repeated, especially in the television age. But suppression in Czechoslovakia in 1968, while it did not give the Politburo everything the Russians wanted, brought the Czechs and Slovaks back into line after the excursion of Prague spring, and furthermore was accomplished without bloodshed. Putting the Poles in their place in 1980–81 seemed an even more successful iteration, in that the Russians pressed the Poles into suppressing themselves, and such bloodshed as there was, which was in any event minor, was on General Jaruzelski’s hands rather than on Brezhnev’s. An East German counterpart in the early 1980s predicted to me that the Berlin Wall would become over time like the Great Wall of China: a monument to an age long past, that would remain in place but cease to be a barrier to exchanges between peoples.

Thus it was natural to conclude at the time a new Soviet leader came to power in March 1985, that Gorbachev was not running any unreasonable risks, from the Soviet point of view, in undertaking a programme of fundamental economic and political reforms. He obviously could not have imagined, in doing so, and in refusing to intervene with force to get other communist regimes out of trouble when they refused to reform, that he was triggering the disappearance not only of the Soviet empire, but of the Soviet Union itself. He did not appreciate, any more than anyone else, just how fragile the whole structure was, or he would presumably have gone about his programme more cautiously.

In any event, it was clear that, whatever happened, the West was not going to intervene. While all the previous crises in Central and Eastern Europe had to be blamed by the Soviet authorities on American imperialists and West German revanchists – because the real source of the problem, which was the Russians themselves, obviously could not be admitted – there had never been any serious destabilizing moves from the West to exploit these periodic crises in Eastern Europe. The NATO countries wanted stability. They believed that diplomatic processes like the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) and Mutual Balanced Force Reduction (MBFR) would eventually lead to ever more civilized relations between the two opposing alliances.

The CSCE negotiations, culminating in the Helsinki Final Act of 1975, provided that, as the West saw it, borders could still be changed in Europe, but only peacefully; so far as the Soviet Union was concerned, it meant that the borders that had emerged from the war were permanent. CSCE also gave not only the Western parties to the Final Act, but the peoples of Eastern Europe themselves a basis for calling repressive governments to account for their human rights records. Meanwhile, the complementary MBFR process was intended to reduce conventional forces in the two alliances without risk of destabilizing imbalances. And so far as the nuclear risk was concerned, the high point of tensions in the Cuban missile crisis of 1962 was followed by a generation of growing conviction that the nuclear threat was extremely difficult to deploy usefully in support of diplomacy; that the actual use of nuclear weapons in war would be disastrous; that their only useful purpose was as a deterrent, to keep the other side from using them; and that for this purpose there was no need for such a huge accumulation of nuclear weapons. A series of arms control and disarmament negotiations acted to confirm all this.

So Europe by the late 1980s was, from the Western point of view, moving slowly in the right direction. The slow pace seemed to many to be the part of wisdom. It gave stability and certainty, time for adjustment. No boats were rocked. That seemed to be in everyone’s interest. In this scenario, German reunification was a dream never to be abandoned, but it was something for our grandchildren. Leaders like Margaret Thatcher, as Brian Mulroney reminded us on the twentieth anniversary of German reunification, would have been happy never to see it in her lifetime. She was bitterly opposed when the prospect had immediately and unexpectedly to be faced. That was what was thrilling but almost frightening about 1989 and its consequences: the unravelling of the Soviet empire went so far and so fast that people feared it would end in some kind of disastrous accident.

Retrospectively, for all the differences between the Warsaw Pact countries, a broadly similar pattern emerged. At the outset, the peoples of Central and Eastern Europe did not know what the limits were when they began to push their rulers and the Russians in the direction of reform. But gradually, they all learned how to organize peaceful mass movements that progressively escaped the control of orthodox communist governments – like Solidarnosc in Poland and the Civic Forum in Czechoslovakia. Eventually reformers obtained the right to organize unions, to constrain the police state, to obtain first half-free and then free elections – all the while carefully avoiding confrontations and violence. Meanwhile, from 1985 onwards, a regime had come to power in the Soviet Union which was not prepared to use force to rescue reactionary leaders like Honecker in East Germany. Progressively, the reactionary communist leaderships were driven from power. The example of one country inspired the others, while the example of Eastern Europe in turn infected the Soviet Union itself; the Baltic states, for example, obtained their independence by adopting tactics that imitated what was happening in neighbouring countries.

The pressure of superpower competition with the United States and the example of Western Europe’s economic success undeniably weakened the Soviet grip. But we in the West were largely bystanders. The notion that the West somehow “won the Cold War” involves a distortion of history. It ignores the decisive roles played on the one hand by the peoples of Central and Eastern Europe themselves, and on the other, by a Soviet leader committed to reform and totally opposed to preserving the status quo, either in the Warsaw Pact countries or in the Soviet Union, through the use of force. And unintended consequences played an important part. Gorbachev certainly did not set out to destroy the Warsaw Pact, let alone the Soviet Union, nor did the East German leaders who opened the wall in response to public pressure on November 10, 1989, think that in doing so, they were bringing down the Wall and themselves with it.

James H. (Si) Taylor is a retired foreign service officer who served as Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs and Ambassador to Japan and NATO.

The Singing Diplomat:
Moose Peru

by Eduardo del Buey

The 1985 musical phenomenon “We Are The World” marked a watershed moment in global musical history and in public diplomacy – hundreds of artists coming together around the world to raise consciousness about the serious plight of East Africans facing severe drought and poverty and call governments around the world to action.

This concert and campaign motivated me – an amateur songwriter, performer and professional Canadian diplomat – to use my talent to do something for the children of Peru, where I was sent on temporary duty to the Canadian Embassy that summer.

Thirty years ago, the owner of Lima’s Radio Miraflores told me that Peruvian artists had tried to do something similar for the poor children of that country, but had failed to come up with a song. He told me, “Write it, and we will produce it.” My ambassador – Keith Bezanson – said, “If they produce it, the Embassy will donate 2000 records for sale to raise funds for the charity of your choice”.

I wrote and recorded the song – Somos Perú (We Are Peru) and decided to donate the proceeds to the children’s charity run by Peru’s First Lady, Pilar Norres de Garcia. The record came out, and the video played every night on the pop video channel (in those days, Lima’s Channel 27). It achieved a certain popularity – indeed, six months later I was walking on the Bahnhofstrasse in Zurich when a couple of young Peruvians stopped me on the street and asked if I was the Canadian singing diplomat. Canada was on the map!

Back in Lima, we found out from a sympathetic contact in the President’s office that the First Lady, a committed pro-Cuban leftist who loathed what she considered “western hegemony”, in fact was going to try to bury the song. No way was the support of a capitalist diplomat going to be accepted!

We then withdrew support for the First Lady’s charity and donated the rights to the song and the proceeds to the Hospital San Juan de Dios – a group of hospitals in many Latin American capitals that performs major corrective surgery on children free of charge. I performed the song on the Hospital’s National Telethon; the record sold, and funds were raised. Canada’s image in Peru created an enthusiastic response among Peruvians who were impressed that an Embassy could take a novel approach to send a message of solidarity and hope for young children. Canada was seen as an excellent partner for this country whose flag colours (red side bars with a white centre) we share.

The record came out, and the video played every night on the pop video channel (in those days, Lima’s Channel 27). It achieved a certain popularity – indeed, six months later I was walking on the Bahnhofstrasse in Zurich when a couple of young Peruvians stopped me on the street and asked if I was the Canadian singing diplomat. Canada was on the map!

A few months later, I was transferred to the Canadian Embassy in Guatemala, then in the throes of a civil war pitting a civilian government that had just replaced decades of military dictatorship against a left-wing revolutionary group. The violence was especially brutal for the country’s indigenous people, often caught in the ideological crossfire.

Ambassador André Potvin found out about my recording career in Lima, as did the President of the Aldeas Infantiles SOS, Maria Luisa Chattareli (affiliated with SOS Kinderdorf, a non-governmental organization that takes in young orphaned victims of violence and provides them with a home and a solid education until they graduate from university). They encouraged me to write a song to support their cause, and the result was Poco A Poco (Little By Little).

Bob Porter, then Guatemala’s finest musical arranger and father of Emmy Award winning producer KC Porter, arranged and produced the record. The Embassy provided the funding for 2000 records that were sold through a major supermarket chain as well as record stores. The video aired every night for a few months, and both Canada and the Aldeas Infantiles SOS came onto the map of young and not so young Guatemalans.

The song called on all to support the youth of the country and end the violence that was claiming so many lives. Needless to say, it did not sit well with the extreme right, whose leader, Mario Sandoval Alarcon, was angered that a foreigner would come to his country to call them out.

In those days, one did not annoy him or his followers. Fortunately, his niece was a good friend of mine who told him I was a non-political young Canadian diplomat whose message was merely in support of poor orphans. Sandoval then focused elsewhere, and I was perhaps spared the kind of violence that had affected my immediate predecessor, who had been fired upon in his car in front of his home by a death squad (he escaped unharmed, but the bullet holes in the garage door were still there when I moved into the house).

Once again, Canadian public diplomacy made its mark and sent a series of messages of hope and solidarity to a country that desperately needed it.

Public diplomacy today need not be anywhere near as expensive or complicated to achieve concrete results as it was just a few decades ago. Indeed, what used to cost thousands of dollars can be achieved today for little or no capital outlay and reach far wider audiences. Today’s technology allows us all to be broadcasters through YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and other media simply by using our imaginations and our smartphones in an effective manner.

Many Foreign Service Officers have talent and creativity and can develop innovative ways to send out Canada’s messages and share Canadian values in their countries of accreditation.

It is up to their political masters to harness these talents and use them judiciously.

Both songs are available for listening at https://soundcloud.com/search?q=eduardo del Buey

Eduardo del Buey served as a Foreign Service Officer for 37 years, including postings in Iran, Venezuela, Peru, Guatemala, Spain and Mexico. In addition, he served as Director for Strategic Communications and Spokesperson for the Secretaries General of the OAS in Washington and the Commonwealth in London, and as Deputy Spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. He is the author of Spokespersonry and Guerrilla Communications in English and Comunicologia Audaz in Spanish, as well as numerous articles on strategic communications in various publications.

The Alienation of Shamus Dikk

A Kafkaesque enigma by A Aalto

“As Samsa the cockroach woke one morning from uneasy dreams, he found himself transformed into a man named Kafka.” Dr Travato from the Department of Extreme Literature looked pleased with himself. The man in the other client chair – D Essex Mackinaw, the world’s driest shyster – snorted and said “Witty, Ben, and not incorrect, but hardly the most logical place to start. Why don’t you leave the introduction to me?” The prof said, “I’d just been waiting so long to use that!”¹

Mackinaw turned to me. “You will recall that your agency assisted the University in resolving the case of Caesar and the First Folio?” “Sure do. Hard to forget watching Big Julie get whacked, even in a holodeck.”

“A good segue. A few months ago, the University upgraded the computer controlling the holodeck by installing a powerful AI called HELIX. It did improve operations. But it got bored and began secretly seeking a way to project things from the holodeck into reality. Including people.”

“It linked up to the AI controlling a 3D bioprinter in the University’s life lab. The two AIs found a way to create blueprints for human clones based on the body-maps the holodecks use to generate visitors’ images in the deck. One glitch in the pilot project, though. A cockroach got into the reader and became part of one blueprint² and the clone came out as a copy of Franz Kafka.”

“Then HELIX had a brainstorm. Using the enormous database on which it had trained, it downloaded everything known about Kafka into a blank chip in the brain of the new creature. So HELIX had what he named a “revival” that believed it was, if not a Central European author who died in 1924, then his reincarnation. But how to explain the appearance of a new holodeck operator with such a familiar face? HELIX decided to tell Dr Travato.”

Unable to contain his enthusiasm, Dr Travato interjected, “We were delighted to learn what HELIX was doing. It really expanded the horizons of what we could achieve. I encouraged it to continue the project³. Meanwhile, I convinced the Department to let me hold a special seminar of my 1920s literature class, involving HELIX’s revivals of major authors who would know all about the people they represented. Also invited would be a major academic expert on each author.”

I shook my head like a Labrador shedding water. “I’m having trouble keeping track here⁴. What do you want me to do?”

D Essex restored his grip. “With Dr Travato’s encouragement, HELIX created six more revivals, making seven including Kafka. They all fell in with the idea, and preparations went ahead for the seminar. Then the bogus books began to appear.”

“What bogus books?” I asked. “Books in the style of 1920s authors but on topics none of them ever covered. Such as Pretentious Wines of Long Island 5 by Fitzgerald, Hemingway’s Accountancy for Dummies 6 and Home Appliances of the Rich and Famous 7 by DH Lawrence. Absurd. But they are making someone a great deal of money.”

Dr Travato added, “It has to be one of the seven revivals, but whoever it is hides behind darknet connections. We questioned HELIX, but it was prevented from answering directly by some kind of cyber block. All it could say is that one of the revivals was corrupted when it answered the dorm door to accept a pizza delivery and his chip was infected by the delivery guy’s electronic pad. The rogue revival is still fighting HELIX for control. We really need to find out which one is creating the bogus books. They have our university press imprint and are making us look like idiots.⁸”

“To say nothing,” said the lawyer tartly, “Of stopping an apparently hostile entity from taking over a dangerously powerful AI.” “Ah yes, of course, of course.”

I pushed in. “OK, let’s get this show on the road. How soon can I meet HELIX and the revivals⁹?” Trovato replied, “As it happens, the special seminar starts this afternoon, at the University. Would that do?” ‘Works for me. Let me make a phone call first, to get some backup.”

I phoned our techie Bugbyte and explained the situation. She had ideas for handling the rogue and suggested contacting Don Gordo Beluga in case distraction was needed.¹⁰ I told her to go ahead.

As we neared the University in Mackinaw’s limo, the prof got a text message. “It’s from HELIX. He says to see the twins on our way to the seminar. They are in the same building.” Another twist is all I needed at this point, but I asked him, “What twins?”

“Maxie and Moxie, the outcome of one of HELIX’s earlier experiments. It was trying to recreate the transporter room from Star Trek, to link the holodeck with reality. It convinced a grad student to go along and the experiment worked. Mostly. Her body-map was transported from the holodeck into the outside world and reincarnated there. But that meant there were two of her, with exactly the same bodies, memories and personalities right up to the transporter event, diverging after that. The legal and philosophical implications are appalling. The twins, however, are delighted.”

I asked, “Why Maxie and Moxie?” The prof said, “The student’s name was Hortense Hermione Harumph-Nagel. The twins went for something easier on the ear.¹¹ But more important, they aren’t chipped by HELIX, so they aren’t linked to the revivals. Ironically, the rogue has a crush on them, keeps sending them anonymous messages.” 12

In the Humanities building, Trovato led us upstairs and down corridors to a small lounge. A pair of identical young women were working at a table. One swore at a laptop, muttering “Just once I’d like to try a password and get the response…” and her twin finished it, “…close enough!” Then that twin looked up, scowled and said, “We’re late for poetry class. And nothing thymes with orange.” 13

The prof said, “Maxie, Moxie, we’re going to see if we can stop the rogue revival we talked about, the one that keeps sending you mash notes. HELIX texted me to see you before we went to the seminar.”

“Oh yeah,” said the one at the laptop, “HELIX asked us to give you this. We just printed it off.” She handed over two sheets of paper, one a blank chart and the other a list of clues. Trovato said, “I recognize this. It’s the pop quiz for the end of the seminar. You use the clues to fill in the chart. Why does our artificially intelligent friend think I need it? – I wrote it!”

The other twin replied, “HELIX said it was changed. If you complete the chart, there will be one box with incorrect information, and the revival in that column is the rogue. It still can’t just tell you the rogue’s name, but hopes this will be enough.”

I scanned the papers. Seven chairs on stage numbered left to right, seven different authors, seven different nationalities, six years of birth, seven different works, seven different facts about them. Piece of cake.

The author of Mrs Dalloway and the Irishman were both born in 1882.

Franz Kafka, in chair 3, wrote The Castle and worked days as an insurance clerk.

A Farewell to Arms was written by a distant cousin of the lyricist of the Star-Spangled Banner.

The Canadian is the youngest author, known for having beaten Hemingway in a boxing match.¹⁴

The German author of Steppenwolf in chair 6 is six years younger than Marcel Proust, the author of Remembrance of Things Past, in an adjacent chair.

James Joyce, in an odd-numbered chair, lived in exile in Zurich for both World Wars.

Hermann Hesse’s “famous work” became the name of a Canadian-American rock band.

F Scott Fitzgerald¹⁵ in chair 2, was born in 1886.

The author of That Summer in Paris, the American author born in 1883, and Virginia Woolf occupy four chairs in a row, in that order.

Morley Callaghan in chair 1 was born in 1903; the oldest author was born in 1871.

The Czech author’s chair number is one less than the UK author’s.

The name of the author in chair 4 appears in the title of a 1966 film starring Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor.

The French author in chair 7 holds the Guinness record for longest novel.

The author of Ulysses is in the chair to the left of the author born in 1877.

THE ALIENATION OF SHAMUS DIKK – BLANK CHART

The twin with the laptop said, “HELIX said you might need backup. Let us know.” I said I would. As we headed into the seminar, Mackinaw peeled off, looking thoughtful and saying he would join us later.

The seminar was in a large hall. On the stage, the revivals and the experts were arguing. The revivals claimed to know things because they were there. The experts kept saying that wasn’t good enough¹⁶. I found a table in the back with less noise and fewer flying books. A place to work on the puzzle while Trovato ran the show.

It didn’t take long to ID the rogue revival. I sent a note asking it to join me in a conference room the prof booked for the mid-afternoon break. The fact that the rogue showed up to meet a total stranger who mentioned a pizza delivery convinced me I was right. The gun pointing at me cinched it.

“Shamus Dikk, Private Eye? How trite. We had better in the 20s. And who’s the frail?” Bugbyte, who was sitting across the table behind a sleek black laptop, spoke for herself. “I’m the not-very-frail with her finger on a localized EMP that can fry that chip in your head with a single click.” Bugbyte had explained the Electro Magnetic Pulse generator to me 5 minutes before, although nothing stuck. The revival said, “Bet I can shoot you faster than you can click.” She replied, “If you enjoy gambling, please try. I have very fast reflexes. And then Shamus would shoot you with the Glock he’s holding in the pocket of his trench coat.” “So, a bit of a stalemate. Maybe I should just shoot your computer and destroy the EMP. I don’t think Dikk would shoot me to defend a machine.”

Then the stained glass window at the end of the room got smashed in by a big drone carrying a fat man in a loud purple suit, carrying a big stuffed panda in a top hat, blowing a vuvuzela and scattering lit firecrackers in all directions. It was Don Gordo,¹⁷ waving to an imaginary crowd of thousands and striding up the revival with his arms wide for a hug. The revival yelped and backed into a corner, gun trembling.

And the room’s giant screen lit up with the wrinkled face of D Essex Mackinaw. He waved his index finger at the revival and mouthed silent words of denunciation. “You’re on mute!” the room chorused. The screen image fiddled with his settings. “As I was saying, I have here an e-writ of habeus corpus.” Rallying, the revival spat, “I am not in custody, so how can an order for my release have any meaning?” ”The writ is not directed to you but to the chip in your head. Consider yourself served. Release that body.”

The revival looked on the ropes. Then the double doors to the room swung open to admit Maxie and Moxie in full showgirl feathers. They sashayed up to the revival, who watched in confused adoration as they sang:

Best let it slide, Clyde

Get a new gal, Hal

Don’t be too sad, Tad

Just be a pal.

We’re not what you think, Linc

Not what you crave, Dave

Listen to HELIX, Felix

Set yourself free.

“No! Stop! Too many prompts!” yelled the revival, clamping its hands over its ears¹⁸. Waving the gun wildly between targets, it finally fired at the laptop, which went up in a loud fizzle. Bugbyte looked down. “Actually, the EMP device was too big to hide in my slimline computer.” Don Gordo added, “But not too big to put inside an Extremely Modish Panda.” He squeezed the plush toy, and the room lit up with a harsh blue light. The wall screen, everyone’s cellphones and the drone all crashed and the coffee machine on the sideboard started spewing out kumquat frappuccinos¹⁹.

The revival slumped to the floor, shaking its head and muttering, “I hope they remember the extra pepperoni.” I hustled back to the seminar hall. On stage, the Czech expert was questioning Kafka. “Your works are deeply infused with the theme of alienation, exploring the sense of isolation and estrangement experienced by individuals in the modern world. I have dedicated my career to the concept. To what extent was it derived from your life?”

Kafka replied in what I guess was Czech: “Odcizení? Jaké odcizení? Jen jsem si dělal legraci. “The expert started chasing Kafka around the stage, screaming “Kéž tě rozdrtí lavina zvonkohry”. Trovato called a recess and came over. We discussed the wind-up of the case. Then I asked what Kafka said to get the expert so mad. He replied. “If my somewhat rusty Czech serves, Kafka said ‘Alienation? What alienation? I was just kidding.’ And the expert is shouting ‘May you be buried under an avalanche of glockenspiels.’” He paused. “Or maybe ‘crushed under a dumpster full of calliopes’²⁰. Could be a Nietzsche reference – I’ll have to ask Fotheringham.”

Academics….

Can you duplicate Shamus’ feat and indicate which revival went for the pizza and got body-snatched? Can you also explain the Samsa reference? Answers will be found on page 351.

A long-term member and associate member of PAFSO, Rob McDougall has been writing the A Aalto puzzles for bout since their inception in 1983. This is the 121st one. Thanks for inspiration to Kafka, David Cronenberg, Paul Simon, James Patrick Kelly and Star Trek, plus The Onion on alienation (see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEyFH-a-XoQ).

1. Academics are like that.

2. The classic “bug in the system”.

3. What could possibly go wrong, right?

4. Don’t worry, it gets worse.

5. Subtitled The Grape Gatsby

6. The Sum Also Rises. Although many hold there’s no accounting for dummies.

7. Lady Chatterley’s Hoover

8. Less difficult task in some cases than others.

9. Sounds like a really bad geezer rock band.

10. They are still trying to work out how he made the CN Tower disappear for half an hour.

11. No kidding.

12. Told you it would get more complicated.

13. No, it doesn’t.

14. The macho Hemingway never forgave him.

15 Not to be confused with his photojournalist brother, F Stop.

16 “It might be true in reality, but does it work in theory?”

17 Because of course it was.

18 Nearly braining itself with the gun, which didn’t help.

19 Default setting – who knew?

20 Either way, a truly obscure Bohemian curse.

Pardy’s Corner:
Coming “Home”

by Laurel and Michael Pardy

I realize that reading other people’s letters is a breach of privacy. However, letters left open on the dining room table are fair game for a peek, if only to ascertain to whom to return them.

Thus it happened that I inadvertently, and uncomfortably, got what I deserved — the truth. The letter was from my son to a friend back in East Africa, the location of our last posting from which we had returned fairly recently. It contained a version of his daily life that was unedited for parental consumption.

In my efforts to cope with my own re-entry trauma, I must have been sending out signals that said, “Don’t bother me. I bought you new clothes, what more do you want?”

I knew that they had been buddies for three years but felt that I had managed their farewells with creditable skill. There had been parties, a special safari during which they could camp together, photographs taken, addresses exchanged, even two phone calls after our return to Canada.

Besides, that was six months ago, at the beginning of summer. Now we were all, so I thought, caught up in the joy and exhilaration of planning a big Canadian family Christmas.

Because he had not said anything directly to me, I had assumed that my son had slid contentedly, comfortably back into his Canadian skin. Only partially, as I was to discover . . .

Dear Kamoya,

I wanted to ‘phone you but my parents are still having a fit over the ‘phone bill from last time.

Well, things are better than when I last wrote. I’m beginning to make a few friends but no one I can really talk to. All they’re interested in is cars and drinking beer.

And my parents — they’re so wrapped up in relatives and plans for their ski holiday they don’t care what I think. I’d rather spend Christmas beside the Indian Ocean with you than in some snowbound village in Alberta.

I was eight years old when I left here the last time, nearly half my lifetime ago. Everyone is still telling me how much I’ve grown. What did they expect after seven years?

Something happened last week that maybe I shouldn’t tell you about. But I was really shocked and upset. There is this gorgeous new girl in my calculus class. She is from Viet Nam and a real brain. Anyhow, since we live in the same part of the city, I drove her to the Christmas dance along with Daniel Nkomah (the guy from the Nigerian embassy, remember?) and his date.

Hardly anyone spoke to us all evening and no one came to sit with us. One teacher! even took me aside and suggested that I would “fit in” better if I mixed with people more like myself. I guess I’m really naive — at first I didn’t know what he meant. I kept thinking, “This is Canada!”

Speaking of girls. They are really different than the girls at the International School. They wear tons of make-up/warpaint (like American Indians) and play little head games with you. I never know where I am with them.

My parents keep bugging me about my marks and nagging me to study harder. Then in the next breath they want me to join the school band, go on dates, play soccer, etc., etc. I wish they’d make up their minds whether they want a jock or a brain. Thank goodness the courses at A.I.S. were so good, I can really coast through and still pass.

I’m beginning to catch up with the music scene at last. All the stuff we practised so hard is unknown here. And no one likes jazz. All teeny bopper rock. Yuk! They only like music after someone tells them it is popular.

I’ve got to end this now. Sorry this letter is such a downer. It’s really not that bad. I’m finally beginning to feel at home. And despite all the things that are different, I have a sense of belonging here even though I miss East Africa.

Write soon, your friend

Sean

P.S. Wish me luck on the “family” Christmas. I won’t know anybody!

Laurel Pardy is a writer and spouse of now-retired Foreign Service Officer Gar Pardy. Michael is their son.

The Washington Mood

The following article was adapted from informal remarks made by Derek Burney, Ambassador to the USA, on May 14 in Ottawa to the PAFSO Professional Committee. These written remarks were provided by Neil Reeder, Executive Assistant to the Ambassador.

Unquestionably, success in the Gulf War gave Americans a surge of national pride; self-confidence and satisfaction in their military victory; in their advanced technology; and in their leaders, some of whom, like General Schwarzkopf, became heroes on a scale usually reserved only for athletes! That was one level of the prevailing mood and it was authentically American: one of unabashed emotion and genuine pride.

Beneath the euphoria, however, were signs of a less confident and more querulous America. The sweetness of military victory was diluted somewhat by the unforeseen plight of the Kurdish refugees, the staying power of Saddam Hussein and the seemingly unchanged rigidity of Middle East political problems. More to the point, underneath the high gloss of victory in the Gulf, then as now, the USA faces serious domestic challenges: education, urban and infrastructure decay, crime, drugs, race and a stagnant economy. Neither the necessary solutions nor the required resources are readily at hand and the competition for what resources are available is becoming more vocal and stronger than ever.

It is ironic that, as the walls come down elsewhere, as democratic and capitalistic values increasingly are in the ascendancy virtually everywhere, even in Albania, there are now growing doubts in the USA itself about its future, and doubts in particular about whether things will indeed continue to get better. The remaining superpower is also in a real sense a lonely superpower. It is still determined to take the lead internationally (and is doing so) but it is less certain and even less committed than when the world was defined more simply, and more sharply, in two camps. The USA sees itself today as being threatened more by the growing economic power of its friends, such as Japan and Germany, than it was by the military power of its former arch-rival. Not surprisingly, public polls in the USA suggest that the protection of American jobs is considered to be the number one foreign policy concern of Americans. In the public’s mind, the major threat to the USA is Japan’s economic power and, ironically, the USSR is now viewed as fourth on the list of “most-liked” nations. Canada continues to be ranked as number one in the “most-liked” category, but that is not necessarily a source of satisfaction for some of our compatriots.

The Bush Administration remains confident, coherent and competent in managing what has suddenly become a vastly different international situation than the one it inherited. The overwhelming success in the Gulf war and American management of the coalition forces were singular successes for the President and for his foreign policy team. While doubts may persist about his national strategic vision, few find fault with Bush’s decisive leadership or with his tactical skills. (And, as the pundits say, you cannot discount his numbers!)

International Priorities are Clear

The USA search for success in the Middle East persisted even with limited signs of progress. The window of opportunity was thought to be narrowing, yet most observers continued to see Bush and Baker as the best equipped American team ever to cajole something useful from their unprecedented Gulf venture. Their creative dynamism also achieved something in parallel on strategic arms control.

That being said, the disintegration of the USSR poses a very different challenge for the USA and for all Western governments. How to find the right balance between support for democratic and economic reform in the USSR and at the same time support the Republics is a key question for the USA and Canada alike. Our European colleagues formerly attached less significance to the aspirations of the Republics. For different reasons, such as geography, they placed a much higher premium on political stability for stability’s sake. There was also a strong desire in Germany to ensure the speedy departure of Soviet troops.

Washington, or the Administration at least (and never forget that there is not really a single government in Washington — negotiations between the Administration and Congress can often be as arduous as are the negotiations between the USA and foreign entities), wants to achieve what it can while it can from Moscow. At the same time, it seems to push arms agreements ahead, support real reform where it finds it, and continue to build on the new thinking in Moscow on many international political issues. This is a delicate and tricky manoeuvre, fraught with risk and uncertainty, but one which does not lend itself to the tidy strategies which academics or pundits prefer.

As the global equation shifts dramatically from Cold War security issues and alliances to global economic competitiveness, I suspect that American relations with Europe and with Japan are likely to become rather more difficult and more fractious. The Gulf war triggered new debates about international burden-sharing, and new rounds of finger-pointing, at Japan in particular. Preemptive lunges of unilateralism by the American Congress (without the Administration’s blessing) may become more tempting than ever. This helps explain in part why the Uruguay Round on tariff negotiations remains a priority for the Administration (if not for Congress) and creates a continuing source of American tension with Europe and Japan. This explains, as well, the current friction over monetary policy. The USA remains determined to stimulate economic growth through the means of lower interest rates. Others in the G-7, including Canada but particularly Germany, are putting more emphasis and faith in measures to check inflation.

Remember too that American leadership on international economics used to be accepted as more or less automatic. It is not so today and this is now becoming most evident in the G-7 Economic Summit context. (Surely the most privileged association membership which we Canadians have!)

Grassroots America tends to see an unfair world out there which is buying up large chunks of America, squeezing American imports through so-called “unfair” subsidies and non-tariff barriers to US trade of one kind or another — all protectionist measures which are claimed not to exist in the “land of the free”.

Remember too that Congress, because it is closer to the grassroots’ sentiments of America, tends to be very parochial on economic matters. It is equally leery of America’s global responsibility for maintaining and defending the open global trading system (or even trans-national institutions). Grassroots America tends to see an unfair world out there which is buying up large chunks of America, squeezing American imports through so-called “unfair” subsidies and non-tariff barriers to US trade of one kind or another — all protectionist measures which are claimed not to exist in the “land of the free” — or so they would like us to believe.

Where Does Canada Fit?

Fortunately, I believe Canada is well positioned in Washington these days to deal with the good, the bad, and the ugly. Relations at the top are excellent and set the standard for constructive effort. Access is unprecedented in quality and frequency and can lead to influence if, and as, we choose to exercise it.

However, this may not last as Canada too could become a victim of the parochial whims and whips of Congress. Accordingly, we need to be more vigilant to use the instruments and the leverage which is available to us to defend and promote our national and foreign policy interests. The Free Trade Agreement gives us a unique bilateral instrument to that end, but is not now, nor ever will be, a universal solvent. The relationship will continue to evolve. The recent action by the USA Administration in challenging the binational panel decision on pork (a decision which had been in Canada’s favour) was a classic example of the politics of domestic interest groups and parochial expedience in Washington prevailing over the principles and obligations of an international agreement. (The incident had relatively little to do with pork and more to do with the somewhat desperate attempt by the Administration to shore up support for the Fast Track).

The recent renewal of NORAD (title amended in 1991 to the North American Aerospace Defence Command), unheralded and unreported as it was, represents one of the quiet successes of our bilateral partnership. Frankly, it places the two countries in a unique category of cost-efficient cooperation on defence and security issues which no other two countries come close to having.

The success in Congress on the Clean Air Act and the negotiation of the Acid Rain Accord were singular achievements for which many individuals on both sides of the 49th parallel struggled persistently for more than a decade. They represent the triumph of reason over parochialism, constitute a tribute to perseverance and unrelenting political pressure, and guarantee a major dividend of the bilateral relationship as a whole.

Now, if I may, let me conclude with a pet theme which may verge on being a sermon of sorts. Some choose to measure success with the USA by the extent of our political differences. I find that a very shallow standard and one that achieves very little if anything for Canada’s interests, let alone Canadian foreign policy objectives. I have no difficulty defining myself as a Canadian in positive terms to Americans and I have no difficulty in celebrating the success of our most vital relationship; whether on trade, environment, or defence, or on more nuanced international issues. Nor do I have any problem in expressing our real differences to Americans which reflect Canadian interests or views.

I have no difficulty defining myself as a Canadian in positive terms to Americans and I have no difficulty in celebrating the success of our most vital relationship; whether on trade, environment, or defence, or on more nuanced international issues.

Where and when we differ, we must assert our differences clearly, confidently and firmly in the hope that in doing so we can influence the USA to adapt to, to share, or even to accept our reasoning. We should not, however, assert our differences simply for the sake of a headline or in some false attempt to shore up our separate identity. This would be folly.

We are different. Canadians have different attitudes about running a country and a different outlook on the world which reflect our very different role and capacity in that world. I can say confidently that Canada is very different in many ways — most of them good differences. If you do not believe me, come on down and see for yourself.

We Canadians also have a country worth preserving and I hope that is something on which we can all agree.

Derek Burney joined External Affairs as a Foreign Service Officer in 1963. He had postings in Wellington and Tokyo, and served as Ambassador to Korea. From March 1987 until December 1988, Mr. Burney served as Chief of Staff to the Prime Minister, and was directly involved in the negotiation of the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement. In January 1989, Mr. Burney became Canada’s fifteenth Ambassador to the United States, where he was serving at time of writing.

Cambodia: Supervising Elections in the Killing Fields

by Barbara Shenstone

As I came down the steep bank towards the boat, I noticed the crowd of children by the water’s edge. They were not making much commotion, but obviously there was something of interest in the water. “It’s a body,” my partner said, “I think it’s been tortured. Where are the Civpol?”

Diane turned back towards the UN truck at the top of the slope. As she radioed for the UN police (Civpol), I stood looking down the bank towards the Mekong River. There were adults on the bank. After a few minutes I did go closer. As Diane said, we had to know what was going on. We both took one look.

The corpse was the bloated remains of a man who had suffered greatly before his death. As he floated on his back, I could see his hands were tied above his head to a pole; he wore a black shirt and pants, but his chest and genitals were exposed, revealing bloody gashes and what looked like burns. The face was pulp.

I remember thinking afterwards how matter-of-fact we were that morning — all of us, not only Diane and myself, but also the people of the village, the Cambodian police, and our colleagues in the UN police. Although the situation was shocking, we behaved as though it was all in a day’s work.

In retrospect, it was all in a day’s work that year, from May 1992 to June 1993, when 35 Canadians like myself were posted as district election supervisors for the United Nations in Cambodia.

This was not the last time we were to come across corpses in the river. In the months leading up to the elections of May 1993, lawlessness and political violence coloured every aspect of life in Cambodia. Although we tried to take on the role of referees, we were helpless to control or even understand the events we witnessed.

There were about 400 district electoral supervisors (known familiarly as DES) in Cambodia, representing about 50 different nationalities. Among the 16,000 other civilian and military personnel, we enjoyed a unique status as volunteers.

The pay was minimal; the job was enormous. We were the front-line “grunts” of the UN. Deployed in twos or threes in each district of the country, our job was to make the election happen: first by organizing the registration of voters, and later the polls themselves.

Setting up an office in each district, hiring local staff, training them, identifying temporary registration sites, spreading the word in each community, supervising teams of registrars, and trouble-shooting — this was the job.

It also meant liaising with local political factions, including the infamous Khmer Rouge, as well as the many new political parties that burgeoned in the country during those eventful months. Later, it meant investigating complaints and violations of the election campaign rules, using whatever means we could to persuade the political parties (and the police and military connected with them) to desist from violence and intimidation.

To encourage political activity and the voters themselves, we also undertook extensive civic education programs to inform Cambodians about their political and human rights, how to vote, and above all, in order to protect them from intimidation, the secrecy of the vote.

We were the front-line “grunts” of the UN.

Cambodia was a difficult place to work. The country had been destroyed by more than 25 years of war. Largely agricultural, much of the land was now unusable because of land mines. There was really no post office or communications system, let alone health care. What were once roads were now intermittent tracks that had become impassable in the rainy season or at best a series of mud pits that sucked a 4 by 4 vehicle to the top of its wheel hubs in seconds. There was a small and corrupt civil administration and a skeletal school system for those who could afford it. It was not unusual for teachers (who earned $15 to $20 per month) and others to go without pay for six months at a time.

All this meant that many districts were isolated and difficult to get around. The countryside was lawless. It was difficult to find qualified personnel to do the clerical work involved in an election. To get to our districts, we spent many hours travelling by truck, boat, or helicopter. Once there, we were often cut off from other UN components, although we had radio communications. Within a district, the DES and the Cambodian staff working with them moved by UN truck, UN helicopter, motorcycle, pony or ox cart, and often on foot.

For those of us who had not seen an operation of this size, we were amazed how much equipment we were constantly moving: diesel for trucks, drinking water, office supplies, posters and pamphlets, tarps, generators, and electrical gear like extension cords, plastic card laminators, cameras, lamps, fans. All of it had to be delivered, warehoused, loaded on and off vehicles and boats, set up and taken down in the right places, and kept track of.

On top of this, the climate of Cambodia was extremely hot and humid, making any physical activity arduous. Everyone was vulnerable to malaria, dengue fever, dysentery, hepatitis, and those other famous tropical diseases. If someone fell sick or injured, help was difficult to get.

Although the DES were the outermost arm of the UN, we were always conscious of being part of a gigantic operational machine. Supporting us was a great network of people organizing supplies, working out procedures, producing videos and posters. An election office worked at the provincial level, and another at the national level. The UN was committed to planning, organizing, and delivering the entire election.

Elections were one of several major tasks the UN had committed itself to carrying out in Cambodia. As DES were scrambling to organize voter registration, UN military components were attempting to get the four Cambodian military factions to demobilize, as the factions had promised in the Paris Agreement of October 1991. The UN was also monitoring Cambodia’s borders, verifying the withdrawal of foreign troops, and seeing that no new troops or weapons were coming in.

The UN Civil Administration component was taking charge of key ministries in the existing Cambodian government to put an end to the worst abuses of power, smoothing the path for a “free and fair” election and a transition to peace and democracy.

About 350,000 Cambodian refugees, most of them in camps along the Thai border, were returning home and resettled with the help of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR).

At first, the only other UN presence the DES ran into in many districts were the UN police, known as Civpol. Civpol were small units of 10 persons drawn from the national police forces of about 40 UN member states. Their role was to supervise the local police, investigate complaints of human rights violations, keep an eye on returned refugees to see they were not being harassed, and help DES at registration and voting sites, and in their travels throughout the districts.

The UN’s plans for Cambodia were ambitious. As events unfolded over the first six months, things were not working out as originally planned. The failure to demobilize and disarm the military factions, and the refusal of the Khmer Rouge to take part in the elections, were the first major setbacks.

By late 1992, the Khmer Rouge had reneged on the promises made in Paris, stepping up attacks on villages and closing their regions to the UN. They also began a new policy of murdering ethnic Vietnamese residents of Cambodia. They apparently wanted nothing to do with UN efforts to hold an election.

The UN Civil Administration component also came up largely empty-handed. By all appearances it failed to take hold of the existing government structures with authority, thus undermining the confidence of other military factions, including the Khmer Rouge. Gross corruption continued unchecked. Police and army elements continued to intimidate and even murder political opponents.

The UN Civilian Police failed to worked effectively either, for a variety of reasons, among them language problems, poor training, and cultural tensions, contributing, on occasion, to an embarrassing show of incompetence and cultural insensitivity, or an infuriating display of sloth and an unco-operative disposition. For example, the tortured corpse that floated ashore in Kroch Chhmar District was never identified. The investigation was quickly dropped because, as the Civpol explained, “We think he was only a robber anyway.”

While things looked glum by early 1993, there had been success on two fronts. The repatriation of refugees, although behind schedule, was taking place in a generally orderly fashion. Many refugees tended to settle in urban areas, but some did end up in districts like Kroch Chhmar. There, because of their education, their influence was felt almost immediately by the UN. For those DES looking for staff to act as registrars and polling officials, they were invaluable. Not only were they literate, but they were also already familiar with many concepts of democracy and human rights.

The other big success was voter registration. Over 4.5 million Cambodians had registered by early January, 1993. This represented almost 100 per cent of the estimated voter population of the country, surpassing everybody’s expectations. Many DES viewed the results with some scepticism. While people had turned out in large numbers to get voter cards, would they actually vote on Election Day? We were not convinced that Cambodians really understood what the card was for. In any case, political events threatened to overtake the whole process and render the election a farce, if not a blood bath.

The security situation was going from bad to worse in many districts of the country. Kroch Chhmar District, about 150 km northwest of Phnom Penh up the Mekong River, was typical. Before Christmas a boat carrying eight Vietnamese fishermen was attacked on a creek not far from the UN office. Four people died, and another disappeared without trace. The assailants were never identified. The local police blamed the Khmer Rouge. Although seven political parties made efforts to open campaign offices, local authorities launched what looked like a concerted effort to intimidate and frighten as many people as possible. Villagers suspected of joining rival political parties were rounded up and forced to sign contracts renouncing any connection with these parties. Inflammatory pamphlets and posters, some of them clever imitations of UN posters, were printed. A number of Cambodians told us they would suffer if they were even seen speaking to an official from a rival party. The local authorities also seemed to be testing the UN, for instance, dropping hints that election offices would be attacked. Cambodian UN staff were harassed and threatened by local army and police. At the end of January, a member of the FUNCINPEC party was murdered in his bed. He had visited our UN office only a few weeks before to complain that he feared for his life.

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Unloading ballot boxes in Kroch Chhmar

On April 8, a Japanese DES, Atsuhito Nakata, and a Cambodian interpreter, Lay Sopheak, were brutally killed in an isolated district of Kampong Thom province. Atsu was found dead under a UN truck, where he had apparently crawled to get away from his assailants. He had been shot several times, and beaten about the face with a rifle butt. Sopheak, a returned refugee, died later that day of gunshot wounds to the stomach.

For many DES in Cambodia, this event marked a turning point. We were angry about Sopheak and Atsu’s deaths. The political temperature of the country was rising dramatically and it was time to take measures and even rethink the entire mission. We thought that some UN military and Civpol units had been downright negligent in their duties. It outraged many DES that the first person on the scene for Atsu and Sopheak had been another DES, and that both Civpol and the military unit in that region (a notoriously hot one) had hesitated and delayed taking action, even after repeated requests from Atsu’s partner who had heard Sopheak’s call for help on his truck radio.

It did not console us to learn later that Atsu and Sopheak were not killed by Khmer Rouge, as was first thought, but probably by a disgruntled soldier who had been turned down for a job as a polling official in Atsu’s district. The DES had been saying for months that the dangers all UN staff faced in the districts came not only from the Khmer Rouge, but equally from the other still-armed factions and the general lawlessness of the country.

Since December, the DES had stressed to headquarters in Phnom Penh concerns about security. We repeatedly asked two questions. With so many weapons and soldiers around, how was the UN to guarantee a “free and fair” election? Given that the factions had not put down their weapons as originally planned, what new measures was the UN taking?

The official answer had always been very frustrating, “Stop being negative. You DES should do your job and leave the rest to the experts.”

In fairness to the top ranks of the UN, even before the deaths of Atsu and Sopheak, some changes were taking place in the UN. If the elections did not take place, or became a farce, the UN could be held accountable for one of the most expensive failures in its history. All components, including military and Civpol, were slowly making the elections the focus of their work. In my opinion, however, the deaths galvanized a new focus, energy, and determination by all the components by the end of April.

Security became paramount in every district. In Kroch Chhmar a company of large and fierce-looking Indian soldiers from Kashmir moved in. They set up camp underneath our office, a traditional wooden house on stilts, with sentries, sandbags, trenches, wire — the whole kit. They began making armed patrols throughout the district, letting it be known that if any groups were interested, they were looking forward to having it out with them. From then on, DES and Cambodian UN staff moved whenever possible with an armed escort.

DES also worked closely with unarmed UN military and naval observers who were assigned in teams to each district. Their job was to keep tabs on the armed factions, monitor troop and weapons movements, and advise DES about unsafe areas for travel. In Kroch Chhmar, we worked mostly with naval observers from New Zealand, Britain, and Canada — a great bunch of guys — hard-working, professional, and brave.

Political tensions continued to rise as the elections approached. The Khmer Rouge leadership had left Phnom Penh and cut off communications with the UN in early April. In many parts of the country Khmer Rouge troops were on the move, gathering in larger groups, apparently in preparation for new operations. Khmer Rouge leaders announced they would do all they could to disrupt the elections, predicting a blood bath.

UN staff in the districts lived with sickening feelings of tension and dread. We constantly reworked plans for the poll. We agonized over the location of polling stations. Which ones were more likely to be attacked? How could we protect them? There was the Cambodian polling staff to worry about, and, as the election was to take place over six days, the ballot boxes. They had to be transported and protected at night, and eventually delivered to the provincial centre where the counting would take place.

To the DES, it seemed an endless balancing act, and to many a bluff, because we all knew (and the Cambodian staff working with us knew even better) how easy it would be to make it all go horribly wrong. One day I asked an interpreter what the rest of the staff feared most about election day. He said they did not fear a large-scale military attack from the Khmer Rouge. They feared a man on a motorscooter driving past a polling station and tossing a grenade into the crowd. This scenario haunted all our plans and preparations.

Against all the odds, the voters came by the thousands — rowdy soldiers, saffron-robed monks, ancient women bent double, young girls, families.

By the middle of May, we had reduced the number of planned voting centres to the bare minimum. In two communes in Kroch Chhmar district, we eliminated voting centres altogether, hoping people would be willing to walk the six, seven or even ten kilometres to the next commune. In several areas we no longer dared venture at all, for fear of making ourselves targets for the growing number of Khmer Rouge who appeared to be collecting there. Elsewhere, we took circuitous routes by river or track to avoid hot spots, where we feared ambushes or mines.

Three days before the election, it began to rain. The country became a river of mud. In our district, a lake appeared in front of one polling station, cutting it off from the road. The voting materials and boxes would have to be carried across the lake on people’s heads or with ox or pony carts — twice a day for three days. Still, we consoled ourselves that at least at this voting centre it would be hard to drive a grenade-laden motorscooter within lobbing range.

Torrents fell all night before the first day of the election. UN staff braced themselves for a low turnout at the polls. We had expected the first day might be slow in any case, as voters were likely to be cautious.

What took place, however, was one of the most moving sights I have ever witnessed. Against all the odds, the voters came by the thousands — rowdy soldiers, saffron-robed monks, ancient women bent double, young girls, families. They waited in the rain before the polls opened at 7 am, having slogged through mud and rain, waded across lakes, and trudged or bicycled for miles in the dark. They came in large numbers all day the first day, and the ballot boxes filled to bursting.

As DES, we knew from our civic education efforts that Cambodians were keen to vote, but this surpassed all expectations. The turnout was enormous all over the country. I asked the Cambodian presiding officer with whom I worked what he made of it all.

“Satharioh,” I said, “will everyone who got a voter card come to vote?” Satharioh looked at me as though I had two heads. “Of course,” he said, “all Cambodian people want to vote.”

Over half the population had voted by the first evening. By the last day, the turnout was 90 per cent country-wide, and in some districts an incredible 99 per cent.

Although there was some isolated violence, the Khmer Rouge did not after all make much effort to disrupt the election. It is still a mystery why. Was a deal with one of the political parties made behind the scenes at the last minute? Did the Khmer Rouge not have the strength they pretended? Or did they realize there was little to be gained from interfering in an activity that was so enthusiastically engaged in by so many Cambodian people?

Most DES loved their work in Cambodia. Although they were part of a gigantic, multi-faceted UN mission, the nature of their work, as well as their isolation, meant that they actually enjoyed great personal freedom and individual responsibility. The work was different every day. We dealt with real problems and issues; and we had enormous satisfaction. Amidst all the frustrations, we, the DES, used to say that we had the best jobs in Cambodia.

Barbara Shenstone did development work in Zimbabwe and, at time of writing, was a consultant at Elections Canada and World University Service of Canada.

The Canadian Foreign
Service on June 2

So, what does the foreign service do, anyway?

This special edition answers what happens on an average day in the life of the foreign service. The day is June 2.

It follows a foreign service which never sleeps. We start at one minute past midnight at headquarters in Ottawa. Overseas, the day is half over in our Asian posts; Europe and Africa are waking up at dawn; and our posts in the United States, Latin America and the Caribbean are asleep. When Ottawa is preparing Ministers to respond to events in the morning, our Asia posts are ending their work days; European, African and Middle Eastern posts are in the middle of their days; and posts in Latin America and the United States are just opening. When the Ottawa day ends, dawn breaks on a new day in Asia.

Two departments are the homes of the foreign service — the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade and the Department of Citizenship and Immigration.

The Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade

The Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT) “promotes and defends the interests of Canada and the common values of Canadians around the world. It seeks to improve Canadians’ awareness of the world and serve Canadians abroad.”

Yes, but what does it really do? Well, it pursues Canadian political, economic and cultural relations internationally; it is Canada’s negotiator with other countries or in multilateral arenas; it advises on international developments; it helps Canadian business in international markets; it attracts foreign investment and technology to Canada; it fosters international law; it promotes international peace and security; it delivers Canadian aid overseas; it helps distressed Canadians abroad; and it manages Canada’s missions around the world.

The department has two Ministers — the Minister of Foreign Affairs, André Ouellet and the Minister for International Trade, Roy MacLaren — and two Secretaries of State — one for Latin America and Africa, Christine Stewart and the other for Asia-Pacific, Raymond Chan.

It has a Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, a Deputy Minister for International Trade and an Associate Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs who are career civil servants. They are the chief policy advisors for the Ministers and are responsible for the administration and management of the department.

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Managing Canada’s relations in an ever-changing, fast-moving world - Minister Ouellet

Ten Assistant Deputy Ministers head the five geographic, four functional and corporate services branches. These branches are supported by the Communications Bureau, the Policy Staff, and the Office of Protocol. In addition, senior officials head up small units on special priorities such as the Ambassador for Environment, the Ambassador for Fisheries Conservation, the Ambassador for Circumpolar Affairs, the Senior Coordinator for Federal-Provincial Relations and the Chief Air Negotiator.

The four functional branches — International Business Development; Trade and Economic Policy; Political and International Security Affairs; and Legal, Consular and Security Affairs — head the march for what is the policy relative to the grand questions of international commerce, economics and policy. The five geographical sections (Africa and the Middle East; Asia and Pacific; Europe; Latin America and Caribbean; and the United States) administer the relations of Canada with their regions respectively.

The Department of Citizenship and Immigration

The Department of Citizenship and Immigration “promotes Canada’s goals of a prosperous, tolerant and humanitarian society by maximising the benefits of the global movement of people.”

Yes, and in real life? The department defends membership in the Canadian society; manages entry into Canada; recruits immigrants and protects legitimate refugees; administers the Citizenship Act and the Immigration Act; and advises on the global movement of people.

The Minister of Citizenship and Immigration is Sergio Marchi. He is supported by a Deputy Minister and four Assistant Deputy Ministers (Corporate; Policy; National Service; and International Service Sector). Three directorates (Ministerial and Executive Services; Public Affairs, and Legal Services) offer common services.

The Corporate Sector looks after human and financial resources; the Policy Sector analyzes trends, legislation and issues. The National Services Sector treats the integration of newcomers to Canadian society, the administration of border points-of-entry, citizenship, enforcement, immigrant landings and the in-Canada processing of visitor and immigrant applications. The International Service Sector delivers the refugee programs, issues visas and undertakes the immigrant selection at posts abroad. The Immigration and Refugee Board, an independent quasi-judicial tribunal, carries out immigration and detention reviews, immigration appeals and refugee determination.

Missions Abroad

Canada has 111 posts abroad. There are 22 in Africa and the Middle East; 20 in Asia-Pacific; 33 in Europe; 16 in Latin America; 12 in the United States; and 8 missions accredited to international organizations such as the United Nations, the European Communities, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

June 2: So What’s Up?

What does a June 2 snapshot of the foreign service capture?

International conflicts Rwanda, Haiti, and Bosnia. On June 2, members of the foreign service in headquarters and posts are closely monitoring and providing advice on what Canada can do to end misery and promote peace in these three international hotspots.

The Ministers’ days Minister Ouellet attends a Cabinet meeting and Question Period in the House of Commons in Ottawa and then travels to Quebec City to give a speech. Minister MacLaren is in London. He meets with his British counterpart and the President of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. Minister Marchi is in Ottawa, attending Cabinet meetings in the morning and afternoon as well as participating in Question Period in the afternoon. Secretary of State (Latin America and Africa) Stewart is in Colombia. She meets with the Colombian President and his Cabinet and has dinner with Canadian aid organizations. Secretary of State (Asia and Pacific) Chan is in Vancouver.

Policy decisions Some are seemingly mundane; others have wide importance. All require a political decision. On June 2 some of the issues are: the directions of the parliamentary review of foreign policy; a program of special measures for the acceptance of immigrants from the former Yugoslavia; the Export Development Corporation’s financing to China; Haitian athletes and les Jeux de la Francophonie; Canadian panelists to the NAFTA panel on apples; international reaction to new Canadian fisheries legislation; clothing imports from the Middle East; commercial relations with Cuba; and the future of the Commonwealth Committee of Foreign Ministers on Southern Africa.

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Minister MacLaren: This man means business, international business.

Canadians abroad The members of the foreign service are helping Canadians overseas. There is an earthquake in Indonesia and the Embassy checks up on the safety of the five Canadians working in the area. In Rwanda, the Embassy is looking for Canadian nuns caught in the fighting of the civil war. The Canadian Embassy in Moscow is evacuating a Canadian businessman injured in a robbery. In Delhi, the High Commission visits a young Canadian prisoner awaiting trial.

Trade and investment INCO, Goodyear, Bell Canada, Northern Telecom and Atomic Energy Canada visit the department seeking information on marketing and financing opportunities in Japan, Russia, Indonesia, Kazakhstan and other countries. In Kuwait, the Embassy holds a press conference to support a Canadian truck manufacturer’s bid to provide vehicles to the Kuwait military. Senior Canadian officials open secret negotiations with Chile in the Canadian Embassy in Mexico on the expansion of the North America Free Trade Agreement.

Immigration Approximately 1,000 new immigrants and refugees are accepted on June 2 by the foreign service. Thousands of visas are being reviewed in forty eight processing offices in missions abroad.

Political and economic policies Protecting Canadian fishing resources of the East and West Coast, ensuring the access of Canadian agricultural products to the United States, forging Canadian commercial links in Asia, particularly China, pushing a Canadian candidate to head the OECD, forging a substantive relationship with the European Union to protect Canadian trade and investment, promoting the peace process in the Middle East, assisting the peaceful transition to majority rule in South Africa, participating in the public and parliamentary reviews of Canadian immigration and foreign policies, and preparing Canada for the G-7 Summits in Naples this year and in Halifax next year are all issues that members of the foreign service are actively working on today.

International Political and Economic Meetings NATO, the principal defence alliance of Western Europe and North America, the OECD, the forum for the major economic industrialized countries of Europe, North America and Asia Pacific, and the Organization of American States are all holding ministerial meetings in early June. The foreign service is preparing Canadian ministers for these meetings.

Minister Ouellet attends Question Period then travels to Quebec City. Minister MacLaren is in London. Minister Marchi is in Ottawa, attending Cabinet. Secretary of State Stewart is in Colombia and Secretary of State Chan is in Vancouver.

Bilateral visits Members of the foreign service are laying the groundwork for visits of Ministers and Heads of Government, both Canadian Ministers to foreign countries and foreign Ministers to Canada.

Prime Minister Chrétien is visiting the UK and France from June 2 to June 8 to attend the ceremonies commemorating the Normandy landing of the Allies fifty years ago in 1944. Minister Ouellet will be in Paris and Istanbul for the OECD and NATO ministerial meetings. Minister MacLaren is in London on June 2, then travelling to Brussels for consultations with the European Union. He finishes his trip with a visit to Paris for the OECD Ministerial meeting and the Canada-France Joint Commission. Secretary of State Stewart is visiting Ecuador and Colombia on June 2 and 3 and then goes to Brazil for the OAS Annual Assembly. Minister Marchi is preparing a visit to Europe which will include Russia, Hungary and Italy to promote cooperation on immigration and trade between Canada and these countries.

Then, coming to Canada is Argentine President Carlos Saul Menem on June 20. Preparations are well underway. Other visits to Canada being prepared on June 2 are those of the Mongolian Foreign Relations Minister, the Czech Minister of Industry and Trade and the Croatian Foreign Minister.

This then is what happened on June 2. The day is about to begin.

Le service extérieur du Canada, le 2 juin

«Ainsi, que fait donc le service extérieur?»

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Secretary of State Chan, immersed in constituents’ concerns in Richmond.

Ce numéro spécial donne un instantané de ce qui se passe une journée typique, le 2 juin 1994, dans la vie du service extérieur.

Il suit pas à pas un service extérieur toujours en alerte. Nous commençons à minuit et une minute, à l’administration centrale à Ottawa. Outre-mer, la journée est déjà à moitié terminée dans nos missions en Asie; c’est l’aurore en Europe et en Afrique; et nos missions aux États-Unis, en Amérique Latine et aux Caraïbes dorment encore. Lorsque Ottawa prépare ses ministres à réagir aux événements au cours des premières heures de la journée, nos missions en Asie sont sur le point de fermer; nos missions en Europe, en Afrique et au Moyen-Orient fonctionnent à plein régime, au milieu de leurs journées; et nos missions en Amérique Latine et aux États-Unis viennent tout juste d’ouvrir. Au moment où la journée à Ottawa s’achève, l’aurore annonce une nouvelle journée en Asie.

Deux ministères abritent le service extérieur — le ministère des Affaires étrangères et du Commerce international et le ministère de la Citoyenneté et de l’Immigration.

Le ministère des Affaires étrangères et du Commerce international

Le ministère des Affaires étrangères et du Commerce international (AÉCI) a pour mission «de promouvoir et de défendre dans le monde les intérêts du Canada et les valeurs communes des Canadiens, d’aider les Canadiens à mieux connaître le monde extérieur et de servir les Canadiens au pays et à l’étranger».

Oui, mais, que fait-il vraiment? Eh bien, il fait la promotion des relations politiques, économiques et culturelles du Canada à l’échelle internationale; il est le négociateur du Canada avec d’autres pays ou dans le cadre de représentations multilatérales, il donne des conseils sur les événements internationaux; il aide les entreprises canadiennes dans les marchés internationaux; il attire les investissements et des technologies de l’étranger au Canada; il favorise le développement du droit international; il prône le maintien de la paix et la sécurité internationales; il exécute à l’étranger un programme canadien d’aide; il aide les Canadiens en détresse à l’étranger; et il administre les missions du Canada partout dans le monde.

Le ministère compte deux ministres — le ministre des Affaires étrangères, André Ouellet, et le ministre du Commerce international, Roy MacLaren — et deux secrétaires d’État — une pour l’Amérique Latine et l’Afrique, Christine Stewart, l’autre pour l’Asie et le Pacifique, Raymond Chan.

Il est doté d’un sous-ministre des Affaires étrangères, d’un sous-ministre du Commerce international et d’un sous-ministre associé des Affaires étrangères, qui sont des fonctionnaires de carrière. Ce sont les conseillers politiques en chef des ministres et ils sont chargés de l’administration et de la gestion du ministère.

Dix sous-ministres adjoints sont à la tête de cinq secteurs géographiques, de quatre secteurs fonctionnels et d’un secteur des services ministériels. Ces secteurs sont appuyés par la Direction générale des communications, le Groupe des politiques et le Bureau du protocole. En outre, des hauts fonctionnaires sont à la tête de petits services consacrés à des priorités spéciales, notamment l’ambassadeur à l’Environnement, l’ambassadeur pour la conservation des pêches, l’ambassadeur pour les affaires circumpolaires, le coordonnateur principal des relations fédérales-provinciales et le négociateur en chef des accords aériens.

Les quatre secteurs fonctionnels (Expansion commerciale internationale, Politique économique et commerciale, Affaires politiques et politique de sécurité internationale et Affaires juridiques et consulaires et passeports) battent la marche pour ce qui est de la politique relative aux grandes questions de commerce international, d’économie et de politique. Les cinq secteurs géographiques (Afrique et Moyen-Orient, Asie et Pacifique, Europe, Amérique Latine et Caraïbes et États-Unis) administrent les relations du Canada avec leurs régions respectives.

Le ministère de la Citoyenneté et de l’Immigration

Le ministère de la Citoyenneté et de l’Immigration a pour mission de «promouvoir les objectifs d’une société prospère, tolérante et humanitaire en maximisant les avantages du mouvement d’immigration à l’échelle mondiale».

Oui, mais, en réalité? Le ministère définit les conditions d’insertion dans la société canadienne; gère l’arrivée au Canada; recrute des immigrants et protège les réfugiés légitimes; applique la Loi sur la citoyenneté et la Loi sur l’immigration; et conseille sur le mouvement d’immigration à l’échelle mondiale.

Le ministre de la Citoyenneté et de l’Immigration est Sergio Marchi. Il est appuyé par un sous-ministre et quatre sous-ministres adjoints (Gestion ministérielle, Politique, Service intérieur et Service international). Trois directions générales (Services ministériels et exécutifs, Affaires publiques et Services juridiques) offrent des services communs.

Le secteur de la Gestion ministérielle s’occupe de la gestion des ressources humaines et financières; le secteur de la Politique analyse les tendances, la législation et les questions. Le secteur du Service intérieur traite l’intégration des arrivants dans la société canadienne, l’administration des points d’entrée frontaliers, la citoyenneté, l’application de la loi, la reconnaissance du statut d’immigrant et le traitement au Canada des demandes de visiteurs et d’immigrants. Le secteur du Service international applique les programmes de réfugiés, émet les visas et procède à la sélection des immigrants aux missions à l’étranger. La Commission de l’immigration et du statut de réfugié, un tribunal quasi-judiciaire indépendant, s’occupe des révisions des motifs d’immigration et de détention, des appels en immigration et de l’établissement du statut de réfugié.

Missions à l’étranger

Le Canada compte 111 missions à l’étranger. Il y en a 22 en Afrique et au Moyen-Orient, 20 en Asie et dans le Pacifique, 33 en Europe, 16 en Amérique Latine, 12 aux États-Unis et 8 missions accréditées auprès d’organisations internationales comme les Nations Unies, les Communautés européennes, l’Organisation du traité de l’Atlantique Nord (l’OTAN) et l’Organisation de coopération et de développement économiques (l’OCDE).

Le 2 juin : Que se passera-t-il?

Que donne un instantané du 2 juin dans le service extérieur?

Conflits internationaux Rwanda, Haïti et Bosnie. Le 2 juin, des membres du service extérieur à l’administration centrale et dans les missions surveillent la situation de près et donnent des conseils sur ce que le Canada peut faire pour mettre fin à la misère et promouvoir la paix dans ces trois points chauds internationaux.

Les journées des ministres Le ministre Ouellet assiste à une réunion du conseil des ministres et à la période de questions à la Chambre des communes, à Ottawa, puis il se rend à Québec pour y prononcer une allocution. Le ministre MacLaren est à Londres. Il rencontre son homologue britannique et le président de la Banque européenne pour la reconstruction et le développement. Le ministre Marchi est à Ottawa pour assister à des réunions du conseil des ministres le matin ainsi qu’à la période de questions en après-midi. La secrétaire d’État (Amérique Latine et Afrique) Stewart se trouve en Colombie. Elle y rencontre le président de ce pays et son conseil des ministres, puis elle dîne avec des organisations d’aide canadiennes. Le secrétaire d’État (Asie et Pacifique) Chan est à Vancouver.

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Le ministre Marchi rencontre une nouvelle génération de nouveaux Canadiens.

Décisions d’ordre politique Certaines semblent banales; d’autres revêtent une grande importance. Toutes exigent une décision d’ordre politique. Le 2 juin, les questions d’actualité sont notamment : les orientations de l’examen de la politique étrangère par le parlement; un programme de mesures spéciales pour l’acceptation d’immigrants de l’ancienne Yougoslavie; le financement de la Société pour l’expansion des exportations en Chine; les athlètes haïtiens et les Jeux de la francophonie; les panelistes canadiens au comité de l’ALÉNA sur les pommes; la réaction internationale à la nouvelle législation canadienne sur les pêches; les importations de vêtements du Moyen-Orient; les relations commerciales avec Cuba; et l’avenir du Comité des ministres des Affaires étrangères du Commonwealth sur l’Afrique du Sud.

Canadiens à l’étranger Les membres du service extérieur aident les Canadiens à l’étranger. Un tremblement de terre se produit en Indonésie, et l’ambassade s’assure de la sécurité des cinq Canadiens travaillant dans la région. Au Rwanda, l’ambassade cherche des religieuses canadiennes prises là où la guerre civile fait rage. L’ambassade du Canada à Moscou évacue un homme d’affaires canadien blessé dans un vol. À Delhi, le haut-commissaire visite un jeune prisonnier canadien en instance de procès.

Commerce et investissements INCO, Goodyear, Bell Canada, Northern Telecom et l’Énergie atomique du Canada rendent visite au ministère à la recherche d’information sur des occasions de marketing et de financement au Japon, en Russie, en Indonésie, au Kazakhstan et dans d’autres pays. Au Koweït, l’ambassade tient une conférence de presse à l’appui d’une soumission d’un fabricant canadien de camions en vue de fournir des véhicules à l’armée koweïtienne.

Immigration Le 2 juin, le service extérieur accepte quelque 1000 nouveaux immigrants et réfugiés. Des milliers de visas sont en train d’être examinés dans 48 bureaux de traitement dans les missions à l’étranger.

Le ministre Ouellet assiste à la période de questions, puis il se rend à Québec. Le ministre MacLaren est à Londres. Le ministre Marchi est à Ottawa pour assister à des réunions du conseil des ministres. La secrétaire d’État Stewart se trouve en Colombie. Le secrétaire d’État Chan est à Vancouver.

Politiques d’ordre politique et économique Protéger les ressources halieutiques canadiennes des Côtes Est et Ouest, assurer l’accès des produits agricoles canadiens aux États-Unis, nouer des liens commerciaux canadiens en Asie, en particulier avec la Chine, mousser la candidature d’un Canadien à la tête de l’OCDE, établir des rapports fermes avec l’Union européenne afin de protéger les investissements canadiens, promouvoir la paix au Moyen-Orient, aider la transition pacifique au gouvernement par la majorité en Afrique du Sud, participer aux examens public et parlementaire de la politique d’immigration et de la politique étrangère du Canada et préparer le Canada en vue des sommets du G-7 à Naples, cette année, et à Halifax, l’année prochaine, voilà autant de questions qui occupent les membres du service extérieur, aujourd’hui.

Réunions politiques et économiques internationales L’OTAN, la principale alliance de défense de l’Europe occidentale et de l’Amérique du Nord, l’OCDE, la tribune des grands pays industrialisés de l’Europe, de l’Amérique du Nord, de l’Asie et du Pacifique, ainsi que l’Organisation des États américains, tiennent tous des réunions ministérielles au début de juin. Le service extérieur prépare les ministres canadiens en vue de ces réunions.

Visites bilatérales Des membres du service extérieur s’occupent des premiers préparatifs en vue de visites de ministres et de chefs d’État et de gouvernement, tant de ministres canadiens à d’autres pays que de ministres étrangers au Canada.

Le premier ministre Chrétien est en visite au Royaume-Uni et en France, du 2 au 8 juin, pour assister aux cérémonies commémoratives du débarquement des Alliés en Normandie il y a cinquante ans, soit en 1944. Le ministre Ouellet sera à Paris et à Istanbul pour les réunions ministérielles de l’OCDE et de l’OTAN. Le ministre MacLaren est à Londres, le 2 juin, puis il se rendra à Bruxelles pour des consultations avec l’Union européenne. Il terminera son périple par une visite à Paris pour la réunion ministérielle de l’OCDE et de la Commission mixte Canada-France. La secrétaire d’État Stewart est en Équateur et en Colombie, les 2 et 3 juin, puis elle se rendra au Brésil pour l’assemblée annuelle de l’OÉA. Le ministre Marchi prépare une visite en Europe, notamment en Russie, en Hongrie et en Italie, afin de promouvoir la coopération en matière d’immigration et de commerce entre le Canada et ces pays.

Enfin, le président de l’Argentine, Carlos Saul Menem, doit venir au Canada le 20 juin. Les préparatifs vont bon train. D’autres visites au Canada sont en voie d’être préparées, le 2 juin, soit celles du ministre des Relations étrangères de la Mongolie, du ministre de l’Industrie et du Commerce de la République tchèque et du ministre des Affaires étrangères de la Croatie.

Voici donc ce qui s’est passé, le 2 juin. La journée est sur le point de débuter.

Early Morning Watch
to Morning Alert

It is a clear, cool night in Ottawa. The Lester Pearson Building, home of the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, is a massive black shadow on the backdrop of an inky night. The four unequal towers of the Pearson Building look imperturbable and silent.

The Morning Watch

The Watch Office is brightly lit. The new watch officer reports for duty. A bank of clocks line the top of one wall. Midnight in Ottawa makes it noon in Tokyo, one o’clock in the afternoon in Delhi, six in the morning in London, seven in the morning in Moscow, and midnight in Washington. The glow of CNN flickers in a room crammed with machines carrying Reuters and AP press feeds.

The watch officer is now the voice of the department. He monitors telegraphic traffic and the press wires; he responds to consular and all quiet hour calls; and he liaises with posts and other Operations Centres in Ottawa, notably that of National Defence.

A communications operator is working the graveyard shift in the Communications Centre (Comcentre). He too starts at midnight. He is alone today as his partner has booked off sick. Throughout the night, he will monitor incoming communications to the department. The Comcentre runs 24 hours per day, 7 days a week.

The watch officer drops by the Comcentre. He will not be down for another few hours unless there is a “high precedence” message. Then he must decide whether the message can be left for the morning or delivered immediately to a foreign service officer at home.

A woman from California calls, “How long it takes to renew a Canadian passport?” The Canadian High Commission in Kenya reports, “We just heard that the convent of the Soeurs du Bon Pasteur was attacked by an armed Hutu militia. All the Tutsi nuns have been killed. We are trying to locate the Canadian sisters.” It is noon in Islamabad and the Canadian High Commission in Pakistan has not received a promised secure fax on Canadian nuclear policy.

At three in the morning, CNN reports an earthquake in Java in Indonesia. The Watch Office phones Jakarta. “We just saw the report on television. Can you check to see if there were any Canadians in the area.”

The communications operator checks the direct telegraphic link to the NATO Allies Communications System. Normally there is little activity on this circuit during the night shift. Tonight there is an “immediate message”. It is related to Canadian peacekeepers in Bosnia.

The Globe and Mail five page synopsis of the day’s news is received by fax from Toronto. The Operator sends it to Canadian missions around the world. He scans the synopsis quickly, “A number of stories here will keep the Department on its toes today.” He sees articles on a Canadian Hercules aircraft shot at in Rwanda while delivering humanitarian assistance, an article on the fisheries situation off Newfoundland, fighting in Bosnia, North Korean nuclear facilities, and American threats of invasion of Haiti.

Three key communications links are lost and restored by the MITNET Command Centre through the night: Jakarta because of operator error at the Earth Station in Indonesia; Moscow as the result of heavy rains; and Delhi.

As dawn approaches, the “Tel Pack”, the early morning newspaper of the department, containing the overnight reporting from Canada’s network of missions abroad, is prepared for delivery. It is “must” reading for all divisions.

The Department Mobilizes

An assessment officer arrives in the Watch Office to put together the two page Morning Brief, the digest of overnight developments. It is prepared from intelligence assessments, mission reports, wire stories, and information from the Operations Centre of National Defence. Today, National Defence reports, “Headquarters is anticipating a request for a mechanized company in Bosnia to go to beleaguered Gorazde. Also, the UN has asked us to extend the operation of the CAF Hercules flying relief into Rwanda.”

The Pearson Building is springing to life. The staff of the Cafeteria arrive at six o’clock to prepare for the day. The menu today is fish chowder, roast lamb, stuffed pepper or hamburger. The Mail Room is ready to mail documents to over 111 missions and other government departments. The Printing Office will run off briefing books or Department publication. The Corps of Canadian Commissioners will maintain security in the Building.

The Departments on Alert

DFAIT and CIC are on high alert. Ministers have to be prepared to respond to the press and to Parliament on the international political, trade, economic and immigration issues which have happened overnight.

The Morning Brief is distributed. It covers events in Haiti, North Korea, Bosnia, Yemen, the UK and Iraq. The previous evening’s newscasts, CBC’s World at Six, Canada AM, and the morning papers, the Globe and Mail, Le Devoir, La Presse, The Ottawa Citizen highlight many of the same issues.

The Ministers’ Offices

The “tenth floor”, the convenient designation for the Ministers’ offices in the DFAIT, is alive with action as is the Immigration Minister’s office in Hull.

The political staff — a senior policy advisor, a number of junior advisors or speechwriters, constituency people and a scheduling person — are mobilizing to make sure the Ministers are prepared for the often hectic schedule of meetings and the enormous variety of issues they must consider.

The legislative assistant is poring over the news and overnight reports. It is his task to put together a daily briefing book that contains answers to the literally hundreds of potential questions that can be posed in Question Period in the House of Commons.

The senior departmental assistant, who is responsible for moving the department’s business in the Minister’s office, is reviewing the Ministerial Night File to see if the Minister has taken any decisions overnight. He thinks, “Ahh, a decision on the opening of free trade negotiations with Israel. Africa Branch will be pleased with this.” The press secretary, who is the spokesman of the Minister and the department, is meeting with the legislative assistant to discuss likely issues for Question Period. “Yes, I think the fisheries issue will play big in the House today.”

The Deputies

The Deputy Minister for International Trade is meeting with his executive assistant and the senior departmental assistant. With Minister MacLaren in London, the atmosphere is relaxed. If the Minister was in town, the Deputy would be meeting him at least two or three times during the day. They talk briefly. “The frigates tour for the Canadian navy in Asia should be a good opportunity to raise the profile of Canada. We must make sure our Asian missions make it a part of their trade efforts.”

Down the hall, the Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs is also reviewing his day with his executive assistant. He will chair the Ops Committee in fifteen minutes. Then at nine, he will brief Minister Ouellet for the Graduation Ceremony for the new Foreign Service Officers. In the afternoon, his big preoccupation will be a briefing on the arrangements for the Naples and Halifax Summits. As the Canadian sherpa to the G-7 Summit, he is the personal representative of the Prime Minister in the preparation of the annual G-7 Summits.

For now, the biggest worry is the talking points for the Minister for the Cabinet Meeting. His face betrays his impatience. His management advisor has not yet arrived. Just before eight thirty, she arrives, her red coat signalling her presence as she steps off the elevator. Quickly besieged while opening her office, she opens her briefcase and gives the notes to the Deputy.

Meanwhile at Citizenship and Immigration, the Deputy Minister is meeting with Minister Marchi. “There is this last minute visit of the US Ambassador to the United Nations. The US wants Canadian assistance in receiving some of the Haitian refugees fleeing on the rafts. You also have a meeting this afternoon to discuss your visit to Russia, Hungary and Italy. Finally, Minister, I want to alert you to an appeal in the Federal Court on an immigrant application refusal. If we lose, it could put into question the legality of the Immigration Act.”

The Ops Committee

The Operations Committee (Ops Committee) is the high mass of DFAIT’s senior management. It is a daily ritual. It highlights the major issues of the day and priorities for the coming weeks.

Today, as usual, the Assistant Deputy Ministers file into the large conference room. Some carry files under their arms, some a pad of paper. It is chaired briskly and brusquely in the fashion of the Spanish Inquisition. The Deputy takes his place at the centre of the large oval table. At one end of the room stands an Art Deco podium for formal presentations.

The Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs is in a rush. He must leave early to brief Minister Ouellet in his House of Commons office at nine. He starts the discussion. “The Prime Minister does not like last minute walk-on items in Cabinet. Consider yourselves informed.”

Each ADM takes a turn outlining the breaking issues of the day.

“We are monitoring US and European reaction to our new fisheries legislation that gives us the right to seize foreign fishing vessels off our 200 mile zone. The Canadian Coast Guard seized two more American shipping vessels off Vancouver Island. They will be fined $1,500. The Pacific Salmon debate will liven up, no doubt. We can expect something from the State Department.”

“The Joint Parliamentary Committee on Foreign Affairs and National Defence’s review of Canadian foreign policy is really focusing on Asia-Pacific. Looks like we’re going to have to close down Europe”.

“The fifth anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre is coming up. We are preparing speeches for the Minister and Secretary of State Chan for the House. The issue should be manageable. As well, we are consulting with the Americans and the International Atomic Energy Agency on what are the next steps on our concerns that North Korea is diverting plutonium to make nuclear weapons.”

“Severe fighting in Yemen and Rwanda. An issue of real concern in Rwanda. Canadian sisters have disappeared. We are making it our highest priority. Also, the UN has asked us to extend our humanitarian flights to Kigali, despite the shooting on a Canadian Hercules yesterday by government troops. We are examining the options with Defence.”

“We are meeting with the Chileans in Mexico about the possible extension of the North America Free Trade Agreement. As well, we will be following up with Washington on the agricultural negotiations. The Administration looks like it is willing to make Canadian wheat a sacrificial offering to the Congress.”

“Minister MacLaren is in London today. PM’s trip looks good. All preparations are finished for the D-Day celebrations. Looks like we got a good media event in front of Buckingham Palace with the Royals. Also a good article in the Financial Times today, about the importance of recent UK elections on EU integration.”

“Serbs are breaking the ceasefire in Bosnia but the Moslems seem confident enough that Americans will side with them. The Canadian peacekeeping contingent is not in any new danger. The UN is asking today and tomorrow to move up on to relieve Gorazde.”

“The Don Johnston candidacy for the OECD is entering a critical phase. We are setting up meetings between Ministers Ouellet and MacLaren and their European counterparts at the OECD and NATO ministerial meetings”.

“We have meetings with President Aristide in Washington today and with the UN “Five Friends of Haiti” in New York today and tomorrow. After that, we should have a better reading of how President Aristide views the impact of sanctions on the military rulers and whether he favours a deadline for an international invasion”.

Just as the Haiti debrief ends, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs excuses himself to head for the Minister’s West Block office. The meeting soon comes to a quick end.

The ADMs disperse. They carry the marching orders of the day and the priorities for the coming weeks back to their respective branches.

The Press Office

Philip Graham, late publisher of the Washington Post, defined the news as “the first draft of history.” The morning “heads up” meeting and the Minister’s press secretary is taking place. The discussion focuses on the likely issues of interest to the press and the approach to be taken. “The Minister will be asked about our peacekeepers in Bosnia and the missing sisters in Rwanda. We will need the latest information throughout the day.”

The press officers in the Office are visiting or phoning divisions, providing them with clippings, and obtaining updated press lines. “Have you anything more on the Canadian nuns? What is Canada going to do if the US asks for economic sanctions on North Korea?” “Can I say anything about our meeting with Aristide in Washington?” “There is a rumour that Canada will start up our aid program to Cuba. What can I say on the issue?” Media officers subscribe to songwriter Paul Simon’s advice that “Improvisation is too good to be left to chance...”.

The Divisions in the Trenches of Foreign Policy

The Ministers’ offices, the Press Office and the “eighth floor” (the name given to DFAIT senior management since most Deputies and ADMs have their offices there) are now generating an early morning bombardment of the divisions on the front lines of Canadian diplomacy. All divisions in both departments are busy preparing Questions and Answers for Question Period, notes for ministerial meetings of the day or coming week, policy notes to senior management and media lines for the press office. There is a very quick turnaround time.

June 2 is well launched.

Another Day of
Immigration in Delhi

by Audrey Oppertshauser, Immigration, India

On Thursday, June 2, staff created 114 new immigration files, interviewed 62 prospective immigrants, reviewed 59 visa applications and issued 142 immigrant visas. On the visitor side, the section created visa files for 106 tourists, 7 students, 3 workers and 2 returning residents; issued 117 visas and refused 17. We received 22 representations from Ministers and MPs.

A quiet day.

Audrey Oppertshauser served at the Canadian High Commission in New Delhi.

A Picnic with the Prince

by Hartmuth Kroll

The first day of the weekend in Saudi Arabia dawns better than expected. Temperatures are in the low 40s with bright sunshine. There had been some fear that the hot weather and blowing sand of the last week would continue, but things have settled down nicely, much to the relief of those who had accepted the invitation to visit the farm of Prince Faisal. Given the lack of variety in weekend activities in Riyadh, a Saudi picnic promised a pleasant diversion, and now it looks as if it will not be spoiled by the need to pick sand out of the hummus.

The convoy gathers at the Chancery around ten. We will be on paved, well-travelled road the whole way so four-wheel drive vehicles are optional, although the standard safety gear of water supplies and basic tools are not. Breakdowns outside the cities are not to be taken lightly in Saudi Arabia. The two and a half hour trip proceeds without incident, and we respond to the warm greetings of our host and his sons. The Prince’s wife and daughters, as expected, are not present.

We go for a walk to see the Prince’s racing camels, followed by a picnic lunch. In deference to our Western sensibilities, we sit at tables with cutlery, rather than in traditional Saudi style on rugs, using pita bread and fingers. The food is a mix of Middle Eastern — hummus, tabouli, and babaganoush with barbecued lamb, quail and goat — and Western — tomatoes and lettuce (all local produce) and steak. Dessert is the various kinds of fruit and sticky sweets. There are dates and melons, but also locally grown apples and grapes. Conversation ranges from the finer points of camel racing and the economics of farming in a desert climate to Québec and, among Canadians only, how long can a salad be left out in 40 degree weather without suffering irreparable harm.

The heat of the day breaks by the late afternoon. We make a more extended tour of the farm. Centre pivot irrigation creates one kilometre circles of green alfalfa, barley and wheat scattered across expanses of desiccated grey-brown hardpan. It is becoming more difficult to pump the water necessary to grow crops. Wells that previously went down 100 metres to tap the aquifer now sink to depths of 1600 metres before striking water. The Prince expects that he will be forced to abandon the present farming methods within ten years.

Dry as it is, the farm area is still more hospitable than the sandy wasteland which forms one border of the Prince’s holdings. It is very much the conventional western conception of the desert. Before the discovery of water and oil, the Prince’s family lived and prospered in this seemingly desolate and totally inhospitable expanse of sand by controlling trading routes.

As we walk up the nearest dunes, the Prince shows us the burrows of some of the desert creatures. Mice, scorpions and snakes huddle in the inadequate shade of seemingly lifeless brambles. Some of the more energetic, and younger, among us go a bit further, climbing to the next sandy ridge. They report that there are only more and bigger dunes to be seen with even less vegetation. For this group, cartwheels are the only appropriate means of descent. The rest of us, with sand in our shoes, watch only in amazement as they wind their way down the slopes. What our hosts must have thought of this, is beyond imagining.

The author served at the Canadian Embassy in Saudi Arabia.

Day 58 of the Rwandan Crisis

by Lucie Edwards

It is one minute past midnight in Ottawa. It is eight o’clock in the morning in Kigali, Rwanda.

In Kigali…

The Deputy High Commissioner has been up for four hours. A particularly noisy mortar barrage and the crackling of machine guns have shaken him out of an uneasy sleep in the United Nations Armed Mission in Rwanda’s (UNAMIR) headquarters. The noise provides counterpoint to the eerie howls of the packs of dogs that prowl the deserted streets of Kigali and feast on the corpses.

Following a rooftop briefing from the UN Commander, Canadian Major-General Romeo Dallaire, it is on to a visit to King Faisal Hospital, where hundreds of Rwandan refugees shelter under UNAMIR protection. The closed Armoured Personnel Carrier does not give much of a view to the visiting Canadian contingent which includes the Deputy Minister of National Defence, the Deputy Chief of Defence Staff, and their aides. Theirs is a view through a periscope.

For those who knew the city from before the civil war, Kigali has a surreal air. There is practically no one on the streets or in the green African fields surrounding the city. Abandoned vehicles, with their windows shot out, litter the approaches to the city centre. It is a city silenced, a silence periodically shattered by the sounds of mortars and machine guns.

At the hospital located close to the dividing line between government and rebel forces, the displaced cut up furniture for fuel, wood to boil their meagre supplies of maize and lentils supplied by relief agencies. The adults seem resigned and apathetic. The many children who aren’t injured bounce boisterously around the wazungu VIPs.

Meanwhile back in Nairobi...

The High Commissioner begins her day, as usual, with a briefing by the commander of the Canadian air force unit briefs on the situation at Kigali Airport. Yesterday the Canadian Hercules had been fired upon; for the first time since the crisis began, the airplane has been cleared to land at Kigali Airport for the entire day. Usually the clearance is only received a half an hour before the plane departs. There is a heads-up that a substantial number of wounded children will be evacuated in a few days.

This is an exceptionally busy day for the military contingent, who operate out of a conference room in the mission. A new unit had arrived the day before and the old 48-person crew will be leaving for Canada. Briefings at the mission and the airfield are scheduled for the entire day. In addition, there are three other military units in town: a military police team, investigating security; administration and security officers with the office; and a signals team. Our administration officer working with the visiting missions all day, showing them the ropes at the airfield, the hotel, the bank, and the office.

The immigration officer working on refugee cases for Rwanda receives some bad news about the convent of the Soeurs du Bon Pasteur in Kigali. At the request of the mother house in Canada, we had agreed to issue Minister’s permits for all the sisters to be evacuated to Canada. Unfortunately, due to fighting near the convent, the United Nations forces have been unable to carry out the evacuation. UNAMIR has now confirmed a report that the Interhamwe militia had invaded the convent and ordered all the nuns to leave for Western Rwanda. At a roadblock outside the city, all the Tutsi nuns had been separated and killed. We urgently try to find out the whereabouts of the surviving nuns.

The political officer has an appointment to meet the local representative of the Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) at nine o’clock. There are a number of issues on the agenda: the RPF battle plans and the prospects for a ceasefire; their attitude to the deployment of an expanded United Nations contingent; humanitarian assistance for displaced people; and Kenyan President Moi’s call for a regional summit on Rwanda on June 6. The RPF representative becomes very emotional and angry when he discusses the killing of civilians by the Hutu militia. The RPF had repeatedly warned the world community that the Hutu militia were plotting the massacre of the Tutsi population. As far as he is concerned, the UN intervention is too little, too late. The case of a Canadian nun, working in Northern Rwanda, whom we have been told has been denied permission to leave Rwanda, is raised. We warn him that Canada is deeply concerned and wants her exit facilitated as soon as possible.

In Kigali

Mid-morning, the Canadian defence team sits down to a meeting with the Commander of the Rwandan government forces in the deserted Hotel des Diplomates. A few minutes into the discussion, a mortar round lands a hundred yards away. The whoosh sound of the secondary splatter effect injects a pause in the conversation.

And in Nairobi

The development section working on humanitarian aid for Rwanda and Burundi is able to reach two Canadian nuns in Kabale, Uganda, who have recently visited the sister in Northern Rwanda. They confirm that she attempted to leave Rwanda for Uganda, accompanied by a number of Rwandan nuns and two infants who are destined for adoption in Canada. The entire party was blocked from leaving Rwanda. The RPF reportedly wants the Canadian nun to remain in order to run a large orphanage for victims of the civil war which they are setting up. The nuns report that their colleague is sick.

The High Commission immediately calls the International Red Cross office to arrange for a doctor to visit her from Rwanda. An officer is sent to the border to try to reach her and escort her to Uganda.

At noon, the High Commissioner hosts a lunch for the outgoing head of the CARE office in Nairobi. CARE is involved in the Ngare refugee camp in Tanzania, which has received nearly 300,000 Rwandan refugees. The Rwandans are still streaming into Tanzania at a rate of 5,000 a day. CARE is also considering beginning operations with Rwandan refugees in Burundi and in Zaire. The major topic of discussion is logistics: how to get food and medical supplies to remote localities along Lake Victoria and Lake Kivu, the sanitation problems in large refugee camps. There are 40,000 bodies floating in Lake Victoria.

Lunch in Kigali

The Canadian defence team is hosted by the Ghanaian contingent of UNAMIR at a deserted hangar on a silent airfield. From a motley collection of charcoal braziers and earthenware pots, a delicious meal of rice and chicken in Ghanaian peanut sauce is served. It is General Dallaire’s third hot meal since the crisis began on April 6. A large hole in the roof, a product of a direct mortar hit a few days before, provides a pleasant ventilation in the hangar.

Back to Nairobi

By mid-afternoon the rush is on for the daily sitrep on Rwanda and Burundi. It is now going on to six thirty in the morning in Ottawa. Over lunch, the High Commission gets through to the UN Secretary General’s special representative in Burundi to get his assessment of the security situation in the negotiations on the election of a new President.

The mission secretaries prepare themselves to “fly solo” on our communications equipment. Nairobi is soon to lose its only communicator and the two secretaries have been receiving training in taking over the communications function. The communicator is away today, and they are on their own. The tension rises in the office: will we successfully send the sitrep and all the other traffic to Ottawa? All systems are go. A sigh of relief goes up throughout the mission.

The Canadian Hercules touches down at Kenyatta Airport. The flight back from Kigali is relatively uneventful although, as usual, the Herc spends the first 15 minutes on stomach-churning, tree-hugging evasive flying. The local bureau chief for Time grabs the Deputy High Commissioner’s helmet for a quick up-chuck, mercifully avoiding the flak jackets. The Canadian Deputy Minister of Defence and his colleagues are bundled into cars and taken directly to the Tanzanian High Commission. In the rush of departure, they had neglected to obtain visas for Tanzania. As a former Chief of the Defence Staff of the Tanzanian Army, the Tanzanian High Commissioner retains a soft spot for Canada. He agrees to keep his mission open late and issue the visas on their arrival, and he too proudly informs them he is a graduate of a training program in Chilliwack, B.C. They are on their way within minutes. Thank God for the Military Training Assistance Program!

Five in the afternoon in Nairobi, nine in the morning in Ottawa, and the second shift of the Rwandan crisis begins. Ottawa is now awake, and clamouring for information. The High Commissioner fields a conference call from the Consular Division about the Canadian nun in Northern Rwanda. She also discusses the Deputy Minister’s visit with the Africa Branch.

At the Official Residence, the kitchen puts on an extra effort for dinner, warned in advance that the military contingent has been subsisting on cold German army rations in Kigali. Tribute is paid to the outgoing Commander for his work during the consular evacuation and humanitarian airlift.

Eleven o’clock, at the end of a long day, Nairobi goes to bed. It is three o’clock in the afternoon in Ottawa.

At five in the morning of the next day, a development officer and the DND delegation are on their way to Wilson Airport, to catch the Federation of Red Cross airplane to Ngare refugee camp in Western Tanzania. The new air crew is also at the airfield in the pre-dawn chill, preparing for their first flight into Kigali.

Another day in the life of the Rwandan crisis begins.

The author served as Canadian High Commissioner to Kenya.

Canada at the UN:
On the Global Stage

by James Trottier

June 2 is one of the few days free of formal UN meetings. It is only the second week in five months when there are no formal meetings of the numerous bodies of the UN or the Security Council. This allows officers to concentrate on the work they normally leave until the evening. The work schedule reaches its extremes during the annual September to December session of the General Assembly, when the workday often stretches to 14 hours or longer.

Silence is unnerving in New York. Being on top of developments can become somewhat of an obsession...

The morning is now well underway. The first secretary (Human Rights) telephones several other missions to speak out at the special meeting on Rwanda. He urges several African delegations to speak out at the meeting. He seeks out the latest information about the Rwanda crisis, and sends a final report to Ottawa.

Afternoon of Deliberations

All formal U.N. meetings adjourn at one o’clock in the afternoon. Much business is conducted, contacts established and information exchanged at the many lunches held each day in the numerous restaurants around the U.N.

Lunches are a pot pourri of nationalities, issues and friends: a lunch with the Finnish on the Agenda for Development; a lunch with the Mexicans who are members of “friends of” groups for El Salvador and Guatemala; lunch on international coordination to combat HIV/AIDS with Dutch and Australian colleagues; lunch with the Irish, Australians, Americans, Germans and British to discuss a common strategy to follow up the results of the World Conference on Human Rights. The American advises that the US plans to insert language concerning human rights in a parallel resolution on Rwanda at the Security Council.

Time slips into the mid-afternoon. The latest developments on a draft Security Council sanctions resolution against North Korea for alleged violations of its obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty and the International Atomic Energy Safeguards Agreement are moving quickly. The second secretary (Political) pursues this and also keeps an eye on the Rwandan crisis. He phones the UN Secretariat and Security Council colleagues and relays information to Ottawa. He liaises closely with the Deputy Military Adviser.

The representatives of the “Friends of Haiti” group meet again to discuss the final draft of a communique for the June 3 meeting on Haiti.

The first secretary (Political) drafts a statement on the rights of women which he will deliver to a group of non-governmental organizations next week. It is now four in the afternoon. Telephone calls from Ottawa and from other missions seeking views on a variety of issues bombard him. At the request of Ottawa, he inquires at the UN budget office concerning the 1995 World Summit for Social Development in Copenhagen.

Silence is unnerving in New York. Being on top of developments can become somewhat of an obsession...

The property manager returns to her office after five hours on the streets of Manhattan ensuring the safe unloading of computer equipment. It is five o’clock. Time to think about heading home.

In the boardroom of the Canadian Mission, the legal adviser convenes a meeting of the “expanded midnight group”, a group of ten countries with important deep seabed mining interests. Four years of negotiations will finally conclude successfully on June 3. Following its passage through the UN system, the agreement will enter into force on or before November 16, the date the Convention on the Law of the Sea itself will enter into force. The Agreement will facilitate accession to the Convention by industrialized states, and make the Convention truly universal.

The first secretary (Human Rights) telephones several other missions to coordinate action at the special meeting on Rwanda. He urges several African delegations to speak out at the meeting. He seeks a room to receive a briefing from a colleague on the meeting. He will return to the Canadian Mission after midnight to draft a report (and to check details with colleagues engaged in identical tasks at other missions) on the latest twist for policy makers in Ottawa to read first thing in the morning.

The day’s activities on Haiti culminate in an evening bilateral meeting. The Canadian Ambassador, the Canadian ADM, the French Representative and a few officers from the Canadian and French Missions meet at the Canadian mission. Consultations with President Aristideare planned for June 3 and the two sides exchange information on expectations.

It is now nine o’clock. After the meeting, the Canadian team decides that the draft communique lacks focus; it should deliver a simple, clear and direct message to the Haitian military with an emphasis on actions we are ready to undertake. A Canadian alternative to the communique should be drafted. At eleven in the evening, the revised draft communique is completed. The last officer locks up the Mission, early by U.N. General Assembly standards, and leaves the building for his nearby residence. Thus ends another day on the global stage.

James Trottier served at the Canadian Permanent Mission to the UN in New York.

There Was a Summit
in Halifax…

Behind the scenes at the 21st birthday of the G-7 by Peter Boehm

[picture]

Prime Minister and Mrs. Chrétien meet the author and members of the summit team.

Friedrich Nietzsche had not experienced any G-7 summits in the late nineteenth century but he did more or less get it right when he wrote that “Life always gets harder towards the summit: the cold increases, responsibility increases.” Halifax in June 1995 represented the third G-7 Summit hosted by Canada, the previous events being Toronto in 1988 and Montebello in 1981. Both earlier events are seared on the subconscious of numerous members of the service: from those who toiled with the minutiae of logistical arrangements to those who wondered why they were faced with negotiating communiqué language on macroeconomic policies and preparing intervention points for our prime ministers. Halifax launched another generation of officers, logistical experts and observers into the pantheon of summitology to be drawn upon for another G-7 (if we are still seven) event in the future or to participate in what has become a thriving cottage industry: world and regional summits.

To the tired and cynical G-7 observer, Halifax appeared to be the end of a cycle: the twenty-first summit in the third cycle hosted by the last and smallest member to join the group. Hardly stirring, it appeared, as these events in recent years had featured a yawning chasm between the magnificence of the event and the substantive outputs at the end, too often reflected in a final communiqué that contained all the correct aphorisms but the sole certainty that the group would meet again next year, nothing more. The involvement of Russia, at Tokyo in 1993 when the G-7 mustered a $42 billion assistance package, and President Yeltsin’s desire at Naples the following year to become a full member of the organization — despite the fact that Russia does not yet belong or carry weight in the exclusive international financial institutions in which the G-7 does its least visible but most important coordination — provided a new interest to these observers and a signal, Schadenfreude at its best, that the G-7 was engaged in a sort of negative metamorphosis.

This was not the case. Halifax emerged as a different sort of summit: smaller, providing more time for leaders together, less formal and it eschewed the ritualistic reading of documents in favour of more spontaneous summaries of deliberations by the chair. It produced numerous pithy but substantive documents: a statement on Bosnia; a G-7 Communiqué that set out an action plan for a review of international institutions; a detailed background document on how this would be accomplished in the international financial institutions; and a Chairman’s Statement reflecting the political discussions that had included Russia. The preparatory phase was different too. Prime Minister Chrétien, fresh from his active participation in the Naples discussions on a review of international institutions, had vowed that Halifax would be a leaner, more focussed affair. His dedication to that focus and the alacrity with which he sought support from other leaders over the course of the following year, did much to set expectations for Halifax. At the bureaucratic level, we sought to have fewer and more pointed Sherpa or Personal Representatives Meetings; the Prime Minister’s Sherpa, our Deputy Prime Minister Gordon Smith, took the unusual step of meeting his Sherpa colleagues prior to our assumption of the chair from Italy in January 1995.

In Policy Staff, a few of us had been to Naples with the Prime Minister in July of 1994 and had in fact supported the Sherpa meetings that had led to the Italian summit. The substantive material was therefore not new to us and the Naples outcomes, in addition to the expected review of international institutions, suggested remits in the areas of international trade, environment, and developing country debt for Halifax. Closure of the Chernobyl nuclear facility in Ukraine remained a vexing problem as we knew that Canada would be assuming the chair of the G-7 Nuclear Safety Working Group come January. In process terms, we also were aware of the Prime Minister’s wish to host a smaller leaders’-only meeting and of Russian wishes for a more meaningful type of participation at Halifax. On the former point, it soon became evident that coalition politics in several G-7 countries would not permit leaders to participate without their key finance and foreign ministers nearby. Our enthusiasm in preparing the substantive elements for a summit that our country would host was founded on a growing realization that Canada could use this position to influence the setting of a progressive global agenda.

We increased our divisional staff numbers slightly following that Naples summer, assigning key roles to officers in the areas of coordinating developments on the institutional review (meaning a very close cooperation with both our Economic and Trade Policy Branch, CIDA and particularly the Department of Finance), on outreach issues for summit and on logistics for Halifax — the latter a temporary measure until the Halifax Summit Office under Len Edwards was up and running. We provided the new Sherpa, Mr. Smith, with a sharp analysis of the Naples Communiqué and a compendium of process issues to prepare him to meet his Sherpa colleagues in their capitals. The fact that he undertook these meetings even before January 1995 augured well for the subsequent preparatory process: informal personal links were established at high levels and preliminary concerns on the part of any one country were dealt with on a bilateral basis. The Winnipeg Conference on Partnership for Transformation in Ukraine, a Naples Summit initiative, took place in October 1994 and gave us our first experience on how serious Russian desires for a meaningful role at Halifax were. Plans were also set in train during the autumn for the other two G-7 ministerial meetings that would have an impact on Halifax: a meeting on the global information society in Brussels in February (a Naples initiative) and a Canadian-chaired meeting of environment ministers held in Hamilton in the spring.

At Naples, leaders had given a clear signal that they wished to have a more focussed and substantive agenda for Halifax and that this wish should be mirrored in a more streamlined preparatory process. The number of preparatory meetings was therefore reduced to one informal Sherpas only meeting at Rideau Gate in Ottawa in January, and two “full” meetings including Finance and Foreign Affairs Sous-sherpas as well as Political Directors (the latter with the Russians present) in Vancouver in March and at the Millcroft Inn outside Toronto in May. By sticking to this number of meetings, we streamlined the preparatory process by as much as fifty percent, an approach that was also successfully followed in determining delegation size for Halifax.

Full Russian participation on political and security issues in the preparatory process led to the coinage of the term “P-8”.

This represented an advance over Naples or what we loosely termed a “Naples Plus” approach, giving Russia full participation in the discussion of issues that touched it directly: nuclear safety, money-laundering and crime. The classic-7 issues of monetary, fiscal and trade policies, the IFI review and debt matter remained outside the purview of discussions with Russian representatives. On the other part, part of the Naples Plus approach was to provide more time for Mr. Yeltsin to consult with his colleagues through a non-ceremonial working dinner. It was a success, with good discussion on a variety of issues, although at Halifax the Russian President commented that he found the juxtaposition of working while eating something of an alien concept. With the addition of another working luncheon the final day, following the issuance of all declaratory documents, all leaders had an opportunity for an in-depth appraisal of UN reform prospects. They also surprised everyone by calling for a summit on nuclear safety and security in Moscow in spring 1996.

Under the clear direction of the Prime Minister, the focus of the preparatory process was on the institutional review called for in the Naples Communiqué. The question of how comprehensive this review should be remained a lively point of departure through the early stages of the process. The Prime Minister had addressed the theme of IFI review in some detail at Naples and his approach centred on an appreciation that profound changes in the global economy, particularly the prevalence of large currency transactions underscored new vulnerabilities. Mr. Chrétien’s commitment to this issue, in the face of some early scepticism among some of our G-7 partners, was justified with the challenges posed by the Mexican peso crisis early in the year. The subsequent Barings Bank imbroglio underscored the extent to which currency trading had gone beyond any conceivable governmental or IFI regulation. Emphasis in the preparatory G-7 process turned to how the IMF and World Bank could develop an enhanced early warning and response system to deal with the sort of crises exemplified by Mexico.

Thus, the issue provided much work for the G-7 Finance Deputies which in turn necessitated the closest of cooperation between the Department of Finance and our department in preparing the item for the Halifax agenda. Global interest was high, with public (a Canadian parliamentary committee was struck) and non-governmental groups (the Round Table, Bretton Woods Committee) suggesting innovative ways and means to deal with problems posed by volatility in currency markets. Solutions ranged from the imposition of tax on capital transactions (the “Tobin Tax” — not an initiative of our erstwhile celebrated fisheries minister but of an American Nobel laureate in economics), to fixing currency trading bands — all operationally difficult for the global economic structure to enforce.

With the exception of the financial/economic newspapers and magazines, most media ignored the often arcane economic policy elements, but did devote the occasional article or video-byte to the projected costs of the event, why Halifax was chosen over other Canadian cities as well as to the quintessentially Canadian question: “Why do we deserve to be in this august body of economies larger than ours?” This “we are not worthy” question is, of course, asked only by Canadians in Canada, or by a Canadian abroad who happens to write for an international economic journal. Other G-7 members have long understood the difference between quantitative and qualitative worth; the question has simply never been put in G-7 councils since Prime Minister Trudeau participated in the Puerto Rico meeting in 1976. This low-level philosophical debate — as Canadians we must be inferior so how could we host — changed however with the leak of an unofficial working draft of the communiqué from the Millcroft Sherpa meeting in May. This document provided fodder for everyone: astounding proof yet again to some of the media that leaders do not write their own communiqués: evidence for the many interest groups that the G-7 was cowardly, as it did not plan to call for the demise of the IMF and the World Bank; and, most significantly, growing evidence to many observers that Halifax had all the makings of a substantive summit. The Financial Times noted that if many of the Millcroft proposals did in fact remain in the final document issued by leaders, then the G-7 could move ahead, confident that it still had a relevant global leadership role.

By the end of May, the media had almost exclusively focussed on issues that could “derail” the summit, postpone it or embarrass the host. This frenzy is de rigueur before a G-7 Summit, as in the past there have been numerous events that have diverted leaders’ attention at the table. In the case of Naples the year before, the death of Kim Il Sung on the eve of the summit resulted in a discussion of nuclear security on the Korean peninsula. An unprecedented run on the American dollar the day before President Clinton’s stated position not to call for its support, set the stage for an unplanned exchange between leaders that led to the call for an institutional review. The summit chair has the responsibility to ensure the maintenance of the summit agenda but also the delicate task of responding to quickly changing circumstances. For Halifax, the Japan-USA automobile dispute was seen by many as being the item that could influence the agenda or the atmosphere among leaders, particularly in the context of any discussion on the newly born World Trade Organization. The just-resolved Canada-EU fisheries dispute, fresh in the minds of the four EU members of the G-7 and particularly the European Commission that also participates, was seen as a potential “atmospheric” problem, given the location of the summit. Neither had any impact. In our planning, we always believed that the situation in the former Yugoslavia could, as a result of current events, become the agenda distraction. In the event, leaders dispensed with the issue at their private working dinner the first evening, assessing most recent developments (President Chirac was particularly active on this issue given dangers to French peacekeepers at the time) and issuing a short statement read by Prime Minister Chrétien. The summit agenda was adhered to, the result of a combination of a positive dynamic among leaders, solid chairmanship of the meeting, and — yes — a more streamlined and focussed preparatory process.

Any major event of these proportions is not without its stresses and frustrations, particularly when the host country is attempting to make progress on the agenda and is seeking consensus. The most ubiquitous phrase during the preparatory process was “where/when/as appropriate”, that convenient diplomatic placebo that abounds in communiqués but signifies very little. In the preparatory phase, the phrase symbolized the difference between providing specificity in the communiqué and other summit documents, thereby lending credibility to the G-7 process and the summit itself, and the very real wish that leaders retain their flexibility and not be trapped into agreeing to detailed commitments that might not be in their countries’ interests. A substantive consensus was found, as the summit documents and leaders’ statements indicated, but a desire for many “as appropriates” had to be weakened during the all-night officials’ communiqué drafting session at the beginning of the summit. The gentle but persistent persuasion of our Sherpa and Sous-Sherpas as well as generous measures of decaffeinated coffee unwittingly consumed by our jet-lagged guests assisted us in achieving the goal. It was on that evening that we secured agreement on the key measures to recommend to our leaders, initiatives in which Canada played a key role. They included the push on new resources and powers for the IMF, an emphasis on “regulating the financial regulators”, linking aid concessionality to military spending of recipient countries, and a comprehensive international trade agenda in preparation for the Singapore ministerial meeting. Our work on nuclear safety was more of a stand-alone issue and work to seek closure of the Chernobyl facility and safeguarding others proceeds. We advocated a fair and balanced role for Russia in the preparations for Halifax and at the summit itself, the result of an open dialogue on the Halifax Summit begun with Moscow during the visit of Minister Ouellet and Mr. Smith in December 1994.

Many of us could not relax after the Halifax Summit, a fact that was not a result of adrenalin excess but of the requirements for immediate follow-up work. Ministerial meetings on employment, terrorism and crime were all set in train; another Sherpa meeting was called to plan these meetings, to discuss UN reform issues as well as prospects for the summit on nuclear safety and security in Moscow. As a host country that had engaged in pre-summit consultations at the highest of levels around the world, we also considered it proper to provide extensive debriefings through our missions abroad to the many countries whose governments had requested Canada to take their issues to the table. In addition to the results described above, the lasting legacy of the Halifax Summit could very well be the restored faith in summits that it engendered, characterized by an informal, business-like atmosphere, a streamlined preparatory process, flawless logistical execution of the event and the involvement of thousands of vocal and justifiably proud Nova Scotians.

Peter Boehm was Director of Economic Summit Coordination in the Policy Staff for the 1994 Naples and 1995 Halifax G-7 Summits. At the time this article was published, he was Director, South America and Inter-American Relations Division.

Growing Up in the
Foreign Service

The Ups and Downs of Being a Teenager on the Diplomatic Circuit

by Liza Linklater

Life in the Foreign Service has its ups and downs, and who is better qualified to talk about these trials than the children of Foreign Service officers?

In preparing this feature article, in which Jake Hirsch-Allen and Mariana Henry (both aged 13) talk about their life on postings with their parents and the strains of returning to Ottawa, longtime bout contributor Liza Linklater met and spoke not only with Jake and Mariana but with a number of the older children.

All responded to her questions with great honesty and frankness, and a number of the older children (now adults) discussed the particular problems posed by sudden immersion as 16 or 17 year olds (after some years at school in tranquil Ottawa) into the sometimes more sophisticated, usually more cosmopolitan settings of first and third world capitals, where schoolmates may be drawn from the international teenage jet set and where the strongest of family units may be put under strain. For reasons which parents of adolescent children may understand and for privacy considerations, an editorial decision was made not to run this commentary but we do invite bout readers, especially those who have served on postings with their children or who were themselves children of the Foreign Service, to comment on the challenges of raising — or being — children in the Foreign Service.

Mariana Henry

Right now I’m 13 and in grade 8. I’ve been on three posts. I was born near San Francisco and we lived there until I was four. Then we moved to Ottawa for two years and I went to kindergarten. When I was 6 we moved to Russia and I entered grade one. I lived there for three years until we moved to Turkey for three more years. We’ve been back in Canada for one year. I have an older brother who was born in Ottawa.

Russia was not very nice. It was muddy and dirty. The winters were really bad, because when it snowed it turned into slush right away. The people were pretty rude because it was so crowded. The drivers were really bad and nobody felt safe letting their kids go out on the streets. I didn’t really like living there. It was icky.

When we arrived I was introduced to an Australian girl who lived in my apartment building and we became best friends and classmates. The one thing that I liked there was the school. It was fun because for the whole three years I had the same friends.

I was happy to leave Russia, but sad about leaving my friends. My Australian friend wrote to say she was moving to China, which was exactly when I was moving back to Canada, so we haven’t been in touch since.

When the plane landed in Turkey, we had to go down the stairs onto the tarmac. It was dry and hot and everything was brown. I didn’t love it there, but I liked it a lot better than Russia. Everything except the driving was better than Russia. They drove so fast and went through red lights. When the people weren’t driving they were very polite.

It was harder to make friends at that school. At first I thought I didn’t fit in but I really did. It only took a few weeks to make friends and eventually I had five close friends.

I travelled a lot with my family. Every spring break we took a week off and went to a different part of Turkey. They have all of these ancient ruins and that stuff really fascinates me.

We didn’t get MTV, but we had British TV and every Friday night it had a music show. We got CNN, NBC news, and a lot of German TV. My brother and I would watch a lot of cartoons in German even though we didn’t understand it because they had the best cartoons and kids’ shows.

It was even harder to leave friends when we left Turkey because they were the closest friends I’d ever had. Now I’m not upset about it, but I still miss them. I write to them.

But I was happy to come back here. I missed Canada, and it was like my favourite place in the whole world. Home means here, this house and this country. If I stay in another country for a long time I may start to feel like it’s home, but this house is my real home.

I was sort of nervous the first day of school here, but I figured I’d been to so many new schools that I shouldn’t worry about not knowing anybody. I can make new friends. At lunch I made my first friend, and I started hanging out with her and one other person and then we got into this bigger group. Now my closest friends and I are in a group of 8 or 9.

I have a lot more freedom and there is the opportunity to do more things here. My parents have to know where I’m going, I can go off on my own here.

I’m having more fights with my parents here in Ottawa because I’m freer. My parents are putting limits on my freedom; I know it’s for my own good, but still. I always want to do more things. I want to stay out late but I’m not allowed to and I get really mad.

I’ve always done well in school. This year I got my lowest grades on my report card but I did better in the second term. I was adjusting to the new environment, and school is always easier in the second year.

Most kids here want to hear about my experiences. In French class we talk a lot about the news and I can always tell them about my trips and things I’ve seen.

I don’t feel special because of these experiences, because some of my friends are from other countries and they have interesting things to tell too. I figure that I’m a person who has been a lot of places and I’m not special because of that.

I was always brought up to think that everybody is equal; seeing other parts of the world has made me believe that even more. I think that everybody is completely equal and everybody is special in their own way.

In Turkey my school was an American school and the students were mainly Americans. In Ottawa my school is more multicultural like the Russian school was. I gravitate to kids from other countries. I think people who have seen the world are more interesting than people who have lived in one place their whole lives. Except for my best friend who has lived here her whole life — she’s fun, smart and nice.

Right now if I had to move I’d get really mad because I’m happy here. I want to finish high school here. I don’t want to move again.

But it’s a yes and no sort of thing. I like seeing new things, but I hate leaving my friends.

Jake Hirsch-Allen

Right now I’m 13 and in 8th grade. I was born in Ottawa. I’ve been on two postings. We left on our first posting to Mexico before I was one, and returned two years later. My brother was born in Mexico.

I was five when I started kindergarten. We were in Ottawa for four years before we went away again. I think I was six and a half when we left for India for three years. We’ve been in Ottawa for four years now.

I was half way through first grade when I heard we were going to India. I started doing a project on India. I remember we were in our basement cutting up a huge number of magazines on India. I was quite little and I thought India was full of native Indians and then I got reoriented after I looked through all the articles.

I had quite a few friends in Ottawa but they weren’t good friends. I hadn’t known them for long enough because I’d only been in that school for two years and I’d switched classes a lot. It wasn’t hard leaving and I’d always anticipated it. My brother doesn’t like the idea of moving and leaving his friends.

When we arrived in India, I remember a huge bowl of fruit in the hotel. I tried mangos for the first time in my life, which was pretty neat.

My first impressions involve moving into the house and meeting all the people who worked for us. Our Indonesian cook had a son and a daughter and we became good friends. Later on our cook and the person who looked after us took us around the city, to the market, and to the villages nearby to see the snake charmers and stuff.

Most of my life I’ve been at school or with someone taking care of me, so I didn’t notice them being around much. After we returned to Ottawa, I looked back on that as quite a large privilege. They were really nice people and we were lucky to have them.

The school buses were a bit rickety and the one thing I really remember was that the gear shift was a screwdriver. Our school was called the International School but it was American. It was a great multicultural school and the kids spoke over a 100 different languages.

Because it was an American school when they were in history class they talked about Columbus and here we talk about Jacques Cartier.

School was definitely more difficult there. I was upgraded here before we left and I was downgraded there because the school year was almost a year ahead of us here. By second grade they were doing complicated multiplications. I was astounded. So I went back to first grade for another year. I think I was given the option of being bumped up again but I wanted to stay with my age group.

We travelled through a lot of India. Ladakh and Nepal were also amazing. We hiked in the mountains in Nepal and it was really fun and a bit scary. My parents didn’t really realize what it was going to be like. We had a three-foot-wide path to walk on and it was straight down, 11,000 feet on one side, and straight up on the other.

Once we were on a train during a festival of coloured water and a girl threw a bucket of water through the window. We were completely soaked. Luckily it wasn’t coloured. Everything gets stained, even cars. We’d go out with our worst clothes on and take little water guns. It was fun. It took days to get all the stains off our skin.

I remember another festival, Divali, the festival of lights. We’d be on our flat roof watching the fireworks. The people put firecrackers in coke bottles and would shoot them off. It was sometimes scary because there were a lot of accidents, but it was a lot of fun too. Our parents probably kept us inside more than most Indian parents did.

My first school back in Ottawa was a terrible one. The next year I switched to another school and went into Middle French Immersion one year late. You’re supposed to start in fourth grade, but I came in fifth grade. I was a little behind but I caught up.

It was difficult leaving the kids in India, but it would be a lot harder leaving my friends now. I don’t want to leave the house and my friends, and the tennis courts are right across the street. For the first time in my life I actually know a city. But I also want to go and have more experiences. We’ll probably go next summer because I’ll be finishing middle school and my brother will be finishing elementary school so we’d be switching schools anyway.

There are a few places I’d like to either visit or live in. Anywhere that has a lot of forests. I like to be in nature and to get away from the city. I’m not a real city person. You see movies about the ape lady; I’d love to live in the rain forest and do studies like a botanist.

As for moving, the experiences of living abroad are the best part, and the hardest part is the leaving of friends and places. If you’ve been here for three years and it doesn’t look like you’re going to leave, often you want to leave more than if you have to leave the next year after you arrive.

At time of writing, Liza Linklater was an Ottawa-based writer and photographer. She had been on postings to Bangkok and New York City.

Great Lakes’ Mission

Reflections of a Special Envoy

by Raymond Chrétien

In the fall of 1996, a humanitarian crisis loomed in the Great Lakes region of Central Africa. Fighting in eastern Zaire between rebel troops led by Laurent Kabila and troops of the government of Zaire drove refugees, mostly Hutus from Rwanda, from camps in eastern Zaire and cut off their access to food and medical supplies. The fighting threatened to bring in neighbouring countries and set off a regional war. In October then Secretary-General of the United Nations Boutros Boutros-Ghali appointed Raymond Chrétien, Canada’s Ambassador to the United States, his Special Envoy to the region. Ambassador Chrétien was familiar with the region from his tenure as Ambassador to Zaire with accreditation to Rwanda, Burundi and the Congo Republic from 1978 to 1981.

Between November 5 and December 5, Ambassador Chrétien and his team of five (Georges Rioux, press counsellor at the Washington Embassy, and three UN aides) logged 55,000 kilometres on their Challenger jet, shuttling between Nice, France, where Zairian President Mobutu was recuperating from cancer treatment, and 12 African capitals to confer with the leaders of the neighbouring countries. As the Ambassador relates, they did not always receive the warmest of welcomes. On November 8, upon the Ambassador’s recommendation, the UN Security Council authorized the formation of a multinational force to facilitate the repatriation of the refugees, and several days later Prime Minister Chrétien proposed that Canada lead it. Before the force could be organized, thousands of refugees had returned to Rwanda on their own, the humanitarian crisis was averted and the multinational force was disbanded. Laurent Kabila’s forces were ultimately victorious in overthrowing Mobutu’s government and he is now President of the Democratic Republic of Congo, formerly Zaire. (Rwanda’s Minister of Defence Paul Kagamé admitted to The Washington Post in early July ’97 that he had orchestrated the move of refugees back to Rwanda in order to thwart the establishment of the multinational force.)

Below, in excerpts from his speech to the PAFSO Professional Committee Breakfast Seminar on December 17, 1996, Ambassador Chrétien describes his short but very intense mission to Africa, what he calls “one hell of a trip.”

On the last day of October I received a call from Lloyd Axworthy, asking if I would be prepared to let my name go to the UN into a kind of hat held by Mr. Boutros-Ghali. I hesitated initially because I was already sufficiently occupied in Washington and did not think it would be fair to tackle such a mission in barely a month. Our Minister convinced me to take this assignment by saying that he thought it was “too perfect to pass up” since I knew the region and some of the leaders. In the end I allowed my name to go to the UN expecting never to hear about it again. The next morning I got a call from the Secretary General telling me that I was the lucky candidate.

Essentially he wanted me to do two things: First, to create the conditions on the ground for a ceasefire that would hold for more than a few weeks so that the refugees from eastern Zaire could go back voluntarily to their countries of origin, mostly Rwanda but also Burundi. Secondly, I was to determine if some kind of political dialogue could be launched to tackle the longer-term issues facing the Great Lakes region.

To be candid, when I left je n’avais pas la moindre idée de la galère dans laquelle je m’embarquais. I did not have a clue that the UN Security Council would pass a resolution on the 15th of November establishing a multinational neutral force to help with the return of the refugees; or that Canada might be prepared to play a role in overcoming the paralysis that seemed then to block developments in New York; or that refugees, from Tanzania as well as from eastern Zaire, would start walking home within a month.

Soon after I met with President Mobutu in Nice, I realized that perhaps something could be done — for the very simple reason that, for a period of about two weeks, the eyes of the world were focussed on Central Africa. I knew that it is usually at the beginning of a crisis, when the pressure begins, that governments are forced to act. And that is exactly what happened.

In my first round of consultations between Kigali, Rwanda, and Kinshasa, Zaire, I tried to tell the leaders of both countries that we meant business, that I did not intend to run around African capitals for the purpose of writing a report that nobody would read. It took about a week before they began to take us seriously. My meeting with President Mobutu helped a lot in this regard. He had not been seen publicly for the previous three months, and there were all sorts of rumours in Zaire about the state of his health. The pictures taken during my first meeting with Mr. Mobutu had an immediate calming effect in Zaire. Whatever we may think of Mobutu, and he is a controversial man to say the least, even his fondest adversaries give him credit for establishing the unity of his country and the integrity of Zaire.

He took the high road from the start, indicating that he would not prevent the return of the refugees. Actually he wanted all the refugees out of his country, the sooner the better.

[picture]

Ambassador Chrétien and Nelson Mandela in Johannesburg.

From the beginning, my main problem was not with the Zairians. I still knew most of the officials there, including Prime Minister Kengo, from the period when I represented Canada in the late 1970s. Rwanda was the problem. Major changes had occurred since I had presented my credentials in 1978 to President Habyarimana, a French-speaking Hutu. Now, I faced a different kind of leadership, English-speaking and almost entirely Tutsi. First of all, in Rwanda especially but also in Burundi and in Zaire, the UN is not popular — to a large extent, it is blamed for the massacres in Rwanda. I quickly realized that I had to put away my UN hat and say, “I am representing the UN but don’t forget, I was here 20 years ago and I’m also very much a Canadian.” There was reluctance even to talk with me, and a great deal of skepticism in dealing with yet another UN representative as there was a proliferation of them in Africa. But after a couple of sessions, I think both President Beseeming and Vice President Kagamé of Rwanda realized I meant business, that when I told them a resolution would be adopted by the Security Council it had a good chance of happening.

Originally they had welcomed the resolution and the arrival of the multinational force and were saying all the right things until they realized that it was going to happen. And then a major about-face occurred in a matter of days. When they realized that they could not stop the force, they immediately acted to dramatically weaken the logic behind it.

When the Rwandan leadership realized that a multinational force could come into eastern Zaire, a possibility they did not consider to be in their interests, they immediately activated the rebels, whom they controlled to a great extent. They encouraged them; helped them organize; provoked a battle with the ex-FAR (the former Rwandan army), which they won easily, allowing the ex-FAR to go deeper into Zaire and thereby freeing the refugees to come back to Rwanda, which they encouraged. This all happened quickly — the refugees started walking back to Rwanda some four or five hours prior to the approval of the resolution.

This was a rare and interesting case for the UN — just the threat of the deployment of a multinational force had the desired effect.

The return of hundreds of thousands of refugees took care of the first part of my mandate. I also met with the President of Tanzania as I knew there were 700,000 refugees on his territory, about 520,000 from Rwanda, 100,000 from Burundi and another 100,000 from Zaire. He told me that he could make those refugees walk the same day but would wait until he had the green light from the leadership in Kigali, to make sure that the departure happened in an organized, systematic and safe way. Et c’est ce qui est arrivé, ces réfugiés ont commencés à rentrer vers le Rwanda. À la fin de décembre, plus d’un million de réfugiés sur un million deux cents milles ont réintégré leur pays. This was good news and bad news for Rwanda, good news because this is what they wanted from the beginning, bad news because this was a massive inflow of people into a tiny country already under a great deal of stress. They will need the help of the international community to reestablish these refugees in their villages of origin, to feed them, to organize the next crops, to socially reintegrate them into a country they left two years ago. They are facing enormous problems. On the other hand, the return of those refugees should be the beginning of an effort to tackle their longer-term issues, one of which of course, is reconciliation between the Hutus and the Tutsis.

For the second part of my mandate, I explored a number of avenues. I tried to organize a direct meeting between the Rwandans and the Zairians under the auspices of President Museveni of Uganda on the margins of the FAO summit in Rome, which ultimately didn’t work out. I talked and met with President Mandela to see if he would be prepared to take a role. He is a highly respected figure in Africa, and I think that in the future, we will see South Africa and President Mandela playing a larger role in the affairs of their continent. That is a positive development.

One of the messages I received along the way is that African leaders want to deal with their own affairs. They have the Organization of African Unity run by Secretary General Salim-Salim. None of the leaders felt an international conference was possible any time in the near future.

The third recommendation I made to Mr. Boutros-Ghali was to use the momentum created by our mission by appointing a permanent Special Envoy, a facilitator, backed up by strong administrative support. The UN is very good when it comes to diplomatic and political skills but much weaker when it comes to support — getting 10 meetings organized and getting you from point A to point B. Without the support of our embassies in Africa, I simply would not have been able to complete this mission.

What lessons can we learn from this mission? I think UN officials in New York have realized that, faced with shrinking resources, it is not a bad idea to contract out part of their work to countries that have the means to do the job and can support the initiative. This mission is clearly a good example. This is an avenue that they might explore a bit further in the future, one that would provide extraordinary benefits to an institution which is suffering considerable financial problems.

One lesson I learned is that the UN carries a lot of baggage. On the other hand, it is also an extraordinary entrée to the world. I had not realized before I went to Africa that wearing a neutral hat makes you more acceptable than representing country X, Y or Z.

A lesson for Canada specifically is that when there is a right fit, we should not hesitate to take a leadership role. I think in this case the fit was quite right. Canada is a G-7 country, respected throughout Africa. We have a history of activism on the world stage and we have very good people in various spheres of activities.

Canada’s action in breaking the stalemate was not foreseen or planned. It came about very simply. One day, in Kinshasa, I received a phone call from our Prime Minister, who said, “Qu’est-ce qui se passe en Afrique? J’étais supposé aller jouer au golf aujourd’hui mais il pleut à Ottawa. Je suis en train de voir ces images à la télévision et j’aimerais avoir ton sentiment. Qu’est ce que tu en penses?”

Then he asked me, “Do you think that Canada could play a role?” I said, “That is another story. I am not prepared to jump to that conclusion right now but let me think about it and we can talk in 24 hours.” Then Georges and I, with a few others, prepared a list of the advantages, inconveniences and dangers — pros and cons. The following day, through a bad satellite line in Entebbe, I connected with him and said: “These are the advantages. We have had huge assistance programs in Zaire, Rwanda, and Burundi. We’re known and respected there. We are bilingual. Canada is at the heart of the Francophonie, the Commonwealth.” It looked to me like it was natural for us. In the end, Cabinet decided it was a good fit, and it was recognized as such throughout Africa and the world. We were perceived to have broken the impasse at the UN. It was risky, but we were lucky — the refugees came back. Many countries were surprised that Canada was prepared to act, and I think this will prove to have been a positive experience for Canada. Even in Washington, the Americans were pleased to see us unblocking the situation in New York.

For Georges and me, it was a hell of a trip — very intense, fast-moving, difficult, even painful. We were not received very warmly for the first week or so. In fact, it took about a week before I was offered my first glass of water. It was difficult to engage the various leaders, especially those of the three key countries, on issues of life and death. But it was profoundly satisfying.

Question and Answer:

Q: Should the rebels have a role in governing Zaire and did they form part of your mandate?

AMB: Those rebels are the Banyamulenge plus other groups that have joined them. Their leader, Laurent Kabila, is not a Banyamulenge, but he is from the same part of Zaire. This is both an internal issue for Zaire and a problem between Zaire and Rwanda. It is an internal matter for Zaire in the sense that the 30,000 or so Banyamulenge — nobody knows for sure how many there are — are Zaireans, although the Mobutu government has taken away their citizenship.

As part of my briefing, I asked to meet the top expert in the world on the Banyamulenge and he happened to be working for the CIA. He came to my office but he didn’t have any answers to my questions.

They are also now part of the tension between Zaire and Rwanda, because they are Tutsis — Protestant, not Catholic. They are being helped, financed, used for the leadership in Rwanda for their own purposes. Action vis-à-vis the rebels has to be taken on two levels. Mobutu has to deal with them from Kinshasa, but the Zaireans also have to convince the Rwandans not to use them as surrogates. This was one of the toughest issues I had to deal with in Rwanda. I would praise the leadership there and say, “You are good friends with the rebels.” And they would look at me with blank faces and reply, “We have nothing to do with them.” That is, until I told them, “I don’t believe you and nobody in the world believes you. Let’s discuss that from that perspective.” It was a very touchy issue.

[Ed. note: space limitations prevented publishing all Qs and As.]

[picture]

Ambassador Chrétien and his mission team during stop-over in Entebbe. Georges Rioux is second from the left.

Same Sex Couples: Making progress, step by step

by Anonymous

Gay and lesbian members of Canada’s Foreign Service have come a long way since the grim days of McCarthyism and the purge of hundreds of gays from the civil service in the 1960s. Targets among the latter included Canada’s former Ambassadors to Moscow, John Watkins (who died of a heart attack in 1964 after an RCMP interrogation) and David Johnson, as well as John Holmes, former Assistant Under-Secretary of State for External Affairs. Holmes was one of Canada’s foremost foreign policy experts. Even as late as 1969, the then DG for Security concluded a briefing for new recruits with the statement: “Would any homosexuals in the group please identify themselves to me after the meeting and we will arrange an orderly departure from the Department”.

At the time, “deviant” sexual orientation was equated with security risks; today, attitudes and standards have changed. Society has concluded that forcing people into the closet is the real security risk. Judging people by the quality of their performance is the best and perhaps only guarantee of security and productivity. In the Canadian service, acceptance of gays and lesbians as individuals has spread, slowly and reluctantly, to acceptance of same sex couples as well. It didn’t happen overnight and the struggle is far from over.

In the Foreign Service acceptance of gays and lesbians has come about for many reasons. Necessity is one of them.

Looking back, it is tempting to think that Canadians are a kinder, gentler sort and acceptance of gays and lesbians and same sex couples is the result of a predisposition to live and let live. There may be an element of that, but history is more complex. Reforms came about because of the amendment to the Criminal Code in 1969 that legalised homosexual acts between consenting adults. The Charter of Rights and Freedoms also had a profound impact. The latter forbade discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation (or was thought to do so) and set things in motion which in retrospect now seem irreversible.

One of the most remarkable changes brought about by the Charter, (and much to the horror of some of our politicians), took place in our Armed Forces. In the Fall of ‘92 the ban against gays and lesbians was lifted. Canadians were given the right to serve in the military regardless of sexual orientation. The decision was controversial and its implementation was delayed for political reasons. But, ultimately, senior brass recognised that the cost of legal settlements the military then faced left little option but to accept change. Our allies balked, particularly the US and the UK.

When the issue of gays and lesbians came to the fore in the early years of the Clinton Administration in the US, a very straight-looking Canadian colonel was interviewed on American television about our “progressive” policy on the matter. He simply said that sex on duty was not acceptable regardless of orientation (to paraphrase, military policy on sexual harassment states that no person will use his or her position or rank to gain sexual or other favours). If people respected that and did their jobs competently, sexual orientation was a non-issue, punto. “Get over it” was his message.

Heterosexuals may not appreciate just how liberating it was for their gay and lesbian colleagues to hear that, to know that in the final analysis Canada’s senior military (many of whom may have resisted change) cared most about professionalism. But the struggle is not over. Gay and lesbian members of the Forces still face major hurdles in the workplace and it is generally understood that it may take 20 years to change attitudes fundamentally.

In the Foreign Service acceptance of gays and lesbians has come about for many reasons. Necessity is one of them. Some years ago an individual now occupying one of the highest positions in the Public Service said that only two kinds of people would survive in the Foreign Service: traditional couples where the spouse (read wife) was prepared to completely subsume her aspirations to her husband’s career, and gays and lesbians (who are single).

Gays and lesbians are well-represented in today’s Foreign Service in part because as “singles” they can better afford to weigh quality of life and interest in the job against meagre pay. Given the paramount importance attached to budget cutting these days, is it too cynical to wonder if gays and lesbians are better tolerated today in part because it is cheaper to run the Foreign Service with singles?

Acceptance of same sex couples also has come about in part by inadvertence. As DFAIT lore has it, a very senior member of the Foreign Service had every intention of taking his common-law spouse on posting, with allowances. He got his way. The unintended consequence of his success was to undercut arguments that no comparable provision could be made for same sex spouses. Once the legally married status of the heterosexual spouse was no longer an issue, the argument that a heterosexual common-law spouse should enjoy allowances but a same sex spouse could not, became unsustainable. It was a blatant case of discrimination based on sexual orientation.

Attitudes are improving, but some managers at Headquarters and admin officers at posts still find ways of making their displeasure with same sex couples felt.

To be sure, when same sex couples began to claim equal treatment with heterosexual couples, roadblocks were put in their way. The stated reason will surprise no one: money. The struggle began in earnest with CIDA’s Stan Moore, who had served in Jakarta as a member of the Foreign Service. He has since transferred to CIDA but proudly remains an FS officer. His life companion accompanied him there (with the attendant cost to his career that every foreign service spouse knows only too well). Stan compared their situation to that of heterosexual couples and calculated that they had lost some $23,000 in benefits that a heterosexual couple in their situation would have been entitled to, which is serious money on our salaries.

Our colleague grieved. PAFSO supported the grievance from the outset. He rejected Treasury Board’s offer to compensate him personally on condition that he drop the grievance. It appears that Treasury Board calculated that it was far cheaper to buy him off than offer same sex couples equal treatment. But Stan was determined to set a precedent for all same sex couples in the service. He would not be deterred. The case dragged on for years. It eventually made its way to the Human Rights Tribunal. A lead witness for Treasury Board was asked if it had ever been explained to him why FSDs should cover heterosexual couples but not same sex couples. The answer was no. The result was historic: Treasury Board was told to cease such discrimination forthwith.

Other decisions of the Supreme Court and provincial courts relating to same sex couples have chipped away at discriminatory practices. The Canadian military have adapted, and members of our Forces in principle are free to lead their private lives in dignity. Suffice it to say that this hard-fought struggle has levelled the playing field considerably. A few years ago PAFSO organised the first ever pre-posting briefing for same sex couples and DFAIT Personnel was there to brief people on the latest! But Foreign Service same sex couples are by no means out of the woods yet.

Attitudes are improving, but some managers at Headquarters and admin officers at posts still find ways of making their displeasure with same sex couples felt. It also remains a problem getting a visa for same sex partners to accompany their FS mates. Today, DFAIT will send a Diplomatic note requesting a visa for a same sex partner (a huge step forward) but not for a same sex “spouse” for reasons that relate to legal definitions under Canadian law. Rather, DFAIT requests a visa for “a member of the family forming part of the household”, which is to say, for a “dependent”. The difference between a spouse and a dependent is significant: if the partner is deemed a “spouse”, the receiving country normally would either provide a visa for both or for neither (if they discriminate against same sex couples); if the partner is described as a “dependent”, the receiving country may have the discretion to refuse a visa to the partner only.

This problem is not hypothetical. For instance, in the US the State Department will not grant a visa to a same sex “dependent” to allow a same sex spouse to remain in the country for the duration of the posting. Spouses must either apply for a visitor’s visa (normally through DFAIT) which must be renewed every six months by application within the country, or they must leave the US and go through the interview process at the point of entry. If a same sex spouse is from a third country, the risk of complications grows (especially at points of entry). Diplomatic visas are issued only to heterosexual spouses (legally wed or common-law). Moreover, although a heterosexual spouse or a dependent child is entitled to work in the US (under a reciprocal agreement), same sex partners are forbidden from working by virtue of their visitor visa. In Canada, different standards for visas also apply to same sex partners as opposed to heterosexual partners.

Looking at other foreign services, Canada now is among the more progressive. The Scandinavians, Dutch, some other Europeans, as well as the Australians, appear to have dealt with most of the old double standards. However, the Americans are likely to remain far behind for the indefinite future given the reactionary attitude of Congress toward non-traditional families. In fact, the State Department does not recognise common-law relationships, so recognition of same sex couples is even farther off. The US military also has a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy which seems to suggest that it is still unacceptable to be gay or lesbian but it is more convenient for the authorities to pretend that gays and lesbians don’t really exist.

Looking at other foreign services, Canada now is among the more progressive.

Strangely enough, one result of this “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy has been a sharp rise in the number of dishonourable discharges of gay and lesbian members of the US military; the policy somehow seems to have become a license to hunt issued to those who object to the presence of gays and lesbians in the military. The obverse of “don’t tell” is that if you do, you’ve almost certainly terminated your career. In some instances, the US military has waited until just before the 20 year retirement point to dishonourably discharge gay and lesbian members, leaving them humiliated and stripped of their benefits (pensions included!). In the State Department the situation is much better. Gays and lesbians breathe a lot easier than they once did. However, they look to our system with envy knowing that the days of full acceptance are still well over the horizon.

Thanks to the courage and conviction of people like Stan Moore and the support of PAFSO, we in Canada have come a long way. There is no question that attitudes and practices are changing. This year Citizenship and Immigration has focused attention on gays and lesbians with the slogan “a respectful workplace starts with an open mind”. Today, the Forces have sensitivity training that includes issues involving sexual orientation. Looking back, one has to wonder what John Watkins or John Holmes would say if they were alive today. But, if ours is a luckier generation than theirs, one is also reminded of Stephen Leacock’s famous line that “...it took twenty years of hard work to get this lucky!”

The author is a Foreign Service officer. The article was written with the help of concerned individuals from the Political, Trade, and Immigration streams and from the Canadian military.

One Foreign Service Officer’s Experience

I have been in the Foreign Service for 15 years and will be going on my fifth posting this summer. I have been in a relationship for 20 years and my spouse has never been on posting with me because of the lack of inclusive regulations which would permit this. Like most couples we have our home in Ottawa and two dogs. We have maintained our relationship by visiting each other every six months and spending all holidays, birthdays and vacations together. No small expense given the costs of travel.

I, like others, have not had a very positive experience at the hands of those who administer benefits or of the management which implements regulations. In the fall of 1995 when benefits were extended to gays and lesbians, I registered as required, though this practice seemed to me at the time as one of census and control and not for the actual benefit of the employee. I was then on posting and what should have been a personal matter was discussed around the Embassy as if I was some kind of circus freak. Later I applied for the rent waiver under the FSDs because I also had a mortgage in Ottawa. DFAIT asked for several documents to show proof of our relationship and who owned the house, who paid the mortgage and taxes, etc... I went along with this procedure thinking it was normal and required. Then DFAIT asked the Admin officer at my post about my character, to see if what I had declared was true, though they already had in hand copies of city and bank documents, tax receipts etc... The Admin officer made it clear that this was a favour done for me. My request could have been denied. I do not believe that other straight colleagues would have been treated this way.

I have been patronised by colleagues at various posts. Some have played on the fact that I am gay, there has been a lack of respect and some hypocrisy. But with time you learn to respond by pointing out what they have just said and refusing to accept such attitudes. What is difficult at posts is often the attitude of other Canadian colleagues. Contrary to popular belief, often the population of the host country is far more accepting.

With Personnel I have also met with resistance, under the guise of trying to be helpful. It is very difficult to get information on visas for a spouse or official recognition. It is often far more simple to ask the host government through contacts. In the past I have had to do all the work myself, and often it can take weeks to find out. In this respect some Admin officers at posts abroad will simply refuse to help. If you have a list of countries you would like to apply for, this can be a roadblock which can deter you from applying for a position. In this respect SERV and Protocol at DFAIT can be helpful and provide clear information. But in my mind this should be a responsibility of Personnel and the employee should not be left wondering.

I have met with a wall of resistance with respect to inquiries about our rights under the law and the FSDs. I was told by an officer working in the S branch at DFAIT that there is still a mentality and attitudes which are clearly homophobic at DFAIT. I believe that is also true at CIC where our colleagues face similar attitudes. HOMs have in the past made comments to me which were out of place but considered acceptable, because it came from an Ambassador. One such HOM upon learning that my spouse was coming to visit told me that he hoped we would not create a scandal and would behave ourselves. Given that both of us are middle-aged, I thought the comment inappropriate and silly and I pointed that out to him. Another Ambassador said to me one day, that giving rights to people had to be a slow process because the majority had to accept the concept of extending rights to other people and one has to be patient. A rather facile comment coming from a Head of Mission who advocated human rights causes.

There is clearly a double standard at work and I am sure that others have faced similar painful situations. I do not believe that attitudes will change rapidly as long as management does not commit itself to lead by example. We should also not leave everything to the courts to decide. Others such as women, native people, visible minorities have all suffered similar treatment. One can only hope that DFAIT will eventually learn to treat its employees in a spirit of inclusiveness. One just has to look at the way DFAIT has treated women in general and wives historically to see that we have a long way to go.

from a dedicated Foreign Service officer.

Le retour au Canada,
ou quand le demi-dieu
revient sur terre

par Olivier Nicoloff

Le 27 juillet 1989, c’est le départ pour ma première affectation, et cette journée m’apparaît comme un grand soulagement. Elle signifie la fin de la course folle des dernières semaines : l’inventaire, cette forme raffinée de supplice, est classé au rang des cauchemars à oublier; les effets personnels ont été emballés, et c’est avec une résignation souriante que je constate mentalement les erreurs commises : non, les patins à glace ne seront pas très utiles au Sénégal alors que le costume de bain, lui, patientera jusqu’à mon retour, tant pis; les différentes démarches ont été effectuées, et pour ce que j’ai oublié, il est de toute façon trop tard, il faudra aviser une fois rendu à destination. Et que sera cette destination? J’en connais la description selon le guide de mission, les souvenirs éparpillés des collègues qui connaissent l’endroit, et les articles de journaux. Pas beaucoup, mais suffisant pour que se forme dans mon imagination une image de ce qui m’attend, image aux contours un peu flous que je me réjouis de préciser.

Le 27 juillet 1991, c’est le départ pour le Canada, et cette journée est triste. Il n’y aura pas de retour cette fois, et l’image du pays accueillant ne pourra dorénavant que s’estomper. Les dernières journées ont été tendues : trop à faire, trop de gens à voir, l’inventaire, l’inventaire toujours qu’il a fallu recommencer, le travail au bureau qui ne diminue pas pour autant, et ce sentiment de ce qui aurait pu être fait mais ne se fera pas faute de temps, en raison de ce départ, ce départ qui arrive au moment où j’établissais mes racines en terre sénégalaise. J’ai appris à connaître ces gens, à les apprécier, mes contacts avec eux sont maintenant très faciles, je connais leurs travers sympathiques, ils connaissent nos obsessions (« ah vous les canadiens et vos droits des femmes... »), je sais les faire rire. Il y a de la complicité dans l›air entre nous. Mais il faut partir. Le Ministère le veut, mon ambition m›y pousse. Et puis, nous allons retrouver le Canada, n›est-ce pas?

Le 28 juillet 1989, c’est l’arrivée à mon premier poste. Il y a un collègue de l’Ambassade pour m’accueillir. Le chauffeur est là. L’hôtel est réservé. Une tournée de la ville, vers l’école, les épiceries, les principaux centres d’intérêt, est planifiée. On me presse de choisir mes domestiques.

Le 28 juillet 1991, c’est l’arrivée à Ottawa. Il n’y a personne à l’aéroport, mais la ligne de taxis est juste là. L’hôtel est réservé. Le plus urgent est de louer une voiture et chercher une maison. J’ai quatre jours pour trouver cette dernière. Ah oui, quel est le circuit d’autobus qui assure la ligne entre l’hôtel et le Ministère? Combien coûte un billet? En fait, où se procurer un billet? On verra bien.

Le 30 juillet 1989, le chauffeur m’amène à ma maison. Elle est vaste, éclairée, la peinture vient d’être faite, je suppute la place des tableaux et autres décorations. La bonne est déjà là. Le gardien m’a ouvert la porte. J’hésite encore sur la personne que je vais engager comme nounou.

Le 30 juillet 1991, je suis avec l’agent d’immeuble à visiter une cinquième maison cette même journée. Les plans de toutes ces maisons s’embrouillent dans ma tête, les prix de vente sont devenus un amalgame de zéros qui s’étendent, affolants, à l’infini.

Le 31 juillet 1989, une collègue m’emmène à la plage. Très préoccupé d’éviter les coups de soleil, je me demande si cette mission a effectivement un indice de difficultés de niveau 4. C’est peut-être, justement, en raison de ce soleil dont il faut se méfier?

Le 31 juillet 1991, j’arrive, trempé par la pluie, d’une autre visite. Les magasins où je pourrais me procurer un parapluie sont fermés, et quant à celui qui est dans mes bagages, mais au fait qui va me dire quand et comment mes bagages vont arriver?

Le 1er août 1989, je suis présenté à mon personnel au bureau : une assistante consulaire, une assistante pour le commerce, une pour les affaires publiques, et une secrétaire. Et puis il y a tous les autres membres de l’Ambassade. L’atmosphère est très agréable. Il va falloir essayer de se souvenir de tous ces nouveaux prénoms.

Le 1er août 1991, je fais face à mon ordinateur. Il semble m’examiner autant que moi je peux l’examiner. Je me demande comment je vais l’aborder. J’ai déjà renoncé à lui donner un nom. Le Ministère me semble tentaculaire. La simple petite portion de travail que j’occupe va m’obliger à cavaler dans les méandres de ce labyrinthe : qui fait quoi ici? Et il va falloir essayer de se souvenir de toutes ces directions.

Le 15 août 1989, je croise dans le couloir de l’Ambassade l’agent d’administration et lui demande ce qu’il advient de mes effets personnels. Le dédouanement est complété, il faut attendre leur arrivée.

Le 15 août 1991, j’en suis à ma deuxième visite au bureau de Douanes Canada. Il me manquait un document la première fois. Ce n’est pas le même agent cette fois, mais son regard est toujours aussi soupçonneux, et je me sens coupable de n’avoir ni voiture, ni cigarettes ni alcool dans mes effets personnels.

Le 1er septembre 1989, l’Ambassade a envoyé quelqu’un percer les trous dans les murs de béton pour que je puisse fixer les cadres. J’hésite sur la place de quelques-uns, et demande à l’ouvrier de patienter.

Le 1er septembre 1991, je viens de plier la troisième mèche de ma perceuse électrique sur un mur de briques.

Le 15 septembre 1989, je me suis déjà laissé emporter dans ce monde de privilèges et de gâteries que représente le fait d’être le représentant diplomatique d’un pays ami, apprécié (et riche) dans un pays du tiers-monde. J’ai le statut, l’argent, le personnel, les privilèges, et un éventail impressionnant de responsabilités. Le travail ne sera jamais routinier.

Le 15 septembre 1991, ayant seulement raté le dernier autobus et n’ayant pas la monnaie pour téléphoner, je souris en me remémorant que durant les deux années passées j’ai été traité comme un demi-dieu et n’en ai à peine eu conscience. Il pleut encore, la grippe m’attire de tous ses charmes, et en me disant qu’il vaut mieux être riche et en bonne santé que pauvre et malade, je réalise la chance qui est mienne d’avoir comme cadre de vie le changement permanent : le demi-dieu du Sénégal est revenu sur terre, mais l’agent du Service extérieur prend conscience de ce privilège exceptionnel qu’il a de travailler dans un environnement où la monotonie et la banalité sont interdits de séjour.

(J’ai bien sûr, pour les besoins de la cause, quelque peu composé avec la réalité des dates et des événements...)

Au Ministère depuis janvier 1987, Olivier Nicoloff travaillait à la Division du Personnel (filière politique/économique) après son retour de Dakar et Abidjan.

An Asian Day is Over /
Une journée en Asie,
c’est déjà terminé

The ADM returns to his office. He stops to ask one of the officers how the trade awards went in Indonesia. No word until tomorrow. It is now about nine o’clock in the evening in most of the Asian posts. The Asian day is over.

Canada has three major priorities in foreign and trade policy in Asia-Pacific.

the economic and investment flows in the Asia Pacific Region. In 1992, ten of Canada’s top twenty-five trading partners were from the Asia-Pacific region.

the building of a new political and economic architecture of the Asia Pacific.

the strengthening of our bilateral ties in key countries.

June 2 unfolds...

... The speech for Secretary of State Chan in the House of Commons on the fifth anniversary of the Tiananmen Massacre is being drafted. “Let’s see, I suppose I can reiterate what Minister Ouellet said in May about how Canada hopes to influence China through “methodical and diversified contacts based on economic partnership, sustainable development, peace and security and human rights”.

... New Delhi cables that a young Canadian prisoner awaiting trial has been transferred to the Central Jail in Faizabad, a “B-Class facility”.

... “The trips of the Governor General and our Trade Minister in the spring helped and so will Minister Ouellet’s upcoming visit. It is just not that easy to sell a nuclear reactor.” The Canadian Ambassador to South Korea meets with the ADM to discuss Canada’s relations and special partnership with South Korea.

... Jakarta nous informe qu’un tremblement de terre d’une magnitude de 7,2 à l’échelle Richter a été enregistré dans la partie est de Java. On compte 5 Canadiens dans la région et on tente de prendre contact avec eux.

... Bell Canada Enterprises gives a briefing on its strategy and investments in Asia Pacific. Atomic Energy of Canada discusses its sales efforts in Indonesia. Northern Telecom gives a briefing on its efforts in Japan.

... «Les inspecteurs de l’Agence nationale de l’énergie atomique ont été confinés dans leur chambre d’hôtel.» Notre poste en Corée du sud nous fait part du refus des nord-Coréens de permettre à une mission d’inspection internationale l’accès aux centrales nucléaires et des conséquences de cette décision sur la stabilité de la péninsule.

... “More Canadian students in Asia and more Asian students here. This will create great links in the future.” There is a meeting on the establishment of Canadian education centres in Asia. Canada has one education centre in Taiwan, one in Korea and another eight are expected.

... «Après Pickering, ils souhaitent maintenant aller à la baie James?» On met la touche finale au programme de visite «ministre des Affaires étrangères bien arrivé». Une agente indonésienne dans le secteur de l’énergie au Nouveau-Brunswick, au Québec, en Ontario, au Manitoba, en Alberta et en Colombie Britannique.

... “I know there’s a lot of meetings but if we want to define the direction of the architecture of the Asia Pacific, we have to be there.” Preparations are underway for the Asia Pacific Economic Commission’s (APEC) Environment Experts meeting, the APEC Human Resource Development Meeting and the Pacific Basin Conference.

... “You have how many copies to make? I’ll be here for at least a half hour waiting for you!”

... The Canadian High Commissioner for Bangladesh is in Ottawa for a discussion of Canada’s overall trade, political and assistance approach.

... The leaders of the Sikh community want to discuss Canadian policy on India.

... The Philippines government is holding a conference on the human rights situation in East Timor Conference and this is causing problems between Indonesia and the Philippines. Our Mission in Jakarta is reporting on the mounting tension.

... The Canadian mission in Cambodia (one person in the Australian Embassy) reports continuing military confrontation between government forces and guerillas. The almost one hundred Canadians in the country are contacted.

... Immigration officials invite members of the Chinese Embassy to lunch to seek their help in facilitating the emigration of orphaned children who have been adopted by Canadian citizens.

... Decision are made on the renovation projects for the Delhi chancery, replacement of living quarters in Osaka and the completing of Embassy sharing arrangements with Australia in Vietnam.

... INTERPOL faxes the results of an investigation that will help a Canadian detained in Vietnam on a commercial fraud case.

... «I’m in Vancouver. The Mongolian Foreign Minister arrived safely”. An officer is accompanying him across Canada. It is the first visit of the Mongolians to Canada and it will terminate with the signing of a trade agreement.

... Representatives of the Indo-Canadian community meet with Immigration officials in Vancouver to hear about new procedures in the High Commission in New Delhi that will shorten the processing times for applicants sponsored by spouses and fiancés in Canada.

Trade, Trade and More Trade

The ADM looks at his watch. It is time to head for his meeting down the hall. The International Business Development Branch is the focal point for the coordination and management of the federal government’s international business development plans and activities. Its major priorities are:

the Trade Commissioner Service (TCS).

the Program for Export Market Development (PEMD).

the International Trade Business Plan.

Canada International Trade Month, Export Vision and Canada Export Awards.

World Information Network (WIN Exports).

June 2 unfolds...

... «Vous pouvez me croire: l’industrie canadienne veut un guichet unique pour les programmes gouvernementaux de promotion commerciale». Des sous-ministres adjoints fédéraux procèdent à la constitution d’un groupe de travail à haut niveau de gens d’affaires dont le mandat sera de revoir les programmes gouvernementaux en matière de promotion des échanges commerciaux internationaux.

... The draft of the International Trade Business Plan is sent to posts and the International Trade Centres for comments.

... «I think the privatization of the Trade Commissioner Service is a non-starter. Do you realize it is Canada’s largest commercial and economic gathering network. Last year, we received 300,000 inquiries, 47,000 Canadian business visitors, 80,000 foreign business visitors, and 6,000 investment inquiries.”

... “Suppose it doesn’t work?” It is the test day for the Trade Information Office’s newest product, WIN Exports for WINDOWS. More than 2,500 projects and 275 trade fairs and missions are approved each year.

... «Il va de soi que nous affirmerons que l’assistance canadienne devrait être plus intimement liée aux intérêts commerciaux canadiens». L’Association des exportateurs du Canada est ici pour préparer un panel canadiens d’excellence à l’exportation.

... There is a meeting with other government departments on how Canadian industry can win more contracts at the World Bank.

... Work is being done on a difficult financing issue on an infrastructure project in the Middle East and the impact of Algeria’s rescheduling agreement on our export financing operations in Algeria.

... Officers are reviewing the latest proposals for PEMD assistance to companies in a specific export markets. More than 2,500 projects and 275 trade fairs and missions are approved each year.

... «Mais, comment vais-je passer à travers ces 250 propositions?» À titre de membre du comité de sélection, le sous-ministre adjoint débute l’examen des propositions canadiens d’excellence à l’exportation.

Le Canada, les Casques bleus et le maintien de la paix

Le Lieutenant-Général Maurice Baril répond aux questions de François Taschereau

Le Lieutenant-Général Maurice Baril est né en septembre 1943 à Saint-Albert de Warwick (Québec). Au cours d’une carrière distinguée au sein des forces armées canadiennes, il a servi trois fois à Chypre et a été affecté à Lahr en Allemagne. De juin 1992 au 23 juin 1995 (jour de cette entrevue), il a été Conseiller militaire du Secrétaire général au sein du Département des opérations de maintien de la paix de l’ONU.

bdp: Parlez-nous de votre expérience comme Casque bleu ainsi que de votre nomination en tant que Conseiller militaire auprès du Secrétaire général Boutros-Ghali il y a trois ans.

MB: La réputation du Canada et des gardiens de la paix canadiens n’est pas étrangère au choix d’un Canadien par le Secrétaire général. Le Canada est un pays qui ne menace personne et qui participe à des opérations de maintien de la paix depuis le tout début. Fort de cette réputation en tant que Canadien, je n’ai pas eu à prouver ce que je valais. En fait, c’est probablement cela qui est le plus difficile pour un Canadien qui arrive dans un tel poste: maintenir cette réputation. Comme tous les jeunes officiers canadiens, j’ai servi dans les opérations de maintien de la paix que nous considérions comme un entraînement. Nous estimions que ce genre de mission et la défense de notre pays sont les tâches les plus nobles que nous pouvions accomplir. Je n’ai jamais changé d’idée. Ma dernière expérience a été celle de commandant de bataillon de 600 à 700 hommes dans le secteur de Nicosie. Cela a enrichi mon expérience avant que j’aille à New York.

bdp: Selon vous, y avait-il, à ce moment-là, des différences de perceptions importantes entre les missions sur le terrain et le Secrétariat à New York?

MB: Quand j’ai rencontré le Secrétaire général pour la première fois, il m’a demandé si je connaissais le Secrétariat. J’ai répondu par la négative. Par la suite, l’occasion m’a été donnée de prendre contact avec la mécanique de cette grande organisation. À Chypre, nous nous sentions protégés. Je m’y sentais à l’aise de donner ma loyauté et celles de tous les soldats canadiens qui étaient sous mon commandement de la Force des Nations Unies. De plus, le gouvernement canadien ne m’a jamais donné d’instructions à Chypre, les autorités canadiennes ne m’ont jamais contacté sauf pour nous souhaiter bon anniversaire lors de la fête du régiment. Chypre est un endroit où on avait besoin et où on a encore besoin d’une police internationale. Les conséquences d’un conflit sont trop élevées dans une région instable.

bdp: On s’interroge parfois sur l’urgence d’agir du Conseil de sécurité qui, après six mois, un an, tient à modifier les conditions de déploiement s’il ne se passe rien. Peut-être y a-t-il une perception du temps à New York différente des réalités sur le terrain.

MB: Quelqu’un m’a déjà fait remarquer avec sagesse que nos démocraties établies depuis des centaines d’années, dont nous avons raison d’être fiers, sont très stables; mais qu’en Afrique, les États ne commencent à vivre seuls que depuis le début des années ‘60. Alors, «ne nous demandez pas de bâtir un pays en deux ans», disent-ils. «Donnez-nous du temps, soyez patients». Je n’ai jamais oublié cela, puisqu’en Somalie, nous disions aux Somaliens qu’ils avaient six mois pour se bâtir un pays, sinon nous les abandonnerions.

bdp: Au Rwanda, si l’on avait pu envoyer rapidement 5000 soldats bien équipés sur le terrain, aurait-il été possible d’empêcher le génocide?

MB: J’aimerais répondre par l’affirmative. Est-ce qu’une force imposante aurait permis de prendre le contrôle? Les Français étaient intervenus au Rwanda en 1992 avec un régiment de parachutistes et avaient arrêté l’avance du FPR. Mais ce n’était pas la même chose en 1994. Aurait-on dû prévoir le génocide? Il est facile de dire oui maintenant puisque l’on sait qu’il y a eu un génocide. Mais pourquoi n’a-t-on réalisé qu’il y avait eu un génocide en Allemagne qu’en 1943-44? Pourquoi ne l’a-t-on pas prévu ou su en 1936, 37 ou 38, pour alors agir à ce moment-là? Nous savons maintenant que le génocide était planifié. Mais il était difficile de le croire. Du côté politique, il aurait sûrement été difficile, au mois de janvier 94, de dire au Conseil de sécurité qu’un génocide était planifié au Rwanda et de lui demander d’agir. J’estimais à ce moment-là que les autorités rwandaises ne voulaient pas partager le pouvoir. Mais je n’aurais jamais cru que le Président allait être éliminé. Le Président voulait se servir des Nations Unies pour retarder le partage du pouvoir. Nous savions que des armes étaient distribuées et qu’il y avait des possibilités de tueries dans le cas d’un coup d’État. Mais pas des massacres de l’ordre de 500 000 personnes. Il ne faut pas oublier d’autre part que nous avions demandé plus de troupes et des équipement adéquats. Le Major-général Dallaire n’avait même pas de camions pour le transport. Nous savions dès le début qu’il nous fallait deux brigades mécanisées. Que voulez-vous, nous demandions le minimum puisqu’il s’agissait d’opérations de la paix basées sur la bonne volonté et la sécurité et aux États qui paient la facture.

bdp: Après le lancement de l’Agenda pour la paix dans un grand enthousiasme, puis les difficultés que vous venez d’évoquer, se retrouve-t-on aujourd’hui dans une situation désespérée?

MB: Non, non. Si les Nations Unies n’existaient pas, il faudrait les inventer. C’est un instrument à la disposition de tous les États membres. Cet instrument peut être amélioré, raffiné et rendu plus efficace. Mais il faut la volonté de le faire. Il faut mettre en place des mécanismes appropriés pour le rendre efficace. Le Supplément du Secrétaire général publié après l’Agenda pour la paix, m’apparaît plus réaliste. Au début, dans l’euphorie générale, tous pensaient que les États membres étaient disposés à faire beaucoup pour la paix. L’expérience nous a démontré qu’il n’en était pas ainsi. Dorénavant, preuve a été faite qu’il faut un instrument capable de réagir rapidement pour assurer la sécurité collective internationale et pour aider les pays qui sollicitent de l’aide. Il s’agit de mettre en place des cadres administratifs de prise de décisions, de commandement et de contrôle acceptables.

bdp: Et des conditions sur le terrain qui permettent le maintien de la paix?

MB: Évidemment, les conditions sur le terrain peuvent varier et notre capacité d’y répondre doit être souple. Pour le moment, parlons de troupes en alerte. L’idée d’une armée permanente des Nations Unies est pour plus tard, si jamais la communauté internationale en décide ainsi. Pour le moment, nous avons des assurances de certains États membres vont participer au système de troupes en alerte. L’idéal est que plusieurs États y souscrivent de sorte qu’on ait un choix de pays intéressés à y participer. Certains pays nous ont garanti qu’ils nous donneraient des troupes et du matériel dans certaines circonstances. Selon notre base de données actuelles, j’espère que nous pourrons disposer automatiquement des ressources lorsque les besoins seront connus. Ainsi, par exemple, quand douze pays m’auront indiqué leur intérêt à participer à une mission, nous pourrons alors en informer le Conseil de sécurité et lui dire que des troupes peuvent être déployées dans un laps de temps de 14 ou 28 jours selon la contribution de tel ou tel pays. Je pense que l’on se dirige dans cette direction, à condition que les États le veuillent. Les états membres peuvent faire des études, mais on ne peut pas déployer des études. Il faut une entente entre les pays. Il faut améliorer la planification, la logistique, la formation et l’équipement. Tout est possible, à condition que la volonté politique existe.

bdp: Est-ce que vous pensez qu’éventuellement le Conseil de sécurité pourrait disposer d’un système efficace pour des opérations qui nécessitent l’usage de la force?

MB: On ne traverse pas l’océan en chaloupe. Si l’on veut traverser l’océan, il faut construire un bateau à la mesure de ses moyens financiers et de son équipage, ce qui va en limiter la taille. Si l’on veut avoir recours à la force internationale pour régler des contentieux internationaux comme ce fut le cas dans la guerre du Golfe, il vaudrait mieux commencer à y penser tout de suite et essayer de déterminer en quelle année nous serons prêts. Avec la volonté politique des États nous pouvons continuer à jouer un rôle positif. Je suis probablement optimiste de nature. Je crois que l’ONU peut répondre à nos attentes à condition de lui donner les moyens nécessaires et de l’appuyer dans ses efforts.

bdp: Merci beaucoup. Bonne chance dans vos nouvelles fonctions au Canada.

François Taschereau était conseiller (affaires politiques) à la Mission du Canada auprès des Nations Unies à New York. Il a déjà été en poste à Bogota et Madrid. À Ottawa, François Taschereau a été chef de cabinet du sous-ministre et a travaillé au bureau juridique (droit de l’environnement).

Cour criminelle internationale - Dans le feu de l’action

par Philippe Kirsch

Le ministère des Affaires étrangères et du Commerce international a lancé un site Web éducatif destiné principalement aux enseignants et aux étudiants de niveau secondaire au Canada, mais dont une grande partie du contenu pourrait aussi intéresser un auditoire plus vaste. Canadians in the World/Les Canadiens dans le monde compte tout un éventail de sujets, notamment du matériel original conçu pour Internet et des versions Web de documents imprimés et audiovisuels. Dans le cadre de ce projet, on a demandé au journaliste et écrivain Clyde Sanger d’actualiser son livre de 1988 intitulé Canadians and the United Nations/Les Canadiens et les Nations Unies. Le profil de Philippe Kirsch sera affiché sur Canadians in the World (http://www.canschool.org) et Les Canadiens dans le monde (http://canecole.org).

Hector Mackenzie

Les origines de la Cour criminelle internationale, dont la création fut sanctionnée à la Conférence de Rome présidée par l’avocat canadien Philippe Kirsch, en juillet 1998, remontent plus loin qu’aux procès de Nuremberg de 1945-1946, puisqu’il faut en lier la genèse au Pacte Briand-Kellogg de 1928. En vertu de ce Traité général de renonciation à la guerre, signé à Paris, 63 pays renonçaient à la guerre comme instrument de politique nationale, même si le Pacte autorisait l’autodéfense et une riposte collective de la part de la Société des Nations. En août 1945, des représentants des États-Unis, de l’Union soviétique, de la Grande-Bretagne et du gouvernement provisoire français signèrent à Londres un accord incluant la charte d’un tribunal militaire international créé pour traduire en justice les principaux criminels de guerre des puissances de l’Axe. Plus tard, 19 autres pays contresignèrent cet accord, sur la base duquel furent tenus les procès de Nuremberg et de Tokyo.

Le tribunal rejeta l’argument présenté par les avocats de la défense voulant que seul un État, et non des particuliers, puisse être reconnu coupable de crimes de guerre et déclara que c’est seulement en punissant les particuliers qui commettent des crimes de droit international que l’on peut faire respecter les mesures d’application de ce droit.

L’historique de la Cour criminelle internationale (CCI) depuis 1946 est rappelé ici par Philippe Kirsch, qui en 1998, était jurisconsulte auprès du ministère des Affaires étrangères et du Commerce international et qui est maintenant ambassadeur du Canada en Suède.

Entré au service juridique du ministère des Affaires extérieures en 1972 et affecté au Pérou un an plus tard, il s’est retrouvé parmi les participants de l’importante Conférence des Nations Unies sur le droit de la mer tenue à Caracas, car il était parmi les rares avocats canadiens qui parlaient espagnol. Pendant deux ans, il s’occupa à Ottawa des relations avec les États-Unis sur les questions environnementales, «un dossier intéressant, même à cette époque». Il ajoute :

«Durant tout le reste de ma carrière, j’ai partagé mon temps entre le droit et les relations multilatérales, combinant parfois les deux.» Depuis 1993, il avait présidé de nombreux comités des Nations Unies et d’autres organes internationaux, et avait travaillé à des dossiers comme la protection des victimes de la guerre, la sécurité du personnel des Nations Unies et l’élaboration d’une convention pour la répression des attentats terroristes. Il avait également présidé la Sixième Commission (questions juridiques) de l’Assemblée générale des Nations Unies. Il était donc la personne idéale pour remplacer le diplomate hollandais Adriaan Bos, qui avait présidé les réunions de New York, lorsque celui-ci tomba malade.

«On ne m’a prévenu que quelques semaines à l’avance que j’allais devoir présider la Conférence. Juste avant, je devais plaider devant la Cour internationale de justice dans l’affaire de la saisie du bateau de pêche espagnol Estai, une tâche qui m’occupait à 150 p. 100! De fait, j’ai lu le texte du statut qui était proposé dans l’avion qui allait de La Haye à Rome et j’ai manqué la deuxième série d’audiences dans l’affaire de l’Estai. Adriaan Bos m’avait appelé, et je pensais qu’il voulait que je prépare quelque chose sur un sujet donné en prévision de la Conférence. Au lieu de cela, il m’a dit : “Écoutez, je dois me faire opérer. Pourriez-vous présider à ma place la Commission plénière?” J’ai répondu qu’à mon avis, ce n’était pas une bonne idée, étant donné que je n’avais pas participé aux négociations précédentes [qui portaient sur la création de la Cour]. Mais il me dit : “Vous êtes sans doute la seule personne qui ferait l’unanimité.” Nous avons convenu qu’il chercherait à savoir ce qu’en pensaient les délégations, alors que moi, de mon côté, je vérifierais auprès du ministère des Affaires étrangères et du Commerce international, au cas où cela poserait un problème. Il communiqua avec Hans Corell, le conseiller juridique des Nations Unies. Cela prit une semaine ou deux. Je n’en savais pas assez sur le poste pour imposer quelque condition que ce soit.»

Quoi qu’il en soit, il prit fermement les choses en main et imposa ce qui était, pour les Nations Unies, une méthode inhabituelle d’élaborer un texte — probablement la seule méthode susceptible de produire un document avalisé par 148 délégations dans un délai aussi bref que cinq semaines. La méthode habituelle, utilisée par exemple lors des négociations de la Convention sur le droit de la mer, était de produire un texte truffé de passages entre crochets. Ces crochets indiquent les points de désaccord et peuvent entourer un nombre illimité d’énoncés remplaçant partiellement ou complètement certains articles. Philippe Kirsch explique sa méthode : «J’ai délibérément écarté la méthode utilisée pour la Convention sur le droit de la mer. En effet, lorsque j›ai pris connaissance du statut, où l’on comptait pas moins de 1 400 passages entre crochets, c’était un texte extrêmement désorganisé — très riche, certes, mais impossible à utiliser comme base des négociations. J’ai donc pensé : “Impossible de travailler avec cela et impossible de travailler avec des passages entre crochets, parce que si l’on essaie de les éliminer un par un, on n’y arrivera jamais en cinq semaines.”

«Donc, lors de la première réunion que j’ai présidée à Rome, à laquelle assistaient les 12 ou 15 coordonnateurs, j’ai dit : “Il y a une chose sur laquelle j’aimerais insister tout particulièrement, c’est la nécessité de ne jamais, j’insiste bien, jamais, laisser les délégations élaborer un texte. C’est vous qui le faites. Vous écoutez ce que les délégations ont à dire et vous prenez les propositions écrites en considération, ce qui vous permet de préparer un texte ‘en devenir’. Au début, vous pouvez présenter diverses options qui peuvent être discutées, mais vous ne déposez jamais un texte où il y a des passages entre crochets. Vous allez apporter des modifications à votre texte puisqu’il est ‘en devenir’, mais ne redonnez pas le crayon aux délégations.” Tout au long de ma carrière, j’avais pu constater qu’il était beaucoup plus facile de mettre certaines parties d’un texte entre crochets que d’enlever les crochets. De fait, j’ai appliqué la méthode que j’avais suivie pendant au moins 15 ans, chaque fois que je présidais un groupe.»

Il ne rejeta cependant pas le statut élaboré provisoirement au cours des réunions de la Commission préparatoire. Comme le reconnaît Philippe Kirsch, ces réunions avaient permis d’accomplir des progrès notables : définir la structure générale du statut final; établir un cadre propice aux maillages entre des régimes juridiques différents, notamment le droit civil et le droit pénal; et parvenir à un accord sur l’importante question de la «complémentarité», c›est-à-dire de la relation entre les tribunaux nationaux et la CCI.

Philippe Kirsch explique ainsi la raison d’être de la CCI : «La création de la Cour criminelle internationale est en fait le point culminant d’années d’efforts consentis pour remplacer une culture de l’impunité par une culture de la responsabilité. Le processus a été lancé sérieusement à Nuremberg et à Tokyo, mais ensuite, la guerre froide a restreint les avenues de coopération entre les principales puissances, et en ce qui concerne les sanctions à l’égard de criminels, les choses sont restées au point mort pendant longtemps. C’est la raison pour laquelle des gens comme Idi Amin Dada et Pol Pot ont pu commettre des crimes absolument horribles sans jamais même courir le risque d’être traduits en justice. Ensuite, la fin de la guerre froide eut deux conséquences : premièrement, les principales puissances recommencèrent à coopérer, mais la stabilité que l’on avait connue durant la guerre froide fut remplacée par une multiplication de conflits ethniques, au cours desquels des crimes particulièrement odieux furent commis. La reprise d’une certaine collaboration entre les États et le besoin qui se faisait clairement sentir aboutirent à la création de deux tribunaux spéciaux qui, d’une certaine façon, se révélèrent plus efficaces que prévu au début. Mais ces tribunaux ont leur limite : ils sont censés juger certaines affaires précises, mais non des actes criminels commis ailleurs par la suite. De plus, ils n’ont aucun effet dissuasif, sauf peut-être dans le cas de la Yougoslavie, pour empêcher que des crimes soient commis sur le même territoire, parce qu’aucune date butoir n’a été imposée, comme ce fut le cas du tribunal pour le Rwanda. Il y avait également un obstacle d’ordre plus institutionnel. Ces deux tribunaux sont des émanations du Conseil de sécurité, et de très nombreux États jugeaient tout simplement insatisfaisant de laisser au Conseil de sécurité le monopole des sanctions imposées à des criminels de cette envergure et estimaient que l’on devrait établir un organe plus formel, plus permanent et moins sélectif, sans pour autant avoir à faire face au problème de repartir à zéro pour trouver les fonds nécessaires.»

Quels étaient les États qui préconisaient l’établissement d’une telle Cour, étant donné que les cinq membres permanents du Conseil de sécurité n’étaient pas tellement partisans de l’idée? Philippe Kirsch explique ce qui s’est passé : «L’action de deux types d’États s’est combinée. Dans la première catégorie, on retrouvait des pays appartenant à ce que l’on appelle le “groupe des pays d’optique commune”, essentiellement des moyennes puissances comme le Canada, l’Australie, la Norvège, l’Argentine, qui n’avaient jamais eu de colonies et n’avaient jamais commis d’agression contre d’autres États, mais cherchaient uniquement à faire établir un nouvel organe qui pourrait éventuellement défendre les victimes de futures guerres. Au début, les membres de ce groupe étaient peu nombreux, mais bientôt plusieurs pays en développement se joignirent à eux, pour des raisons qui étaient en partie les mêmes et en partie différentes. Persuadés que les crimes devraient être sanctionnés et découragés, ils partageaient les mêmes valeurs. En outre, plusieurs d’entre eux connaissaient d’expérience les situations décrites dans le statut portant création de la CCI. Des crimes avaient été commis sur leur territoire, ou ils avaient été victimes de ce qu’ils avaient perçu comme une agression. Ils avaient tout intérêt à ce qu’un nouvel organe soit mis en place pour tenter de décourager de telles interventions à l’avenir. Au début des négociations de Rome, le groupe d’optique commune rassemblait environ 40 pays, mais en bout de ligne, en comptant les pays en développement qui s’y joignirent, il en comprenait 60. Cependant, ce n’était pas le seul groupe qui était en faveur de l’établissement de la Cour criminelle, puisque les résultats du vote final montrent que les pays d’optique commune ne constituaient que la moitié des 120 États qui se sont prononcés en faveur du projet, 7 pays votant contre et 21 choisissant l’abstention. Tous les pays d’Europe de l’Est et de l’Ouest et la plupart des pays d’Amérique latine et des États africains ont voté en sa faveur. Ce qui est encourageant, c’est que plusieurs des États qui s’étaient abstenus ont décidé de signer et de ratifier le statut, avec ou sans conditions — par exemple, la Trinité-et-Tobago. Je trouve cet appui très encourageant, d’autant plus que plusieurs États arabes ont pris la même décision.»

Sueurs à Rome

La Conférence entama ses travaux le 15 juin au siège de l’Organisation des Nations Unies pour l’alimentation et l’agriculture, à Rome. Fergus Watt, directeur général du Mouvement canadien pour une fédération mondiale, se souvient : «Il faisait chaud. La Conférence avait lieu dans un vieil immeuble des Nations Unies datant des années 1950, mais la cafétéria s’ouvrait sur une magnifique terrasse d’où l’on pouvait admirer le spectacle des ruines romaines, et c’est là que tout le monde organisait des réunions à l’heure du déjeuner. On ne comptait plus les jeux de mots répétés à plaisir sur le thème des ruines et ainsi de suite.

«Une des choses dont je me souviens encore aujourd’hui, c’est ma grande estime pour le travail accompli par Philippe Kirsch. Il savait se montrer ouvert, aimable et sympathique. C’est quelqu’un qui a de la personnalité et, à titre de président, il imposait sa marque sur les réunions et pouvait faire à peu près ce qu’il voulait pour ordonner les débats à son gré. Il était pleinement conscient des contraintes de temps; il avait un plan et un calendrier — et il n’était pas question pour lui de laisser les choses s’embourber.»

Philippe Kirsch prend ces compliments avec modestie : «En ce qui concerne l’organisation des travaux, on donne au rôle que j’ai joué plus d’importance qu’il ne le mérite. J’ai fait mon possible pour faire avancer les choses rapidement, mais je n’ai pas pu éviter des débats très approfondis, et j’ai donc laissé les discussions aller leur train, alors même que le nombre énorme de questions à résoudre me donnait des sueurs froides. Il y avait des points fondamentaux, mais j’avais également à faire face à l’entêtement dont les gens faisaient preuve à propos de questions d’ordre technique, et la Commission plénière était obligée de recommencer à discuter de textes transmis par les groupes de travail qui étaient presque satisfaisants, parce que deux délégations n’acceptaient pas de les approuver; et tout le processus devait recommencer à zéro. Cela demandait énormément de temps. Rétrospectivement, la Conférence de Rome [qui s’est étalée sur une période de cinq semaines] n’a probablement pas duré assez longtemps, mais les résultats auraient-ils été différents si nous avions disposé de plus de temps? Je n’en suis pas sûr.»

À propos de ses relations avec l›équipe de représentants du Canada, Philippe Kirsch déclare : «Pour présider la Conférence, il fallait être membre d’une délégation. Toutefois, une fois élu président, j’ai dû prendre mes distances par rapport à la délégation canadienne, pour ne pas perdre ma crédibilité, c’est-à-dire mon autorité. Croyez-moi, à Rome, il était très important de pouvoir faire preuve d’autorité. Sinon, vous ne pouviez pas fonctionner. Je travaillais dans le contexte du Bureau de la Conférence, alors que la délégation canadienne était dirigée fermement par Alan Kessel. Un diplomate canadien, John Holmes, me secondait en jouant le rôle d’agent de liaison avec la délégation et le noyau des participants. C’était clair qu’il agissait en mon nom et non au nom de la délégation canadienne».

Le Bureau, qui était chargé de gérer le processus des négociations — et qui donc dirigeait effectivement la Conférence — ne regroupait que cinq pays : le Canada, l’Argentine, la Roumanie, le Lesotho et le Japon. Mais Philippe Kirsch élargit la participation au Bureau en incluant certains coordonnateurs. Un comité de rédaction chargé des questions d’ordre technique avait été établi, mais c’était le Bureau qui rédigeait les documents de discussion et, par la suite, des propositions de plus en plus fermes. Le capitaine tenait la barre d’une main ferme, mais les eaux sur lesquelles voguait son navire furent agitées dès le départ.

Deux semaines (sur cinq) s’écoulèrent avant que le Bureau ne produise son premier texte «en devenir». Philippe Kirsch explique pourquoi : «Il est essentiel, au début d’une conférence, de laisser les représentants des États dire ce qu’ils veulent. On perd du temps, mais cela les agacerait énormément s’ils ne pouvaient pas s’exprimer. J’ai donc procédé ainsi et ensuite, j’ai organisé toute une série de réunions bilatérales avec les délégations les plus importantes en pensant que, si j’agissais de cette façon, ces délégués me diraient en privé ce qu’ils ne disaient pas en public. Mais ce n’est pas ce qui est arrivé; ils ont juste défendu les mêmes positions. J’ai alors convoqué à une réunion tenue à l’ambassade du Canada, le dimanche précédant la troisième semaine de négociations, environ 30 délégations, en pensant que dans un tel cadre, nous allions pouvoir avoir un véritable échange de vues. Ce n’est pas non plus ce qui est arrivé. Nous avons fait quelques progrès en ce qui concerne la définition des crimes, mais les choses sont restées absolument au point mort sur la question de la compétence.»

Les principaux crimes visés étaient le génocide, les crimes contre l’humanité, les agressions et les crimes de guerre. (Tels étaient les chefs d’accusation à Nuremberg.) La question de savoir si l’on devait inclure les conflits internes posait un problème sur le plan de la définition des crimes de guerre. «Cette question était très loin d’être résolue lorsque la Conférence débuta. La plupart des États voulaient que l’on inclue les conflits internes, étant donné que c’est lors de tels affrontements que sont commis la plupart des crimes, si bien qu’il est absurde d’en faire abstraction. Plusieurs États, dont la Chine, l’Inde, la plupart des États arabes, l’Iran, le Nigéria et Cuba, s’y opposaient fermement pour toutes sortes de raisons. Nous avons donc décidé de présenter, pour discussion, un choix de textes très simples à la Commission plénière; manifestement, la plupart des États étaient en faveur de l’inclusion. En ce qui concerne le Bureau, nous étions bien décidés à inclure les conflits internes, mais nous avions pensé être en mesure d’élargir la définition de tels conflits. Or, certains États étaient si opposés à l’inclusion de ce type d’affrontement que peu leur importait que la définition soit large ou non; au bout du compte, nous avons dû revenir à une définition relativement simple et classique.»

La délégation allemande était celle qui défendait le plus vivement l’inclusion des agressions parmi les crimes de guerre, alors que les États-Unis s’y opposaient le plus farouchement — un renversement d’opinions surprenant depuis Nuremberg. L’Allemagne déposa un texte énonçant les modalités selon lesquelles on pourrait définir ce que l’on entend par agression. Philippe Kirsch ajoute : «Le problème fondamental que posait la question de l’agression était, premièrement, le fait qu’un certain nombre d’États, notamment les États-Unis, ne voulaient pas que cela soit inclus du tout; mais même les pays qui étaient d’accord pour que l’agression soit mentionnée dans le statut avaient des idées très différentes de la définition qui devait en être donnée et du rôle que pourrait jouer à cet égard, le cas échéant, le Conseil de sécurité. Ces divergences de vues persistèrent jusqu’à un stade très avancé des négociations. Dans son avant-dernière proposition, le Bureau suggérait d’inclure l’agression sur la liste des crimes de guerre à condition de parvenir à un accord sur la définition d’un tel acte et, dans le cas contraire, de repousser la décision à plus tard, par exemple lorsque se réunirait une conférence de révision du statut. Cela donna lieu à l’un des quatre ou cinq débats les plus âpres de la Conférence, parce que plusieurs États ne cessaient de répéter : “Écoutez, il s’agit d’un crime fondamental, tous les autres en découlent” (une opinion contestable) et “un certain nombre de pays représentés dans cette salle ont été victimes d’agressions. Il faut absolument que cela soit inclus sur la liste des crimes de guerre!” Dans ce contexte politique, nous avons cédé et nous avons décidé d’inclure les agressions, mais de confier à la future Commission préparatoire la mission de rédiger une définition. La Cour ne peut exercer ses compétences dans un certain domaine que si les États parties ont convenu d’une définition.»

Pourquoi les États-Unis s’opposaient-ils à cette proposition? Philippe Kirsch répond en paraphrasant l’explication donnée par ce pays : «Les États-Unis ont dit qu’ils avaient des responsabilités particulières, à titre de membre permanent du Conseil de sécurité, pour assurer la paix et la sécurité internationales, et qu’ils voulaient être en mesure d’intervenir quand, à leur avis, il s’avérait nécessaire de le faire, sans pour autant être pénalisés d’avoir pris des mesures utiles, et sans que certains des pires régimes de la terre puissent utiliser la CCI à des fins politiques. Ils n’en ont pas démordu et sont même allés jusqu’à dire que leur approbation d’une définition serait indispensable et que cela exigerait une décision du Conseil de sécurité. Je ne suis pas certain que ce soit là le dernier obstacle à une éventuelle ratification du statut par les États-Unis.»

Les failles du statut

Quelles sont les failles du statut? Fergus Watt rappelle la déception ressentie par la plupart des ONG qui demandaient que les compétences de la Cour soient universelles : «Le statut stipule que, pour que des poursuites puissent être engagées, l’État sur le territoire duquel le crime présumé a été commis ou l’État dont l’accusé est ressortissant doit être un des pays signataires du traité. Ce n’est pas suffisant. Cela exclut l’État où un accusé peut être détenu, dans le cas où un criminel de guerre se rend à l’étranger et est arrêté. Si la compétence de la Cour se limite à l’État dont l’accusé est ressortissant et à l’État où le crime présumé a été commis — c’est d’ailleurs souvent une seule et même chose, dans le cas de chefs politiques et militaires — la possibilité d’intenter des poursuites est exclue. C’est la plus grande faille du texte. Idéalement, la compétence de la Cour aurait dû être universelle : il s’agit de punir les pires crimes, universellement reconnus comme tels par la communauté internationale, ce qui exigerait que la compétence de la Cour soit universelle. On savait qu’il serait difficile de parvenir à une entente sur ce point. C’est une chose de reconnaître qu’un certain acte est un crime, mais pour certains États, cela ne va pas jusqu’à mettre en place des mesures pour arrêter les criminels et les traduire en justice. Le compromis qui a donc été suggéré à ce stade, sur la question de la compétence de la Cour, a été la proposition de la Corée d’ajouter aux deux premières catégories d’États, celles des pays où un accusé pouvait être détenu et des pays dont les victimes étaient ressortissants. Selon cette proposition, la Cour pouvait exercer sa compétence si un pays entrant dans l’une de ces quatre catégories était signataire du traité. La proposition de la Corée fut écartée, sans doute inutilement, deux jours avant la fin des négociations.»

Philippe Kirsch ajoute alors : «Les Américains voulaient que la Cour puisse exercer sa compétence uniquement si l’État dont l’accusé était ressortissant avait donné son consentement. Telle était leur position à l’origine. Il était clair que cela n’allait pas marcher. Ils ont donc nuancé leur position en demandant que l’on exclue tout acte commis par des “agents de l’autorité,” ce qui signifie qu’ils ne voulaient pas que l’État où les crimes avaient été commis puisse engager des poursuites dans ce cas. Par ailleurs, ils voulaient une option de refus applicable aux crimes contre l’humanité et aux crimes de guerre pendant 10 ans — et renouvelable. Ainsi donc, un État aurait pu avoir signé le statut, mais avoir déclaré ne pas vouloir accepter que la Cour ait une compétence quelconque pour juger ces crimes. La proposition de la Corée aurait donné à la Cour des compétences très larges. Mais plusieurs États avaient des réserves à ce propos. Or, c’est un point essentiel. De l’avis du Bureau, pour que la Cour soit dotée d’un pouvoir véritable, il fallait que ce pouvoir repose sur deux choses : non seulement sur le poids des dispositions régissant sa création, mais également sur l’appui qui lui était accordé par la communauté internationale. Un statut parfait qui n’est appuyé que par 12 États ne sera pas d’une grande utilité, notamment s’il fait l’objet d’une vive opposition de la part de beaucoup d’autres pays. Nous avons donc jugé qu’il était préférable d’accepter un statut qui n’était pas parfait, dont nous rejetions nous-mêmes certains éléments, mais qui pouvait servir de base à la création d’une institution solide et permanente. C’est ainsi qu’à notre grand regret, nous avons finalement décidé de ne pas tenir compte de la proposition de la Corée, même si elle avait l’appui de la plupart des États.»

Au pied du mur

L’heure de vérité

Il y eut de nombreuses autres prises de bec, le bureau de Philippe Kirsch agissant à titre de médiateur, produisant un texte toujours «en devenir» et encourageant les groupes de travail (que des membres du «groupe des pays d’optique commune» avaient, pour la plupart, réussi à présider — «personne ne sait comment», selon Fergus Watt) à redoubler d’efforts. Philippe Kirsch était déterminé à éviter tout vote au cours de la Conférence. «Je n’étais pas d’accord sur ce point avec plusieurs délégations et ONG qui étaient sûres d’avoir la majorité des voix nécessaire pour faire adopter certaines décisions. J’avais deux raisons de vouloir rejeter cette méthode. Premièrement, j’estime que le droit a plus de force s’il bénéficie d’un large appui et, s’il y a un vote pour déterminer ceci ou cela, chaque fois, il y a tout un groupe de délégations que cela contrarie et au bout du compte, vous avez perdu la bonne volonté dont vous avez besoin pour réussir. Mon autre argument était d’ordre plus technique : si vous élaborez un texte législatif par le biais d’une série de votes destinés à faire approuver des dispositions précises, à un moment ou à un autre, vous courez un très grand risque, le risque que le texte devienne incohérent parce qu’il renferme des dispositions qui manquent de logique d’un point de vue technique. J’ai expliqué ma façon d’agir ainsi à maintes reprises aux délégations et aux ONG : premièrement, je cherche le consensus mais, si c’est impossible, je veux limiter et reporter les votes autant que possible pour qu’en bout de ligne, nous ayons un statut solide qui résistera aux décisions qui devront être prises au vote, ce qui se limitera à un ou deux points.»

Ne disposant que de deux jours pour mettre un terme aux négociations, le Bureau devait décider soit de proposer l’adoption d’un texte final par la Commission plénière, soit de rapporter qu’un accord n’avait pas été possible et de commencer à préparer une deuxième session qui se tiendrait quelques mois plus tard. Les membres du Bureau décidèrent sagement de jouer le tout pour le tout et de présenter un texte final qui fut transmis aux délégations aux petites heures de la dernière journée de la Conférence. Philippe Kirsch espérait obtenir un consensus, mais les États-Unis et l’Inde présentèrent des amendements.

Ceux des États-Unis portaient sur l’option de refus applicable pendant 10 ans et l’exemption des «agents de l’autorité». Quant à l’Inde, «elle jugeait le processus très insatisfaisant pour deux raisons. Premièrement, nous avions maintenu que le Conseil de sécurité des Nations Unies devrait jouer un rôle, du moins pour déclencher le processus (en déférant des affaires à la Cour, alors que par ailleurs, ce que l’on appelait la proposition de Singapour prévoyait que, dans certaines circonstances, le Conseil de sécurité pouvait demander à la Cour de différer l’exercice de ses compétences pendant 12 mois. Cela s’éloignait beaucoup du statut provisoire rédigé par la CDI, où il était stipulé que la Cour ne pouvait exercer sa compétence que si elle était autorisée à le faire par le Conseil de sécurité. Donc [la proposition de Singapour] était un compromis. L’Inde voulait également inclure l’armement nucléaire dans la liste des crimes couverts par le statut.»

Quoi qu’il en soit, on était au pied du mur et «les participants commencèrent à réaliser que si l’on commençait à remanier le statut, qui était le fruit d’un compromis, il se désintégrerait. C’est alors que la Norvège présenta, à propos des amendements déposés par les États-Unis et par l’Inde, des motions qui permettaient essentiellement de ne prendre aucune décision à propos de ces amendements et qui furent appuyées à la majorité par 114 et 113 pays respectivement. Cela démontrait en fait que les délégations n’étaient pas nécessairement contre ces amendements, en substance, mais que tout le monde se rendait compte que l’heure de vérité avait sonné». Finalement, même si la Commission plénière avait adopté le texte provisoire du statut sans qu’il y ait eu vote, au cours de la dernière séance plénière de la Conférence, «les États-Unis demandèrent que la proposition globale fasse l’objet d’un vote. Ce n’est pas moi qui l’ai suggéré.» Au cours de ce vote final, 120 États, dont la France, la Russie et la Grande-Bretagne, se déclarèrent en faveur de la proposition globale, alors que 6 États seulement se joignirent aux États-Unis en votant contre et que 21 s’abstinrent. Il faudra que le statut soit ratifié par 60 États avant d’entrer en vigueur.

En dépit des compromis, le résultat a-t-il été satisfaisant? Philippe Kirsch répond prudemment : «Je pense que l’on considère maintenant le statut de Rome comme un document historique, un texte qui n’est pas parfait, mais qui est bien meilleur que le statut élaboré par la CDI qui était beaucoup plus conservateur, étant donné qu’il accordait des privilèges au Conseil de sécurité et ne garantissait que dans une très faible mesure l’indépendance du procureur. Mais à mon avis, en poussant plus que nous l’avons fait à Rome dans l’autre sens, on courait vraiment le risque de ne pas avoir de statut du tout.»

Note de rédacteur: Le ministre des Affaires étrangères, M. Lloyd Axworthy, a annoncé le 7 juillet que le Canada a ratifié le Statut de la Cour pénale internationale (CPI). Les instruments de ratification du Canada ont été déposés par le ministre aux Nations Unies, à New York.

Guerre et paix au
Moyen-orient et en Afrique /
War and Peace in the
Middle East and Africa

Le sous-ministre adjoint consulte sa montre. Il attend toujours les nouvelles du Haut-Commissariat au Kenya sur les sœurs disparues au Rwanda. Il est quatorze heures trente dans la plupart des postes de sa région.

Les priorités canadiennes dans la région sont au nombre de quatre :

appuyer le processus de paix au Moyen-Orient;

la promotion des droits de la personne, la promotion du développement démocratique et la résolution pacifique des conflits dans la région de l’Afrique occidentale, de l’Afrique centrale et l’Afrique du Nord;

appuyer le processus des relations de transition et la reprise des relations commerciales avec l’Afrique du sud;

l’expansion du commerce en Afrique et au Moyen-Orient.

Le 2 juin se déroule...

... «Oui, nous sommes en train de mettre à jour des Questions et Réponses sur le Rwanda. Nous avons eu la confirmation que les forces gouvernementales ont tiré sur notre Hercule C-130 qui a immédiatement redécollé sans dommage. Une nouvelle trêve devra être renégociée avant la reprise du pont aérien.»

... Le Bureau de la presse veut une ligne de presse sur les affrontements de la nuit dernière entre Israël et le Hezbollah qui ont fait 50 morts.

... “We better get a hold of our High Commissioner and tell him that Prime Minister Chrétien has signed the letter to President Mandela inviting him to the Commonwealth Games in Victoria. The PMO and the Minister have agreed that we should release the letter as a press release. Our Mission will want to inform the South African government.”

... Il y a une discussion avec le président du National Council on Canada Arab Relations pour convenir de la suite à donner à la réunion de la veille entre le Ministre et la communauté canado-arabe.

... Le vice-président de Canadian Occidental Petroleum discute des opérations de sa compagnie au Yémen à la lumière des derniers développements de la guerre civile dans ce pays.

... Nairobi requests additional funds to meet the extra costs associated with the Office of the Honorary Consul in Burundi. The closure of the office in Rwanda has increased the demand for services in Bujumbura.

... Algiers updates earlier reports on the security situation and the attacks on foreigners. The one hundred resident Canadians are still safe.

... Un représentant de la communauté canadienne au Zaïre qui est aussi le représentant d’affaires israélien vient discuter la situation au Zaïre.

... Dar-es-Salaam reports they will run out of passport supplies by July as the influx of Canadian aid workers to assist with Rwandan refugees has increased demand significantly.

... The Immigration Services meets to discuss plans for the reopening of our mission in Beirut.

... The Finance Minister of Ghana is in Ottawa for discussion on Ghana’s economic reform program and how Canadian assistance can best play a role.

... Il y a une réunion de stratégie avec l’ACDI pour discuter du rôle du Canada dans les processus de paix au Moyen-Orient, en particulier l’assistance canadienne en matière de logement d’urgence pour les sans-abris au Liban et l’assistance électorale dans les territoires palestiniens.

... The Special Advisor on Middle East Refugees meets with the ADM to discuss the follow-up to the Multilateral Working Group on Refugees. Canada is the chairman and is active in trying to make progress on the issue.

... Les ministres approuvent la négociation d’un accord de libre-échange avec Israël. Ottawa donne à la mission à Tel Aviv l’instruction d’inviter une équipe israélienne au Canada pour un premier échange de vues.

... L’ambassadeur du Niger sollicite et obtient une audience au cours de laquelle il fait part d’une démarche du corps diplomatique africain concernant la tragédie rwandaise. L’ambassadeur du Rwanda passe deux heures au ministère pour discuter de la situation au Rwanda.

... Voyageur Assistance seeks verification that a health clinic in Cameroon exists.

The Graduation Ceremony for the new Foreign Service Officers

The senior management of the two departments of the foreign service attend the graduation ceremony for the first graduates of the Canadian Foreign Service Institute. Created in 1992, the CFSI has the mandate to provide professional training to members of the departments of the foreign service.

The Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs speaks, “Your training is a manifestation of the need for a deeper and stronger set of professional tools at the outset of a foreign service career. A historical transformation is changing the role played by national states in international affairs. It will be a challenge to develop policies that balance domestic and international factors.” The Deputy Minister of International Trade and the ADM International Services Sector of Citizenship and Immigration also congratulate the graduates.

Certificates are presented to the thirty five new officers. They had spent a year in the classroom and on the job. Some also travelled to other regions of the country or served in foreign missions. They will now start work in their respective streams (political/economic; commercial/economic; management/consular; and immigration).

Lever de soleil sur la steppe — Comment le Canada a découvert l’Asie centrale

par Philippe Cousineau

Contrée mythique située sur la route de la soie, isolée par la Sibérie, les déserts de Chine, l’Himalaya et la grande steppe, l’Asie centrale était pratiquement inaccessible, à l’exception de quelques sites touristiques, jusqu’à ce que l’URSS commence à s’effondrer. Lors de mon affectation à Moscou de 1991 à 1993, j’ai pu suivre de près ce processus d’ouverture et la réaction du Canada.

Novembre 1991 — Qu’est-ce que l’indépendance? Je débarque avec un collègue à Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan, à sept heures du matin après une trop courte nuit dans un avion d’Aeroflot. Nous sommes à la recherche d’information sur les réactions des Républiques au démantèlement anticipé de l’Union. Nous n’avons ni interprète, ni rendez-vous confirmés, ni hôtel, ni moyen de transport : c’est la diplomatie sans artifices. Négociations ardues pour acheter un petit déjeuner frugal dans une minuscule salle cachée au sixième étage d’un hôtel; un téléphone public extérieur à peine fonctionnel sous le vrombissement des vieux autobus qui peinent à grimper les côtes de la capitale du Kazakhstan; un attaché de presse présidentiel, un récepteur téléphonique dans chaque main et trois visiteurs dans son antichambre mais d’une rare efficacité nous obtient trois rendez-vous en quelques minutes et nous sommes en affaires. À noter, il n’y a à cette date aucun représentant diplomatique étranger à Alma-Ata.

L’indépendance? «Nous ne considérons même pas cette possibilité», nous dit un officiel. En Ouzbekistan, la population est sceptique. «Les choses allaient mieux à l’époque de Tamerlan» nous explique un passant. Un mois plus tard, le Kazakhstan sera la quatorzième et dernière des Républiques soviétiques à déclarer son indépendance de Moscou (la Russie n’aura jamais à le faire, le sort de l’URSS étant alors scellé).

Février 1992 — La ruée vers l’or commence. Visite d’une délégation de l’Ambassadeur à Bishkek; la capitale du Kyrgyzstan vient de changer de nom. L’Ambassadeur Bell remet au Président Akayev une lettre du Premier ministre offrant d’établir des relations diplomatiques entre nos deux pays. Le Président est sur le point de partir pour le Canada où il veut encourager l’investissement dans le secteur minier. Déjà, plusieurs entreprises étrangères voient miroiter la possibilité de mettre la main sur les gisements d’or et de métaux rares des montagnes du Kyrgyzstan. Le pays a-t-il un drapeau? «Pas encore, mais nous le ramasserons en Suisse en route vers Toronto», nous dit un conseiller présidentiel.

Le Président veut suivre une politique de neutralité, encourager la démocratie, adopter des réformes économiques libérales et créer la première école de gens d’affaires de la région. Il appelle son pays la Suisse de l’Asie centrale. Les deux pays ont des sommets enneigés et des sites enchanteurs, mais le Kyrgyzstan a encore du chemin à faire avant de devenir un paradis fiscal.

Mars 1992 — Le castor a atterri. Le Canada réagit à l’apparition de tous les nouveaux pays issus de l’URSS en y établissant deux antennes, une à Alma-Ata et une à Erevan en Arménie. Cette fois, la diplomatie légère atteint son paroxysme. Que faut-il pour établir une ambassade? : un ordinateur portatif, une imprimante, un télécopieur, une chambre d’hôtel, un FS-1 et un téléphone-satellite. Trimballant tant bien que mal tout cet équipement, Fawad Quraishi et moi débarquons à Alma-Ata un samedi soir pour nous installer à l’hôtel Kazakhstan, un genre Holiday Inn gonflé aux stéroïdes et surmonté d’une espèce de couronne de mariée dorée, un fleuron de l’architecture locale. La minuscule chambre 913, la seule où le satané «satphone» veut bien fonctionner une fois de temps en temps, devient la «Représentation du Gouvernement du Canada à Alma-Ata». Quand la technologie moderne flanche, nous devons nous rabattre sur le téléphone local, une contraption de plastique orange ressemblant à un jouet d’enfant et qui donne l’impression que l’on parle à la Lune quand on rejoint la chambre d’à-côté. Le Gouvernement kazakh reconnaît-il notre présence ou pas? La question restera ouverte plusieurs mois.

Simplement rencontrer le ministère des Affaires étrangères demandera plusieurs journées d’efforts. La ville est alors complètement envahie par les délégations étrangères — turques, allemandes, chinoises, coréennes, américaines et autres – la diplomatie sur le pouce ne pèse pas lourd dans l’engrenage. Autre défi et non le moindre : trouver un restaurant correct. Nous faisons l’expérience de plusieurs désastres culinaires.

Avril 1992 — Le chameau à la stroghanoff. Fawad accomplit des progrès importants dans l’établissement de la présence canadienne en Asie centrale. La Représentation a maintenant un chauffeur, German Ivanovitch, un ancien officier tankiste qui a déjà servi comme coopérant militaire en Iraq. J’accompagne Fawad dans son premier voyage hors de la capitale, à Tchimkent, au cœur de la steppe kazakh, là où aucun arbre ne vient entraver le parcours des caravanes. Malheureusement, la ville est surtout caractérisée aujourd’hui par des usines métallurgiques qui déchargent une fumée épaisse dans l’air ambiant et par un hôtel particulièrement immonde. Mais la population est accueillante et généreuse, les Occidentaux y sont encore une curiosité bienvenue. Dans les environs, un restaurant nous sert ce qui s’avère être du chameau à la stroghanoff. On peut être assuré de sa fraîcheur, des troupeaux de ces bêtes paissent paisiblement le long de la route.

Juillet 1992 — Un piédestal sans statue. Il fait une chaleur abominable à Tashkent où aucun édifice n’est climatisé. Michel de Salaberry visite cette partie méconnue du monde islamique avant d’assumer son poste de directeur des relations avec le Moyen-Orient; je l’accompagne et lui sers d’interprète. «Comment était l’eau de la piscine, Michel? — Je me sens comme si je venais de sucer des vieilles pièces de une cent.» Les Américains semblent convaincus que l’Ouzbekistan est sur le point de tomber sous la coupe des intégristes. Nous visitons le vieux quartier délabré de Tashkent et une madrasa en réparation. Nous entrons dans un coin de la cour intérieure. Le maître des lieux, un jeune ecclésiastique barbu bâti comme un secondeur de ligne, est convaincu qu’il peut convertir Michel à l’Islam. Plus réel est le danger de l’autoritarisme. Ce n’est qu’après une longue et pénible séance de négociations ponctuée de menaces d’expulsion que nous réussissons à faire corriger une anomalie sur le visa de Michel. Devant la grande place de cérémonie, l’immense piédestal où devait autrefois trôner une gigantesque statue de Lénine est maintenant vide. À quand son remplacement par celle d’un Big Brother local?

À Samarcande et Boukhara, la splendeur des monuments cache une grande nervosité : les touristes ne sont plus qu’une poignée, chassés par la difficulté d’obtenir un visa, les lois restrictives sur l’échange des devises, la dissolution presque consommée d’Intourist et la guerre civile au Tadjikistan voisin. On craint des heurts entre Ouzbeks et Tadjiks, qui n’auront finalement pas lieu; la population russe et ukrainienne quitte le pays si elle en a la possibilité. Le manque d’information aggrave les craintes. Il circule des rumeurs non fondées de troubles à Tashkent que quelqu’un nous demande de confirmer, puisque nous en venons; s’il y en avait vraiment, la télévision les tairait probablement.

Après une journée de train à travers le désert du Karakoum, nous arrivons à Ashgabat au Turkmenistan, où cette crainte latente à qui traverse la frontière voisine pour chercher ici de l’alcool et du bon temps. La frontière vient tout juste d’être ouverte et Michel sera un des premiers Occidentaux à la franchir, à travers les montagnes dans un mini-bus avec une demi-douzaine d’Iraniens à son bord.

Octobre 1992 — Un autre Qatar. L’Ambassadeur Bell vient présenter ses lettres de créances à Ashgabat. La ville est toujours calme et propre, mais la ruée iranienne y est moins visible. Le Turkmenistan est maintenant considéré l’État le plus prospère de l’ex-URSS grâce à ses immenses réserves de gaz naturel. Le Président Niyazov peut subventionner les produits de base grâce aux devises gazifères, ce qui aide à sa popularité, à un point tel qu’un véritable culte de la personnalité est en train de se développer. «Autrefois, le Turkmenistan était le dernier chameau de la caravane, à la traîne.

Janvier 1993 — La cité que le charbon a bâtie. Retour à Alma-Ata après sept mois d’absence. Le corps diplomatique a beaucoup grandi, plusieurs pays ont déjà une véritable ambassade mais la Représentation canadienne reflète toujours un souci presque maladif de saine gestion des fonds. Nous avons tout de même engagé deux autres employés très dévoués, qui assurent une présence continue en l’absence d’un agent canadien sur place. L’un d’eux, Jalil, m’accompagne à Karaganda, la deuxième ville du Kazakhstan. Il n’y a que deux choses qui comptent ici, le charbon et l’acier. C’est la compagnie minière qui est le vrai maître en ville, mais elle titube au bord de la faillite. Les aciéries se sont ouvertes aux technologies et marchés étrangers et elles respirent un peu mieux. Toutefois, le pessimisme est de mise : les employés des instituts de recherche qui faisaient jadis la fierté de la ville ne sont plus payés que sur une base intermittente. Alma-Ata semble avoir oublié l’existence de la région. Il est vrai que dans la capitale, on me prend pour un illuminé quand je dis vouloir visiter Karaganda. «Et avec ce manteau? vous allez geler, c’est comme la Sibérie là-bas.» Il y a peut-être du vent par vingt sous zéro, bière américaine aux noms étranges (une «Milwaukee’s Best», vous avez déjà bu ça?); les vallées agricoles donnent une impression de prospérité qu’on ne rencontre jamais dans la campagne russe, mais est-ce grâce à la culture des stupéfiants, comme le veut la rumeur?

Avril 1993 — Cette fois, nous restons. Mon huitième et dernier voyage à Alma-Ata a pour objectif la préparation d’un rapport sur la démarche à suivre pour ouvrir une véritable ambassade. Le gouvernement a finalement décidé de faire le plongeon et de transformer cet étrange bureau temporaire en une mission permanente. Les ambassades sont toujours plus nombreuses, les restaurants et kiosques de marchandises ont poussé comme des champignons, et la criminalité a emboîté le pas. Un ami ne se promène la nuit qu’avec une matraque dissimulée dans ses vêtements. L’inflation est hors de contrôle, plusieurs Russes songent à quitter le pays. «Pour l’avenir de nos enfants», disent-ils. Tanya, notre traductrice, garde précieusement tout son salaire, ridiculement bas mais payé comptant en dollars américains, et survit sur le strict minimum. Elle rêve pouvoir acheter un appartement à Saint-Pétersbourg.

De là je prends la route avec German Ivanovitch et Jalil pour le Kyrgyzstan. L’économie y est complètement chamboulée. Le marché regorge de produits allant du poulet écartelé et rôti aux cannettes de bière américaine aux noms étranges (une «Milwaukee’s Best», vous avez déjà bu ça?); les vallées agricoles donnent une impression de prospérité qu’on ne rencontre jamais dans la campagne russe, mais est-ce grâce à la culture des stupéfiants, comme le veut la rumeur?

Personne ne sait ce qui adviendra des roubles que détiennent les gens. Après une année et demie d’indépendance, la frontière n’est toujours pas indiquée sur la route qui relie Bishkek à Alma-Ata.

Ma dernière vision d’Asie centrale sera de chevaux sauvages, gambadant libres à flanc de montagne, dans un parc national à trente kilomètres de Bishkek. Les questions quant à l’avenir de l’Asie centrale ne sont pas résolues, mais la région demeure l’une des plus fascinantes au monde.

Philippe Cousineau est entré à AECI en 1987. Il a été affecté à Ankara et Moscou. Il a également travaillé dans la Direction des relations avec les Antilles et l’Amérique centrale.

Lorsque la mort se joint
à l’éloignement...

par Jean Gauthier

Le dicton veut qu’uniquement deux choses soient certaines dans la vie: les impôts et la mort. Même à l’étranger, nous ne pouvons échapper ni à l’un, ni à l’autre. Si le premier est de plus en plus supportable, le second nous rappelle vite à l’ordre.

En moins de trois mois, quatre Canadiens de la mission ont appris que nous devions tous éventuellement perdre qui un père, qui une mère, et parfois peut-être les deux presque en même temps. Nos familles, au Canada, pensent qu’elles ont le plus gros du fardeau mais être à l’étranger nous rend peut-être les choses encore plus difficiles ... du moins le pensons-nous. À l’étranger, lorsque cette réalité nous frappe, nous réalisons vite que rien de notre quotidien nous rattache à la réalité que vivent les autres membres de notre famille: bien que nous fassions face aux mêmes situations, nous vivons dans un autre monde et le nôtre est loin...!

État de santé critique

À trois reprises en moins de dix ans, et toujours à l’étranger, l’absence de réponse à un appel téléphonique aura été à l’origine des mauvaises nouvelles. Les deux premières fois, il n’y avait rien que nous puissions y faire, et, malgré tout, tout est rentré dans l’ordre sans que j’aie pu me déplacer. La dernière fois aura été tout aussi difficile mais, cette fois-ci, il n’y a pas eu de retour.

Une bonne soirée, vous appelez à la maison, pas de réponse. Vous essayez un frère, une sœur, pas plus de réponse. Vous tentez de rejoindre une troisième personne ... encore bredouille. C’est impossible, quelqu’un devrait être là: il y a quelque chose qui cloche, ils ne peuvent tous être sortis! Par chance, vous recevez tout à coup un courriel laconique d’un ami de votre sœur:

«Votre père est entré d’urgence à l’hôpital. Elle communiquera avec vous dès qu’elle le pourra». C’est tout, pas d’information sur l’hôpital ou la cause de l’hospitalisation.

Alors commence la première station de votre calvaire. Un habitué de la cueillette de l’information, vous ne savez plus par quel bout commencer. Dans quel hôpital est-il? Est-il aux urgences ou aux soins intensifs?

Est-ce grave et devriez-vous penser rentrer immédiatement à la maison? Alors que les DSE ont changé au fil des ans, quels sont les règlements? Toutes ces questions vous trottent dans la tête et malgré toutes les sessions d’information pré-affectation vous semblez tout avoir oublié....

L’impuissance, la frustration et surtout l’anxiété s’installent. Vous qui dans votre pays d’accueil savez à qui poser n’importe quelle question, tournez maintenant en rond. À qui poser la première question? Mais quelle est cette question? Vous vous sentez seul, désemparé.

Puis la famille vous rejoint finalement et vous déferle ses mauvaises nouvelles. Coup de massue, vous devez prendre sur vous et accumuler tous ces renseignements pour mieux les digérer plus tard. En ce moment, tout ce que vous voyez c’est votre père dans son lit d’hôpital, souffrant, et surtout loin et pour lequel vous ne pouvez strictement rien. On vous rassure malgré les nouvelles et même si l’on ne vous cache rien, vous avez le sentiment que quelque chose de grave se trame et que vous êtes sur la rive à voir venir le raz-de-marée. Vous voulez clarifier la situation et vous voulez parler à votre père. Mais avec le fouillis dans les hôpitaux au pays, il faut s’y prendre de bonne heure et y passer la soirée. Vous devrez aussi aviser les enfants, mais de vive voix : «Ton grand-père se meurt et est à l’hôpital» n’est pas le genre de message qu’on laisse sur un répondeur. Toute votre diplomatie et votre sang-froid, ou du moins ce qu’il en reste, seront mis à rude épreuve car eux aussi veulent des réponses précises à leurs nombreuses questions. Nous pensons tous aux mêmes questions et n’avons pas de réponses.

Enfin, la conspiration du silence et de l’inexactitude se termine lorsque vous apprenez que votre père sortira sous peu de l’hôpital ... il irait mieux même si sa santé n’est pas rutilante. Dans notre coin du monde, deux éventualités sont possibles : votre père décède immédiatement avant de quitter l’hôpital ou il rentre passer ses derniers jours chez lui. Dans le premier cas, vous vous mordrez les pouces de ne pas avoir pris le premier avion disponible. Mais qui aurait pu prévoir ou même vous émettre le certificat demandé par la DSE 54? Dans le second, vous poursuivez vos activités normales et préparez des «vacances». L’anxiété et une certaine morosité ne vous quitteront pas car vous nargue constamment une question, à laquelle seul le temps pourra trouver une réponse adéquate: «Arriverai-je à temps?»

Arriverai-je à temps pour avoir cette discussion que vous avez toujours voulu avoir avec votre père et au cours de laquelle tout ce que vous voulez lui dire est combien vous l’aimez, combien vous appréciez tout ce qu’il a fait pour vous ... Aurais-je assez de temps, ou sera-t-il lucide assez longtemps, pour que je lui dise tout ce que je veux lui dire? Autant de questions qui vous trottent dans la tête et qui peuvent accaparer vos soirées, vos nuits, vos journées libres (ou ce qu’il en reste avec le surtemps qu’on vous demande de faire)...!

Il vous faudra aussi trouver des billets d’avion, faire des réservations d’hôtel ou de pension, et tout ce que cela nécessite. Les choses devraient être relativement faciles bien que dans certains pays, il n’y a pas de vols vers le Canada ou même vers l’Europe tous les jours. Si vous voulez partir au début de la saison estivale, bonne chance car vous vous y prenez peut-être un peu tard! Vous avez peut-être trouvé moyen de quitter la mission, mais les portions qui vous permettraient de rentrer rapidement au pays sont combles. Si votre père était mort, cela serait différent; mais, Dieu merci il ne l’est pas encore ce qui veut dire que pour les billets, il vous faut du «wasta»....

Côté logement, de façon générale, vous devrez oublier pouvoir aller vivre chez Papa ou Maman. Vu leur grand âge et des besoins réduits, ils ont emménagé dans un petit logis qui leur suffit mais qui ne leur permet pas d’avoir des visiteurs à coucher. Il en va de même pour la famille.

À la mission, devriez-vous le dire à tout le monde ou garder pour vous cette peine? Outre le chef de mission, ne serait-ce que pour les besoins de la DSE 54, à qui d’autre expliquer ce qui se passe? Qui est vraiment intéressé? Pourquoi, de plus, devrions-nous dire à qui veut l’entendre ce qui vous ramène au pays: pourquoi ne pouvons-nous pas, en ce moment difficile, garder le tout pour nous?

Enfin c’est le départ. Deux ou trois semaines se sont écoulées depuis l’annonce fatidique et vous êtes maintenant prêt pour rentrer au bercail. Ce ne seront certes pas des vacances même si «cela va vous changer d’atmosphère». Le voyage peut vous permettre de prendre enfin du recul ou tout simplement vous acculer au mur : les pires supputations sont faites et vous vous attendez à la catastrophe.

Veiller au chevet

À l’arrivée, quelle joie de voir son père toujours vivant et lucide. Mais comme il a changé! Le curé, venu lui donner les derniers sacrements, et le médecin, qui lui fait signer un certificat de «non-réanimation», vous rappellent à l’ordre. Sa situation est donc grave et c’est vraiment la fin. Ou du moins, tout y laisse croire.

L’impuissance et l’anxiété des premiers jours est dissipée: vous pouvez enfin avoir quelque réponse «pertinente». Avec le médecin traitant vous avez votre première conversation «intelligente» sur son état de santé et, même si vous vous y attendiez, les commentaires vous assomment. Vous arrivez juste à temps, à temps pour le voir mourir ... L’anxiété et l’impuissance, devant l’inconnu et l’absence d’information, font place à l’impuissance et au désespoir devant votre inhabilité à changer quoi que ce soit, devant l’inéluctable. Alors qu’avant votre départ de la mission vous vous demandiez si vous arriveriez à temps, maintenant vous devez déterminer quel sera le meilleur moment pour lui exprimer votre amour.

Papa avait décidé de rester à la maison. Les soins palliatifs, même à courte distance de la maison, étaient trop impersonnels. Pour faciliter ses dernières heures, le CLSC lui offre tout ce dont il a besoin : lit d’hôpital, visites d’infirmières et de médecin à domicile, aide-infirmier, ergothérapeute, etc. En fait, il a chez lui le même (in)confort qu’à l’hôpital à la seule différence qu’il est vraiment dans «ses» affaires.

En fait, pour nous de l’étranger, il n’y a pas grande différence entre l’hôpital et la maison. Vos frères et sœurs peuvent maintenir un semblant de normalité grâce au téléphone et aux amis : les leurs ne vivent pas aux antipodes comme les vôtres, selon les aléas des affectations et des voyages ministériels. Ils ne sont généralement pas étrangers dans cette ville que vous avez quittée depuis belle lurette. Alors vous patientez. Vous offrez des suggestions mais on vous répond «les choses se passent différemment au Canada, ce n’est pas comme en Afrique, ou ailleurs».

Une pièce devient celle du malade et cela transforme la maison. Lorsque papa est lucide, nous passons tout notre temps avec lui: le silence des vieux complices meuble beaucoup d’heures. À son réveil, nous nous attroupons autour de son lit et tentons de l’égayer quelque peu. Vous réussissez toutefois à vous sentir utile lorsque vous vous substituez à l’aide-malade : vous êtes capable de prendre soin de lui, de lui donner son bain, de lui faire prendre ses repas ou du moins lui faire avaler le peu qu’il mange. Vous le rasez, lui peignez les cheveux et lui redonnez l’impression qu’il est tout pour vous. Les brèves heures de lucidité vous permettent de parler du passé. Il s’intéresse aussi à l’avenir: le vôtre ne compte plus, c’est celui de ses petits-enfants qui prime. Ces très courts et très rares moments meublent en partie nos journées. Vous vivrez ou observerez, de loin, de très beaux moments: ses entretiens en tête-à-tête avec Maman, un souper familial de la fête des Pères, et enfin sa dernière journée de quasi-lucidité, celle de votre anniversaire de mariage.

Notre monde quotidien étant à l’étranger, nous n’avons rien d’autre à faire que d’attendre. Attendre ces moments où il sera éveillé ou lucide, attendre l’heure des repas, attendre l’heure assez tardive du coucher.

Dans une telle situation, ne pas être dans ses affaires pour une période prolongée a aussi des inconvénients particuliers : se trouver un logement n’est pas toujours chose facile et les hôtels deviennent vite hors de prix. Heureusement, il existe de plus en plus de «couette & café» (Bed & Breakfast) et leurs proprios se sont regroupés en association, ce qui rend les choses un peu plus faciles si vous devez prolonger votre séjour et ainsi changer de place.

Après les examens, les enfants sont avec vous et ils devaient rentrer à la mission. Que faire de deux grands gars de 16 et 18 ans qui n’ont, comme nous, rien d’autre à faire que d’attendre? Il faut aussi penser à les loger : vous les envoyez chez des amis ou de la parenté, loin du drame, et vous vous libérez d’un fardeau; eux, ils se sentent exclus, mis de côté et s’inquiètent tout autant.

Cependant, qui peut prévoir la durée d’une phase terminale? Quoi faire? Partir pour devoir retourner chemin faisant? Rester mais sans que «rien» ne se passe et être encore dans l’ «attente de la fin»?

C’est peut-être la fin, mais pas pour ceux qui restent derrière ...

Enfin, une nuit alors que tout est calme, la lutte est terminée. Vous vous retrouvez, toute la famille, au pied du lit et attendez que les procédures administratives soient terminées. La police, Urgence-Santé et enfin les services funéraires. Toutes ces années à faire du consulaire vous ont préparé à passer cette nuit difficile : le choc viendra après les formalités. Votre calme est désarmant pour votre famille mais pour vous, enfin vous êtes dans un de vos éléments.

Après avoir annoncé la nouvelle à la parenté, aux amis de la famille, vous vous retournez vers vos collègues et amis: mais personne n’est là car ils sont soit en vacances, soit à l’étranger ou à la mission. Au salon, vous devrez être là pour la parenté qui sait qui vous êtes mais que vous avez perdu de vue: vous voyagez tellement! Il y a aussi ces amis de vos parents, ceux de vos frères et sœurs et enfin les rares de jadis ou du Ministère. Mais au ministère, ces soirées sont vues comme réservées à la famille, aux proches. On oublie trop souvent que ces visites au salon sont pour les survivants et non pour le disparu.

Il n’y a aucune différence que nous vivions au pays ou à l’étranger lors des funérailles. Vous ne voyez pas passer les journées et tout à coup l’oisiveté revient: après l’enterrement, vous êtes seuls et devez faire face à une nouvelle réalité. Il vous faut maintenant recréer une vie familiale, mais cette fois il y manque un gros morceau.

Vous voulez profiter des quelques jours qu’il vous reste de ce congé pour mettre en branle le règlement de la succession. Mais, pourquoi voulez-vous vous presser ainsi? Vous devrez attendre d’avoir les documents officiels et cela ne se fait pas en criant ciseau! Alors, vous voyez au retour à la mission et aux moyens pour régler de loin les nombreuses questions juridiques et administratives.

Le départ ne sera facile pour personne, mais surtout pour Maman qui sera dorénavant fin seule. Frères et sœurs retourneront à leurs occupations tandis que vous vous expatriez encore une fois. Toutefois, tous se déplaceront pour cet «aurevoir et revient le plus tôt possible». Le voyage de retour sera encore une fois l’occasion de refaire le point. Vous vous demanderez pourquoi êtes-vous au loin et pourquoi ne pourriez-vous pas trouver un moyen pour passer plus de temps avec votre mère. Mais rien à faire, tout le monde a une vie à vivre et voilà votre destin: vous servez à l’étranger.

À la mission, ce sont les longs visages, les questions d’intérêt personnel mais aussi la fameuse question : pourquoi ne nous l’avez-vous pas dit plus tôt? C’est à ce moment que vous commencerez vraiment à vivre votre deuil : lorsque vous vous retrouvez avec des gens du quotidien, avec votre monde à vous et que vous réaliserez vraiment que tout n’était pas un rêve mais bien la réalité. Tous s’empresseront pour vous offrir leurs plus sincères condoléances mais tout ce que vous avez en tête, c’est de refaire le puzzle qui vous a mené de la naissance à cette mission.

L’intérêt et la sincérité des sentiments y est certes. Il y a ceux qui vous disent que seul le temps (et plusieurs années) permettent d’accepter la pilule. Il y a les autres qui, dans l’attente d’un sort identique, ne veulent pas en savoir trop ou ne savent pas trop comment aborder la question. Enfin, il y aura peut-être un collègue qui trouvera l’occasion, le temps et surtout les mots pour vous faire déballer votre trop-plein. Il prendra le temps de vous écouter et, par ses silences et ses encouragements, vous permettre de réfléchir sur ces magnifiques années passées avec votre père.

Cependant, ce n’est pas parce que vous êtes à la mission que la famille n’existe plus, au contraire. Vous ne pouvez couper les ponts du jour au lendemain parce que vous êtes maintenant à quelques 16 heures de vol. Vous appelez au début, peut-être tous les jours, puis ce sera à intervalles réguliers, mais un peu plus que par le passé, avant l’événement. Il y aura de ces appels qui vous font mal au cœur, car ils vous rappelleront trop de souvenirs, ceux qui se feront à l’occasion d’anniversaires ou pour souligner quelque chose en particulier. Mais à chaque fois, le pire sera, si vous êtes un bon écouteur, de savoir quand Maman aura la larme à l’œil, quand elle pleurera en quasi silence et quand, franchement, elle éclatera dès que vous aurez déposé le receveur.

À l’étranger, il n’y a pas de remède: vous ne pouvez pas, la fin de semaine venue, aller lui rendre visite. Tout ce que vous pouvez faire: placer un autre appel ... Comme vous voudriez pouvoir dire «Beam me home, Scotty!» et être à la maison en l’espace d’un clin d’œil! Mais nous ne sommes pas sur l’Enterprise et nous devons faire face à la réalité qu’est perdre un être cher quand on vit à l’étranger.

Jean Gauthier a servi au Koweït, au Caire, à Bagdad, à Dar es Salaam. À la Centrale, il était, jusqu’à sa présente affectation à Riyad, directeur adjoint à GAF.

Four Months as Saddam’s ‘guests’ in Baghdad

by Gary Luton

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A Thanksgiving toast from Baghdad, October, 1990. Last names were not used in the original photo. Kuwait Embassy Staff indicated with a (K): Mary Ann Kurjata (K), Philipp, Jerry, Gary Luton (K), John, Canadian Ambassador to Iraq, Chris Poole, Mireille Farah (K), Jim, Howard, and Michel Tetu (K).

Three weeks after Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait on August 2, 1990, the Canadian Embassy was forced to downsize. Despite Iraq’s threat to round up all foreign embassy staff who did not leave the country by August 24th, five colleagues remained inside the Embassy. The author and four other Embassy staff flew to Baghdad with the understanding that they would be allowed to return to Canada. Instead, they were detained in Baghdad as ‘guests’ of Saddam Hussein as punishment for the Embassy not closing in Kuwait. Weeks turned into months, and on December 9, 1990, 130 days after Iraq’s invasion, all of the Canadian diplomats from Kuwait and other remaining Westerners under detention were released. The following account, pieced together from personal notes, recollections and conversations with former colleagues, gives shape to events that took place in the fall of 1990.

Kuwait City, August 1990

Reluctantly following instructions to reduce staff at the Embassy in Kuwait, no one knew what actually awaited us in Baghdad. Those who would depart on August 24 included Michel Têtu and his spouse Ingrid, Mary Ann Kurjata, Mireille Farah, and myself. Like the Arab nomads from a previous era, I packed a small bag with some light clothing, a few mementos and other valuables in the form of two fine, silk prayer rugs, recently acquired, and a modest collection of old Omani silver jewelry.

Kuwait’s Airport (already renamed Saddam International Airport) was extremely tense. The security office was manned by Iraqi officers, and a portrait of Saddam hung nearby. The armed man in civilian clothing who searched my bag seemed truly apologetic, asking, “Where are you from?” “Canada,” He repeated the word with a sigh – “Canada” and gave a wistful glance. The X-ray machine picked up a miniature Sony radio and Dictaphone, which he confiscated. “Sorry,” he said, with considerable conviction, picked up his gun, and walked back to join the others.

It felt odd sitting quietly in a darkened terminal, almost empty of travelers. The senior Iraqi officers looked smug. Their glances made no mistake of the fact that they were the victors enjoying their moment of glory. “Long live Saddam” was painted in Arabic on the wall, and two Soviet Aleutian freighter aircraft sat on the tarmac – their massive holds being filled with plunder.

Baghdad, August 1990

After a panicked scrum getting off the flight in Baghdad, we were funneled into a crowded, airless terminal and greeted by Chargé d’affaires Dale Carl and a team from the Canadian Embassy. The Ambassador had departed earlier in the summer as part of the normal posting cycle, and his replacement, Chris Poole, had not yet been appointed at the time of the invasion.

The Embassy in Baghdad was located on the Western side of the Tigris, off Mansour Street, in a district by the same name. Embassy staff included Dale Carl, Jean Gauthier, Gaetan Letourneau, Janice Attree-Smith and David Smith. In addition to proximity to our staff quarters (SQ), the Mansour District hosted a number of other embassies and was within walking distance of the famed Al Mansour Racecourse.

Our small SQ, a house across from the Canadian Chancery and down the street from the British Official Residence, was shared with a couple of other Canadians caught up in the crisis.

Our first morning in Baghdad was a relatively late start – a chance to read, contemplate the ceiling fan and walk in the walled garden before others awoke. There had been spurts of gunfire during the night that were relatively close. Supposedly a day of rest, after an early call from Dale, it turned out to be a day filled with consular business, almost as usual. Many Iraqis and others wanted out, but the borders were sealed.

Leaving our SQ, I found our Iraqi ‘spotters’ parked directly in front in a battered sedan.

A Thanksgiving toast from Baghdad, October 1990. Last names were not used in the original photo. Kuwait Embassy Staff indicated with a (K): Mary Ann Kurjata (K), Philipp, Jerry, Gary Luton (K), John, Canadian Ambassador to Iraq, Chris Poole, Mireille Farah (K), Jim, Howard, and Michel Tetu (K).

The neighbourhood was fairly lively, with the Saudi and Pakistani Embassies not far away. The latter had already become an encampment for 600-plus Pakistani refugees. Another 500 were expected later that day from Kuwait, and, with the land border to Jordan now closed until further notice, they would remain living and sleeping in the street with little or no food.

We prepare to make a demarche at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs requesting permission to depart. En route, I get out of the car to put up the flag – otherwise they will not let us in. A soldier with the maroon beret of the Republican Guard saluted, reluctantly.

Later in the day, we learned our arrival in Baghdad was reported in the Canadian press. The story that followed was more alarming. Canada, like other OECD countries, had rejected the deadline to close its embassy in Kuwait. It was likely our colleagues at the embassy had now been surrounded by troops, preventing anyone from coming or going. This was confirmed on August 26.

Not only was the Embassy in Kuwait now surrounded by troops, but telephone and water lines had also been cut. Tanks were reportedly stationed outside of the British Embassy. The UN Security Council imposed a shipping blockade in response. Three days later, Iraq countered by officially declaring Kuwait to be its 19th province.

Baghdad, September 1990

Unlike our colleagues in Kuwait, we were able to make short, weekly telephone calls home on a new satellite phone – the latest in technology at the time. It came by diplomatic courier in far too many diplomatic bags, which created a fracas at the airport. The dish, once assembled, was the size of the hood of a car. While we now had no direct lines of communication with Kuwait, Michel Têtu and David Smith continued to make daily radio broadcasts to inform and entertain our colleagues.

After a month of extreme uncertainty, there were still about 100 Canadians in Baghdad, including Kuwait Embassy staff who had been denied exit visas/permits. We were extremely lucky as U.S. and British hostages continued to be sent to various strategic military locations in Iraq and Kuwait to act as ‘human shields’. All of the captive Canadians had been released to the Canadian embassy.

A burden was lifted when, on September 6, we were able to evacuate 140 Canadian women and children from Kuwait to Baghdad and on to freedom in Turkey. This was the first flight out for foreign women and children from any country. With no Iraqi diplomatic ID, I was almost arrested by airport security for using the ID of a diplomatic colleague to help with the evacuation. Rescued by the Chief of Protocol for the Iraqi Army, I remember him saying, “We wouldn’t like to see mistakes occur,” as he escorted me out of the departure lounge. In the end, we were doing our job, and the Iraqis were doing theirs.

After wheels up from Baghdad, corks popped while we tried to ensure everyone was accounted for before sending a ‘flash’ reporting telex.

Later, reflecting on the day, I realized the extent of the police state in which we found ourselves. Every 150–200 metres for at least ten kilometres on the way to the airport, there had been ‘spotters’ – men who sat on benches covered by plywood shade umbrellas. All within sight of each other, wearing civilian clothes, appearing to be unarmed. Harmless, perhaps, but they, along with policemen under every bridge, were a constant reminder that we were always being observed and monitored.

Baghdad, October 1990

The first week of October, the Iraqi Foreign Ministry sent a diplomatic note to western Embassies warning of a Revolutionary Command Council decree that “anyone harbouring a foreigner could be hanged as a spy”. The note ordered diplomats present for registration any foreigners on their compounds. The government later clarified it would take no action against embassies sheltering ‘civilians.’

About the same time, Ottawa asked us to photograph our SQ and to clearly indicate where they were on various maps – an indicator that air strikes could be coming our way. As the political rhetoric ramped up, we all began to feel somewhat expendable. The need for a Plan B to escape and evade capture started to become a real possibility, should an air attack materialize or the political situation deteriorate.

After two months as “guests” in Iraq, many of the more than 8,000 Westerners and Japanese who remained were growing restive as Saddam continued to try and manipulate Western policies by letting some nationalities leave. On 11 October, a group of about 350 Westerners fleeing Iraq and Kuwait landed in London. It was the first such flight since 22 September. Most of the passengers were Americans, but seven Canadians were on board – mostly women and children and Western men of Arab descent.

My brother in England sent me birthday wishes via a special BBC broadcast (no last name was used). Journalists came and went. Eric Margolis of the Toronto Sun and a photographer, Greg Reekie, came in mid-October. They met with Kuwait Embassy staff and other Canadian hostages and wrote a Thanksgiving cover story with a photo entitled “Canadian ‘guests’ just wait.” With thoughts of home sparked by the visiting journalists, we raised our glasses in a Thanksgiving toast for the camera.

Our five colleagues who emerged after eight weeks from the besieged Canadian Embassy in Kuwait arrived in Baghdad on October 19. Chargé Bill Bowden described the city he once knew as “dirty and largely empty.” The Iraqis had pillaged most moveable objects, and garbage was piled everywhere. Sporadic gunfire could still be heard from the diminished resistance and from roving armed gangs. Joe Clark, then Minister of Foreign Affairs, said the five “exemplified the best tradition of the Canadian Foreign Service.”

Canada maintained that the Embassy remained technically open, in defiance of Iraq’s order to close. As a result, the Iraqi authorities continued to refuse to allow all Canadian diplomats previously based in Kuwait to leave Baghdad.

Every 150–200 metres for at least
ten kilometres on the way to the airport, there had been ‘spotters’ – men who sat on benches covered by plywood shade umbrellas. All within sight of each other, wearing civilian clothes, appearing to be unarmed. Harmless, perhaps, but they, along with policemen under every bridge, were a constant reminder that we were always being observed and monitored.

Two Canadian destroyers and a supply ship, a squadron of CF-18s and 1,700 military personnel from Canada were now in the Gulf at bases in Bahrain and Qatar. With a goal to enforce sanctions against Iraq, their gear also included special nuclear, biological and chemical warfare masks. By late October, more than 200,000 troops from 11 countries were in the northern Saudi desert along with 100 ships from 14 nations and jets, bombers, transport planes and helicopters.

Baghdad, November 1990

As October gave way to November, we continued to update our advice to Canadians. This included information on personal security and medical assistance; access to ‘friendly embassies’; emergency numbers and radio frequencies; what to do in the event of the outbreak of war, most likely in the form of an air attack on Baghdad, or restricted movements due to civil unrest. Evacuation procedures for land routes from Baghdad to the Turkish border (800 km north) or Amman (550 km west) were also highlighted.

We reported to Ottawa that Saddam’s military machine, oppressive security apparatus and shattered economy, resulting from almost a decade of war with Iran, gave Iraq a heightened sense of survival under adverse conditions. The effective use of psychological warfare to avoid or delay the outbreak of hostilities was clearly evident in his threats of inflicting heavy Western casualties if attacked.

Saddam had photo-ops with hostages and held interviews with news anchors such as Dan Rather from CBS and courted peace activists as TV networks tussled in their coverage of the crisis – some argued to mediate it. The sporadic release of detainees through high-profile “special envoys” bought time for Iraq. Despite this, there was still no news for the Canadian guests at the Embassy in Baghdad about a possible departure date. Minister Clark refused to send an official delegation to Iraq, saying it would only provide a propaganda opportunity to Saddam.

Rumours of an impending war were in the air, and Iraqi Generals were reportedly on high alert. At the Melia Mansour Hotel in central Baghdad, the restaurant was filled with Japanese politicians, journalists and many women and children released from military targets preparing to go home. A waitress looked on through the slats of a room divider, taking in the scene like the inmates we had both become.

Three Canadian MPs from the main parties visited Baghdad in late November for an 11-day mission – Lloyd Axworthy (LIB), Svend Robinson (NDP) and Bob Corbett (CON). They gained permission to depart with five Canadians, which would still leave behind 40 others.

On November 28, the Security Council in a Resolution indicated that it was concerned by Iraq’s attempts to “alter the demographic composition of...Kuwait and to destroy the civil records”. Importantly, a day later Resolution 678 announced that Iraq must voluntarily withdraw from Kuwait by January 15, 1991 and gave authority “...to use all necessary means” to force Iraq from Kuwait if it does not comply.”

While Baghdad rejected the UN’s “ultimatums”, a new line had been drawn in the sand. The MPs returned to Canada and, together, told reporters that the UN resolution allowing for military force “was a mistake, making it more difficult to free other Canadian hostages.”

Baghdad, December 1990

By December 1990, our impatience was growing, particularly as other nationals were leaving Iraq, UN sanctions were beginning to take hold with shortages of fuel additives, newsprint, tires and some food. Then, out of the blue, on December 6, Saddam Hussein announced that all foreigners still held in Iraq and those hiding in Kuwait (approximately 2,600 people) were free to leave. That included us!

We continued to lack confidence about our security when dealing with an unpredictable dictator who had changed his mind several times before. In the end, we were indeed allowed to leave Baghdad on Sunday, December 9, on an American chartered Iraqi Airways 707. Thirty-two Canadians – twenty-one from Kuwait, including seven Embassy staff and their spouses and eleven Canadians from Baghdad – were released that day.

The flight of 300, mostly American and British citizens, arrived in Frankfurt around midnight. I don’t recall much of the actual airlift from Baghdad, other than the cumulative fatigue of four months under Iraqi occupation and detention and the cheers and relief that overcame us when we finally flew out of Iraqi airspace.

Epilogue: During Christmas 1990, our thoughts were with the small staff of Canadian diplomats left behind at the Embassy in Baghdad and the Kuwaitis still living under occupation. More than 510,000 Iraqi troops were now in Kuwait and the south of Iraq facing off against a multinational force of about 490,000 in Saudi Arabia. Peace talks ended in failure and, with all diplomatic initiatives exhausted, the first Gulf War began on January 16, 1991. It ended on February 26 with the Iraqi Army largely defeated and Kuwait in disarray, its population traumatized and its oil fields on fire. Part III of this series will discuss events related to the Gulf War and Canada’s involvement in it, leading up to the author’s return to Bahrain and Kuwait in March-April of 1991.

At the time of publication, Gary Luton was the Director of the Treaty Law Division. His postings abroad were as Head of Mission in Doha, Qatar and, prior, as Consul General in Mumbai.

Moscow 1993 -
An encounter with former president Gorbachev

by Lillian Thomsen

February in Moscow was generally, along with November, the dreariest month of the year. Dark and gloomy, the days were still short, and the black ice underfoot on Moscow’s ungroomed sidewalks increasingly treacherous. But inside the Canadian Embassy in Moscow, the beginning of February saw a flurry of activity. The Minister, Barbara MacDougall, was coming on a visit, which was to be the precursor for a visit by the Prime Minister, Brian Mulroney, later in the spring. Canada–Russia relations were in a very positive space. For reasons no one could really understand, Boris Yeltsin and Brian Mulroney had hit it off on a personal level. Both were gregarious and retail politicians by nature, but the resemblance pretty much ended there. But no matter. The Minister was coming and, in a reflection of the good relations between the two countries, had been offered the opportunity to deliver a lecture to be followed by a reception at the highly prestigious State Institute of International Relations, known by its Russian acronym GUMO.

Responsibility for the event was split between the Embassy, where I was in overall charge of the visit, and the Canada desk in the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Issuing the invitations for the Minister’s speech, followed by a reception, was to be split between the two, with the Embassy taking care of the diplomatic corps and the small but growing community of resident Canadian business people. The Canada desk would invite senior Russian officials engaged in relations with Canada, key academics, and the heads of the various foundations sprouting up in Moscow. A mistake was made. Mikhail Gorbachev, head of his own foundation, was invited. Accusations were lobbied that this had been an error on “the Canadian side”. The accusations were rebuffed, but it was clear that Gorbachev could not be uninvited. And his office quickly accepted on his behalf. In his state of near purgatory he did not receive all that many invitations, it would seem, and he also had good memories of Canada, it being one of the first foreign countries he had visited as a member of the Politburo with responsibility for agriculture.

On the day of the Minister’s speech and reception, February 5, Gorbachev’s office called. He would regrettably not be able to attend the speech, but would be present for the reception. What time was the reception expected to start? I provided my best estimate.

That evening at GUMO, guests were welcomed and invited to take their seats in the auditorium where the Minister would speak at a podium with a large painting of Vladimir Lenin directly behind her. No money had been spent on interior decoration since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in December 1991. Just as she started to speak, I received an urgent message. Mr. Gorbachev would be arriving early. For reasons that were a bit hard to understand, he was still allowed to use the special express lanes going to and from the Kremlin on the main thoroughfares and reserved for senior members of the government. So he had made excellent time. He would not go into the auditorium and interrupt the Minister’s speech, but perhaps he could wait somewhere quietly and then join the reception? Quick decisions were made. I would look after Mr. Gorbachev, and we would wait in the Institute’s library, which was located in the basement. Barely a minute went by, and there was a whoosh of the door letting in a blast of cold air. Accompanied only by his long-time aide and translator, Pavel Pavlichenko, Gorbachev came quickly up the stairs, exuding energy and vivacity. I introduced myself and motioned him into the library. There two doughty women, of the kind known in Soviet times as dezhurnaya, were waiting to greet him. Once introductions had been completed, Gorbachev remarked, “You know, I have actually never been here before. As a student, I applied for admission to the Institute, but I was turned down. But Raisa and I used to walk by it regularly, as we lived nearby and I would pass it on my way to the gym. The gym had exercise machines, particularly a rowing machine, which I enjoyed using.” One of the Russian women moved her arms as if she were steering a rowboat and asked, “How did it work?” “I’ll show you,” he replied. In seconds, he was on the floor demonstrating, bent knees moving back and forth in coordination with his arms. He kept it up for nearly a minute and then bounced to his feet.

Mr. Gorbachev would be arriving early. For reasons that were a bit hard to understand, he was still allowed to use the special express lanes going to and from the Kremlin on the main thoroughfares and reserved for senior members of the government. So he had made excellent time.

Turning to one of the two Russian women, he asked if they worked in the library. On her affirmative reply, he asked what kind of books and other items were available. Puffing herself up visibly, she responded proudly, “We have every issue of Pravda since No. 1.” “You know”, said Gorbachev, “I read Pravda every day for years and years and years until I left government. But there was so much I didn’t read.” He then described the book club he and his family had set up at their dacha and the classics of literature and some non-fiction they were reading in Russian translation and then discussing. As quickly as he had discussed his reading habits, he turned to me and asked, leaning in closely, what were the principal themes of the Minister’s speech? This was a question to which I knew the answer as I had worked on multiple drafts. Somewhere in the middle of my second sentence, I realized with whom I was speaking and tripped up over my words. I apologized and went back to the beginning of the sentence I had made a hash of. Gorbachev leaned forward and looked at me intently. “At least you speak more than one language”, he said. At that moment, a round of applause started above us, and the Minister’s speech had clearly ended. “I guess it’s time to go”, he said, thanking us as he turned to leave the library. I escorted him up the stairs to where the reception was to be held and brought him to the Minister’s side. Once introductions had been made, I was no longer needed. I turned to take up my charge of greeting other guests, including the officers from the Canada Desk of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, all the while wondering about missed opportunities and the fickle hand of fate.

Lillian Thomsen is a Foreign Service Officer who has served abroad in Warsaw (Poland), in Moscow and as Consul General of Canada in Saint Petersburg (Russia), at the Canadian delegation to the United Nations, and at the Canadian High Commission in London. She currently serves as Editor-in-Chief for bout de papier.

Compagnons de route :
FS Pet Adoption Stories [1]

par Anne-Marie Leclerc

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Jade and Sam

Sam from Bridgetown

by Jade Puddington

I grew up a diplomatic brat. And through four moves, our long-haired German Shepherd named Sam was a constant.

I was only 6 years old, but my parents have re-counted the story many a time. We were on posting in Barbados, and they had invited a number of guests over for a dinner party. Amongst those guests were some family friends who bred dogs. Evidently, they appeared for the dinner party with a puppy in their arms, asking if we could look after him for the evening. Needless to say, that puppy never left. Sam instantly became a big furry member of the family. He moved with us to Turkey twice and back to Canada in between. In Turkey, at the time, street dogs were still a problem, and so many Turks had a fear of large dogs. The driver at the embassy loved nothing more than walking into the airport with Sam on a leash and watching the crowds of people part as he headed for the check-in counter.

As a family, we often joked that Sam was better travelled than most people, having been back and forth across the Atlantic at least seven times. Whenever we went somewhere new, he was always there with us – a constant whenever everything else was changing. There was no better friend an expat kid could ask for.

Après l’obtention d’une maîtrise en études théâtrales de Trinity College Dublin, Anne-Marie Leclerc a rejoint les rangs du service extérieur en tant que déléguée commerciale en 2006. Elle a eu le plaisir de servir brièvement à l’Ambassade du Canada au Brésil ainsi que pendant trois ans à Paris.

Day One (and how I started my outrageously successful career)

by Michael Kaduck

Day One for me was August 30, 1993, and I joined the Department as a vision of sartorial safety; a bureaucratic fashion plate for the ‘90s. My steel blue, round-around-the-middle Sears suit ensured I would blend into my surroundings, as if I were a part of the Treasury Board-approved vinyl furniture. My sister-in-law, alarmed by my panoply of solid-colour neckties, gave me a snazzy new tie with which to express my individuality in the only corporately-acceptable manner. Besocked by Zellers and besotted with sentimental patriotism, I was ready for anything.

Eight of us started that day. We all arrived early and shuffled our feet for a while in the expansive marble foyer of the Lester B. Pearson Building. Right on time, we were greeted by the Assignment Officer: a svelte Calgarian with a broad smile and an understated prairie charm. She welcomed us, warned us about cafeteria coffee and explained in detail why we should give up hope of ever getting our own parking spaces. The filling out of forms began at that moment, and continues to this day.

A good looking bunch, were my fellow first-dayers, with backgrounds in law or political science, journalism or even botany. In comparison, I am somewhat less endowed with what human resources enthusiasts like to call ‘skills’ or ‘ability’, but I still made it into the Foreign Service (owing to a clerical error and the fact that my Aunt Sophie used to make borscht for Barbara MacDougall).

Those who had previously worked on DFAIT contracts were much better prepared for the job. For example, they were aware that the statue in the foyer was not Howie Meeker as I had suggested, and they knew better than to expect solid information on anything further into the future than Thursday lunchtime. I had never set foot in the Pearson building before, and just tried not to look like a dazed trainee (I fooled nobody). One 1993 recruit told me all his first impressions of people were wrong. I think all mine were right.

A contemporary of mine once told me that the Foreign Service was the only job he thought he would ever do, and that he was the only person of his acquaintance that he felt was suitable for the job. He fits the service, he said, like a hand into a glove. Another new FS worried about how his friends would treat him, some having told him “you’re better than the Foreign Service.” I should add that these same friends used to call him “Slick Lizard,” and their mothers dress them funny.

As Day One wore on, we junior-most of flunkies pledged our loyalty, checked ourselves for security leaks, and had our Monday morning grimaces immortalized in our building pass photos. We attended sedulously a wrinkle-inducing series of welcomes and dress codes and dos and don’ts from various high muckety-mucks. I would describe most of these presentations as soporific if I had a thesaurus handy (and no desire to be promoted before the Mayan calendar ends in the year 2011).

Most humiliating of all the hoops through which brand spankin’ new FS bozos must leap on Day One is that ceremonial mortification known politely as The Rounds. Having no money for boot camp or hazing videos, the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade has devised a uniquely effective manner by which to demonstrate to juniors the extent of their juniorness.

Picture this: you have a sheet of legal paper with eighteen acronyms corresponding to eighteen divisions of the Department. You spend several hours going from division to division, tower to tower of the Pearson Building, collecting an eggcupful of facts and wisdom, along with the initials of eighteen divisional secretaries. I recall thinking of how barbarian kings were paraded through the streets of Rome as a demonstration of Imperial authority. Okay, so we weren’t exactly bound up in chains and pelted with produce. But still, the horror, the horror...

Mercifully this intramural scavenger hunt ended without fatalities, and our legal sheets were as packed with secretaries’ initials as our frontal lobes were with sage advice. Not many of the people we encountered on our rounds seemed to treat the exercise with greater than lunar gravity, except one individual we are sure had appeared in several of the Planet of the Apes movies. We did not receive a lurid briefing on seductive Soviet secret agents (which was a big disappointment, Cold War over or no); neither did we get a licence to kill or a three-colour CSIS decoder ring. We did, however, receive a $2 coupon for breakfast at the International House of Pancakes.

On the afternoon of Day One, each of us had an interview with our Assignment Officer. I recall having the queasy feeling I once associated with going to the Principal’s office. There was some solace in the fact that my Assignment Officer’s surname looked central European, so I thought I might break the ice with my grandparents-from-the-old-country gambit. Or maybe she would be so swept up in the enthusiasm generated by my Sears suit and sister-in-law necktie that she would offer me a posting in Paris and insist I be given a parking space. It didn’t, she didn’t, and I wasn’t.

What she did do, is come to the point:

“Tell me what sort of jobs might interest you.”

“Excuse me?”

“What are your interests?”

“Well, hockey mostly. Also Star Trek.”

“No, what are your professional interests?” (pause)

“Should I have some of those?”

“Couldn’t hurt.”

“Let me see. Well, I’d have to say foreign policy.”

“That’s a good start. Anything more specific?”

“I don’t know if I am really looking for a specific job. With my background, perhaps I would be best suited for something not quite so...specific.”

“You would like a vague job?”

“Exactly!”

“Fortunately, we have plenty of those.” She opened a big, scary file folder, doubtless crammed with nebulous entry level positions, and hummed for a moment.

“What do you think of Africa?”

“That’s the one with the zebras, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“Well, as far as I’m concerned it’s... south of Europe.”

What was I supposed to say? My nearly limitless knowledge of African affairs consisted of three things: i) ‘Daktari’ is an African word; ii) Africa is hot; and iii) There are a lot of sand dunes in the top part.

On Day Two, I started work, vaguely, in the Africa bureau.

A few years later, I can see that Day One was a compressed version of Year One (or Year Five), because it contained all the main elements of life in the Lester B. Pearson Building: paperwork, meetings and ritual humiliation. Plus coffee. And an incomprehensible meeting with Personnel.

Mind you, I still don’t know what the secret handshake is.

At the time of writing, Michael Kaduck was a political officer. He was the one in the blue suit.

Diary Of A Tropical Storm

by Renata E. Wielgosz

The weekend of October 24-25 1998:

The Canadian delegation to the XXIV Meeting of the Inter-American Drug Abuse Control Commission (CICAD) and the Third Meeting of the Intergovernmental Working Group on the Multilateral Evaluation Mechanism (MEM) arrives in Tegucigalpa, Honduras in October 1998. There are four of us: David Duinker from DFAIT, Michel (aka Mitch) Perron from the Office of the Solicitor General, Diane Jacovella from Health Canada, and myself from the Canadian Mission to the Organization of American States (OAS). Deputy Solicitor General Jean Fournier, who was to head our delegation, is required to stay in Canada at the last moment, and the role passes to me. We have a delegation meeting to finalize preparations for the week ahead.

Business out of the way, we avail ourselves of the generous offer extended by Neil Mussell, the CIDA officer who runs the Office of the Canadian Embassy in Tegucigalpa, to see the city and some of the nearby countryside. Neil’s tour is accompanied by a detailed briefing on Honduras. Diane notes that the local vegetation is not as verdant as one would expect for a tropical country. There are few flowers. We learn that Tegucigalpa, high in the mountains, gets little rain. Indeed, the afternoon shower that ends our tour brings welcome freshness to the dry terrain. We are told that in contrast, San Pedro Sula, the country’s business hub located near the coast and the original site proposed for our meetings, is lush with greenery.

Monday, October 26:

Our Honduran hosts, including the staff of the Hotel Maya, have overlooked no detail in ensuring that we have excellent working conditions for our meetings. Their efforts, the preparatory work of the OAS Secretariat and the shared goals of the attending delegations in fighting the drug problem in the hemisphere — all lead to rapid progress in the meetings. On two evenings, the Honduran authorities provide hospitality events. The first is a reception on Monday at the historic city hall hosted by the Mayor of Tegucigalpa, Cesar Castellanos. A large man with an equally large presence, he is widely pointed out to us by Hondurans and by members of the media and the local diplomatic community as the man who is expected to become the next President of Honduras. We listen to his speech. We mill about, exchanging ideas with other delegations, networking, trying to concoct solutions to some of the more difficult items coming up on the agenda. There is a sense of movement on an issue which for many years had seen little progress. It is raining as we return to the hotel.

Tuesday, October 27 – Thursday, October 29:

It now rains on and off every day. Dampness permeates the air. There are news reports that Hurricane Mitch, the fourth most powerful hurricane ever recorded, has hit the Honduran coast. After our meetings, we all watch local television coverage of island resorts that are wiped out. Our attention is riveted by a news photo depicting a farmer walking in brackish water up to his neck, clutching a live chicken over his head. Nothing else remains of his possessions or livelihood. San Pedro Sula is under water. On the margins of our meetings, there are expressions of relief that the CICAD and MEM meetings had been moved to Tegucigalpa. This was pure chance. The active business community had long pre-booked all available conference and hotel facilities in San Pedro Sula. We are cocooned. We are sheltered from Hurricane Mitch by our inland position and the high mountains that surround Tegucigalpa. Secure in our fortress, life goes on. By late Thursday, we complete all of our work, eliminating the need for holding the closing session on Friday morning as had originally been planned.

At the accelerated closing session on Thursday, our Honduran hosts thank the delegations for their expressions of empathy over the tragedy that has hit the Honduran coast and ask that we convey to our capitals the growing need for assistance. Neil Mussell is not at this session where he had hoped to join us. He is coordinating with other local missions and with CIDA. We reaffirm to our hosts that Canada is already considering how it might assist most effectively.

A handful of delegates pick up the few remaining seats on earlier flights out of Tegucigalpa. They disappear into the rain. Within our delegation, we discuss reporting and follow-up. We prepare to leave midday on Friday. With all of the rain that keeps falling, David cannot shake off his premonition of an impending disaster. He draws parallels to last January’s ice storm in Canada, recalling his similar sense of a situation going wrong in slow motion. As the heavens continue to open up and spill out their contents, he grows increasingly pessimistic, stating categorically that Mother Nature is once again refusing to cooperate.

Friday, October 30:

The steady showers have become a thick downpour. Clouds descend, obscuring the peaks that surround Tegucigalpa. Flying, into or out of what is already one of the most geographically difficult airports in Central America, is now impossible.

There are gunshots close to the hotel. We are warned to be careful when crossing the street to the American Airlines office to re-book our tickets for Saturday. Some prisoners were being moved from the nearby penitentiary which was flooded by the rains and they had escaped. We focus on the gunshots. The word “flooded” is peripheral to our concerns.

Late in the evening, there is word that Hurricane Mitch, which has been downgraded to a tropical storm, has begun to move inland after days of hovering near the coast. The storm’s centre is expected to come within 70 kilometres of Tegucigalpa. Hotel staff systematically secure the windows in all the rooms. We are told to stay in the hotel. Having been cooped up all week, we don’t listen and walk around the corner to have supper in another hotel, just for a change of scenery. Mitch Perron endures the growing number of jokes related to the name he shares with the storm. Over dinner, the wind and the rain increase. We run back to our hotel, arriving drenched despite the plastic garbage bags that some of us are wearing over our clothes. The night brings restlessness. There is pounding rain. Electrical power dies and the hotel’s generators kick in.

Saturday, October 31:

Daylight brings a continuing downpour and a massive cloud that remains firmly nestled among the mountains surrounding Tegucigalpa. Again, flights are cancelled. Colleagues talk of missing Halloween with their children. These are the final moments in our surreal existence, disconnected from the tragedy that we are not yet aware is all around us.

Across the street, all the airline offices are closed. Staff has not turned up. The streets have become streams. Hotel staff, too, is missing. Public transportation on which many depend has ceased. David, whose room overlooks a small stream running through parkland is among the first aware of the magnitude of the damage. The stream has turned into a raging river of mud, flooding the park and the adjacent housing, and crashing against the wall that stands between it and our hotel.

Unable to re-book our flights, David and I phone Neil. He agrees to bring us into his office so that we can try to sort out our travel arrangements. We drive off into the rain with him. On the way to the office, we join him as he surveys the damage in preparation for an afternoon meeting of assistance coordinators. The view of the Choluteca River astounds us. It is no longer a pretty ribbon of water meandering under picturesque bridges. It is an angry torrent of mud that has swollen up and swallowed large chunks of the city which had stood on both its banks. We stop and watch. All but one of the many bridges is gone — only one which will still connect our side of the city with the airport. Large pieces of debris are floating downstream at breakneck speed. One piece can still be identified as a washing machine. We continue but we cannot go very far. Each road out of Tegucigalpa is destroyed by muddy landslides.

Bit by bit, the story of the horror of the previous night emerges. Expecting some flooding in this city that had never experienced any, officials had evacuated one block along either side of the river. Between 1:00 and 4:00 in the morning, as people slept, landslides blocked the river causing it to rise rapidly as much as four to six blocks on either side. Homes with entire families suddenly vanished into the swirling water.

Early estimates on Saturday are that about 1000 people have died in Tegucigalpa alone. The city is cut off from surrounding towns and villages and there is no way of knowing how those fared. We drive by the stadium where now thousands of homeless survivors are finding shelter from the rain that continues to pour relentlessly. We stand among the throngs of Tegucigalpans who have lined up along the river to stare at it in shock and helpless silence.

Tropical storm Mitch stops moving, planting itself firmly over the city. Estimates on the news are that Tegucigalpa received a meter of rain on Friday. Another meter of rain empties over the city on Saturday. The lobby of a nearby hotel is flooded. We chat with members of the now skeletal staff in the two hotels where delegations and OAS Secretariat members are staying. Most staff are relieved that their families are safe although some of their homes have suffered damage. They are the lucky ones on higher ground who had escaped the landslides that dot the city. One maid is less fortunate. Unable to find transportation at the end of her shift on Friday, she has spent the night at the hotel. In the morning, she learns that her home and most of her family, including three young children, have disappeared. Her own escape from death does not console her.

The mayor who had hosted us just a few days earlier emerges as a hero. Local media coverage shows him tirelessly urging calm, organizing relief efforts, offering hope that the city will not long remain isolated from much-needed outside help. By the end of the day, we stare in disbelief at the television sets carrying the local news. Mayor Cesar Castellanos is dead. The helicopter he had taken out to survey the worst-hit areas has crashed. The city, already in mourning, is stunned.

Sunday, November 1:

The sun is out. Michel and Diane leave on the early morning TACA flight after paying $1000 each for new tickets. The flight is full, we are told. About sixty of us, including members of various delegations and OAS Secretariat staff are left behind. American Airlines and Continental Airlines refuse to fly or to let us transfer our tickets to another airline. We don’t understand. There isn’t a cloud in the sky. They should be flying in emergency supplies and relief workers. We are told that they will fly on Monday. Back at the hotel, we flip through CNN and other US channels. There is nothing about Tegucigalpa. Again, we don’t understand.

Once more, we clean up our own rooms, make our own beds, have the limited breakfast service offered by the hotel which is both rationing its food and short on staff. Daniel, the Maya Hotel’s coordinator who from the start ensures that we receive full information on the unfolding situation and how it might affect us, issues a strong warning in writing. Roving gangs are roaming the city, plundering shops and offices, stealing the last valuables held by homeless survivors, and attacking passersby who look as if they might be carrying money or jewelry.

In the lobby, I meet David as he returns to the hotel. He was part of a group that had walked to the river and looked at the growing damage as the water receded. He grimly describes his experience, including his walk through the remains of the jail whose walls had collapsed under the pressure of the water. His shoes are caked with muck.

I join him and some American delegates for another walk in the afternoon. I take nothing with me — no jewelry, no purse, no wallet, not even the inexpensive waterproof watch bought to weather the monsoons on a posting many years ago. Who would want this, I ask myself. I feel ridiculous taking such extreme precautions. Later, I see one of the women from the OAS Secretariat with a gash on her skin left when a gang of thieves had torn her necklace from her.

In the bright sunlight in which we walk, no detail escapes us. Rubbish is strewn everywhere, deposited by receding water. Electrical poles and wires lie dead in the streets. Much of the city is without electricity. The stench of raw sewage is overwhelming. People everywhere are working, cleaning up, their clothes slimy with mud. Others sit exhausted on wet mattresses in the street, despondency in their eyes. Pumps are pouring streams of water out from houses on slightly higher ground. Below, homes, office buildings, stores and car dealerships are still under water. Fifty years worth of infrastructure has vanished. We stand at the remaining end of a former bridge. The river current is still much too fast. Heading into a nearby street, we are passed by three running soldiers with raised machine guns. One touches my arm lightly to get my attention. “Cuidado”, he pleads, Spanish for be careful. As he runs ahead, I suggest to my companions that we turn back. I barely finish speaking when we hear shooting.

Back at the hotel, some of us decide to head out to the American Embassy School where early relief efforts are being organized. David and I make boxes there for a while. These will be filled with food prepared by volunteers in our hotel kitchen. Bottles of potable water, clothing and blankets and will be delivered to shelters set up around the city and at the stadium. By the time we return to the hotel, it is raining again.

Our situation is becoming precarious. All security guards at the hotel, in abundance during our meetings, are gone. They have joined the relief effort. Our own security is no longer guaranteed. There is shooting again just outside the door of the lobby. As night falls, the sound of gunfire reaches our hotel with growing frequency.

The approximately sixty of us that remain have become a burden to the beleaguered Honduran authorities who keep apologizing for the crisis that surrounds us and making every effort to extend ever-gracious hospitality to us. We are embarrassed by our helplessness. We learn that American Airlines and Continental Airlines have now cancelled all flights until Thursday. Except for the local Honduran news stations, Tegucigalpa continues to be non-existent on any of the cable stations. We are convinced that the world does not care. We are enraged. We promise each other to make every effort if and when we finally do get out to tell the world about the human tragedy here and to persuade a seemingly uncaring world to help.

We feel guilty for using up diminishing resources. Safe water at the hotel cannot be guaranteed for more than another 24-48 hours. We had just witnessed thousands outside the hotel who already had none. We eat sparingly, knowing that the city is running out of food and wondering which meal might be our last. Gasoline is rationed for relief efforts. An Exxon representative whom David and I meet confirms that the city will run out of gasoline altogether within the next day or two. With all roads into Tegucigalpa destroyed by massive landslides, there is no hope of gasoline or other supplies coming into the city by land. Our prospects for transportation to the airport thus grow dimmer as time goes by. The late evening news reports that three soldiers were killed in a shootout with a gang of looters on the airport road.

The local news further reports that the morgue has been flooded and that holding retrieved bodies for identification has become a health hazard. We recall the stench of raw sewage encountered on our walk that afternoon and know full well that it is only a matter of days before disease adds to the city’s misery.

It is late, very late, when we learn that we are leaving the next morning. David Beall, Executive Secretary of CICAD, and Carlos Sosa Coello, a senior Honduran official who has been one of the key organizers of the meetings in Tegucigalpa, gather together our group to announce the arrangements they have successfully won for us. TACA Airlines will be sending two special planes for us in the morning from El Salvador. American Airlines and Continental Airlines, under substantial pressure, conceded that we could transfer our existing tickets to TACA. We are touched. Mitch has affected so many Central American countries and yet it is precisely those countries, at a time when they themselves need help, that come to our rescue through The Airline of Central America (TACA).

Monday, November 2:

It is 5:00 a.m. and still dark when we head for the airport in a small convoy that we hope will afford us security from ever-roving gangs. By the time we have our boarding passes in our hand, the sun is shining in a perfectly clear blue sky. Rumours abound that airlines other than TACA had left us stranded because they were too cheap to fly into Tegucigalpa without incoming passengers.

Our last moments in Tegucigalpa again bring home never-failing Honduran hospitality. Knowing that our early departure from the hotel left us without breakfast, Daniel brings pastries and thermoses of coffee and juice from the hotel to the waiting lounge. We are sorry to leave him behind.

The flight is quiet. We are painfully aware that we are the fortunate outsiders who can leave. The images of the Hondurans who remain behind do not fade, even when we close our eyes to sleep.

Tuesday, November 3:

Ambassador Lionel Hurst of Antigua and Barbuda, as the senior-most diplomat from an OAS mission who had been part of our group in Tegucigalpa until the very end, delivers an impassioned speech at the OAS Committee on Hemispheric Security. This is the first OAS meeting upon our return and, as agreed, he speaks for all of us in drawing attention to conditions in Tegucigalpa. The OAS Office of Public Information is mobilized into action. The Ambassador of Honduras, touched by expressions of concern over her country, delivers a plea for assistance. The voices grow louder. The news begins to spread.

In Ottawa, David Duinker arrives just in time for a meeting on coordinating Canadian assistance. Neil Mussell’s reports have hit a responsive chord. David delivers a briefing that helps focus that response further.

Aftermath:

Upon my return to Washington, I contact bout de papier as part of the promise all of us had made to broadcast the plight of Honduras. However, within a few days, the world is finally seeing television images of what we had witnessed firsthand. The magnitude of the disaster in Central America, including in Tegucigalpa, becomes known. Relief begins to pour in — but these efforts are now part of other people’s stories.

I wonder about the continuing usefulness of writing an article. Then, on November 19, the postcard I had sent home from Tegucigalpa arrives. I am touched by the fact that its arrival signals the obvious effort of Hondurans to return to the normal routine of daily life after the devastation of Mitch. I am also stung by a sharp awareness that much of what is pictured in the postcard is no more. I write this article no longer to get a story out, but rather so that months from now, when it appears in print, it may in some small way keep us from forgetting those whose valiant struggle to rebuild after Mitch will go on for a long, long time.

Renata E. Wielgosz joined DFAIT in 1982. Her postings include New Delhi and Prague. At the time of publication, she was Counsellor and Alternate Representative at the Permanent Mission of Canada to the Organization of American States (OAS), Washington, DC.

Funeral Director in Dubai: A Consul’s Other Related Duties

by Marilyn Langstaff

In 1993 I was sent to Dubai, United Arab Emirates, to open what was billed as a “mini-mission.” Shortly after my arrival a tragedy occurred amongst the resident Canadian community. I received notice from the local police that a young musician named Michael had jumped from the 18th floor of a downtown apartment building. There was no indication of foul play but a full investigation was nevertheless required. As we were new in the region and had no previous experience dealing with these sorts of situations, I consulted my counterparts at other consulates and was counselled to present myself in person at the police station. Apparently, being blonde and not exactly sylph-like would expedite the process. Accordingly, off I went to the station and was ushered into the presence of the Major in charge. Much desultory chatting occurred and eventually I explained that I was the Canadian Vice-Consul and that I needed his help to wend my way through the bureaucracy. I hastened to add that of course this would not be police bureaucracy, but rather all other forms of bureaucracy which might, or might not, exist in the Emirates.

My Major understood perfectly, handed me yet another cup of mint tea and informed me that he was assigning his best Captain to my case. He gave me a series of business, home and cellular telephone numbers for his colleague and insisted that I should feel free to telephone him whenever it was convenient for me. If the Captain failed in his duty, he would be punished severely for offending such a great country as Canada and such an august person as me, etc., etc.

My next task was to determine what to do with my poor Canadian’s remains. With the help of headquarters personnel, we ascertained that Michael’s mother could not afford the $6,000 I had discovered it would cost to ship his body back to Canada. She also did not wish him to be buried on foreign soil and I, therefore, was instructed to have him cremated and to return his ashes to Canada. Unfortunately, being a Muslim country, there were no Christian or non-secular cremation facilities available in the city. All was not lost, though, as the Indian community sponsored a Hindu site where this could be accomplished, if one had the appropriate connections. There was a laborious process involved in order to convince the Hindu Benefit Association that they should perform the ceremony for a person not of their faith but, fortunately, our secretary was from Goa. Doris had lived in Dubai for 22 years and no one could resist her when she set her mind to something. In due course, we sorted out all the paperwork, donations and fees and chose the only mutually convenient day when the cremation could take place. It was now up to me to have the police formalities completed by the assigned time.

My Major understood perfectly, handed me yet another cup of mint tea and informed me that he was assigning his best Captain to my case.

The Captain was as good as his Major’s word and he guided me through the labyrinthian bureaucracy which ensued. I was required to formally identify the body, inspect the autopsy incisions, meet the Federal Prosecutor (for some inexplicable reason) and attest various pieces of paper with official looking stamps. The police investigation was eventually completed, after much pleading on my part, and more papers attested, one of which contained instructions to the morgue to release the body to me personally. It was necessary to dispatch our Pakistani driver to locate a couple of labourers-for-hire who would not object to handling a body. Two fellow Pakistanis were found and we all went to the morgue to collect Michael’s body. We wrapped his naked body in a clean, white sheet provided by one of the other local staff and settled him into the Consulate station wagon.

The crematorium was basically a fenced compound with a cement pad in the centre and some peripheral wooden seating for mourners. It was open to the elements and, although it was still mid-morning, the temperature had soared to almost 40 degrees celsius. The idea was that we would take some of the “special” wood we were required to purchase and place it on the pad. Next we put Michael on the wood and I covered him with a butter-like substance which I believe was ghee. More wood was arranged on top of his body. During this time, the obligatory Hindu priest chanted rhythmically as he circled the mound several times and tossed bits of coloured powder into the air. He then lit a joss stick and solemnly presented it to me, indicating that I should light the pyre. Apparently, this was a great honour as women are seldom permitted to perform this act. I did so and then retired to the seating area with the only other mourner, a musician friend of Michael’s, whom I believe had taken drugs of some sort. This volatile chap was so distressed that he flung himself into my arms, sobbing hysterically and creating quite a scene, much to the puzzlement of the Pakistani witnesses and the Hindu priest. I consoled him as much as possible and together we sat through the next two hours waiting for Michael’s body to be consumed, drinking warm Coca-Cola and pondering the meaning of life.

It takes several hours for someone to be cremated in this fashion so the driver and I returned to the Consulate until the late afternoon. In the meantime, another colleague had been sent to purchase a suitable container for Michael’s ashes. At this point, the whole ordeal was beginning to be quite macabre and there were many tasteless jokes as to what would be appropriate. None of us meant any disrespect to Michael and the sad circumstances of his death, but it was a necessary release from all the tension we had endured. The driver and I went back about 5:00 pm to collect the ashes which had cooled to the point where we could scoop them up. We put them in the container, sealed the lid and arranged for a courier company to collect the last of Michael.

I was lucky that I was blessed with such a supportive local staff and that my host country officials were so understanding and accommodating. Although this was the first Canadian death I was required to handle, many other challenging incidents have occurred during my career. For any foreign service officer disgruntled with his or her lot — have we Consular Officers got a deal for you!

Marilyn Langstaff served in Lagos, Jakarta, Dubai and Dar es Salaam. At the time of publication, she was a policy officer in the Physical Resources Bureau at the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade.

Holding the Line in Texas:
On the Rio Grande with
the US Border Patrol

by John Morrow

In April of 1999, Canadian Consul John Morrow spent a week walking, flying, boating, and driving the border between Texas and Mexico with agents of the US Border Patrol. By night, by day, and even by infrared light, he witnessed first hand the efforts made to control undocumented aliens crossing the border. All statistics quoted in this article were supplied by the Border Patrol in April 1999.

The border between Texas and Mexico stretches for some 1,200 miles and in most places the land is desolate and dry, void of human habitation, visited only by those trying to cross the border unnoticed and the United States Border Patrol. Along the banks of the Rio Grande River, both the hunters and the hunted play a waiting game, guessing and second guessing where the illicit cargos, ranging from drugs to illegal aliens, will cross once the sun goes down.

Contrary to many people’s expectations, the Rio Grande does not form much of a physical barrier. While its waters do claim some lives each year, particularly in the spring when it runs fast and deep, in many places it can be crossed quickly and safely, often simply by wading. The river is, in fact, the least of the worries of those seeking illicit entry into the United States from Mexico.

In many spots the water flows slowly, and the banks are close together and easily accessible. Enterprising smugglers from the Mexican side have cut back the brush in many places and improved the river bank to provide easy access to the water for boats, rafts, horses, and people with inner tubes. From a Border Patrol helicopter, it is easy to see both the narrowness of the river in some places, as well as the relatively undeveloped country around much of the river. By early summer there will be places on the Rio Grande where illegal migrants could simply walk across.

Many of those seeking to cross the border illegally cannot swim, so flotation devices like inner tubes are invaluable to assist in the crossing. Whenever the Border Patrol comes across an inner tube on the northern bank, it is almost certain that a crossing has recently occurred. In order to prevent repeated use of these inner tubes, each one that is found is cut up. The river bank is littered with slashed inner tubes, deflated rafts and the like. In addition to these low tech flotation aids, some smugglers use horses or homemade boats to facilitate the crossing. In the McAllen Sector, along a short stretch of river, the remains of as many as a half-dozen small homemade boats litter the northern bank, destroyed by the Border Patrol during regular sweeps of the river.

Once across the river, the terrain varies from green scrub brush to rocky desert. One thing that never seems to vary, however, is the sheer unfriendliness of the landscape. Every plant seems to sprout long, jagged thorns; loose rocks and craggy cliffs make travelling the desolate trails dangerous even in daylight. Heat, lack of water, omnipresent bugs, and the occasional rattlesnake make the trip perilous; dozens of illegals die every year from heatstroke, drowning, and other such misadventures.

The sheer number of aliens crossing the border continues to grow and the Border Patrol has grown as well. In the Del Rio sector, one of five Border Patrol sectors in Texas, 131,058 aliens were apprehended in 1998 (more than 350/day), an increase of 16 percent over the previous year. Of these, only 1,342 were classified as Other Than Mexicans (OTMs), but this represented an 80 percent increase over 1997. El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras were the primary points of origin of these OTMs.

The Laredo sector, the largest Border Patrol sector in Texas, recorded 103,433 apprehensions in 1998, down from 141,887 in 1997. This decrease was largely explained by a movement away from Laredo, caused by the intense enforcement activity underway in that sector as part of Operation Rio Grande.

The intensity of the enforcement activity taking place around San Diego, El Paso, and now Laredo has forced the smugglers to take their illegal migrants into the Del Rio sector and into Arizona. The high enforcement operations have proven very effective, but also very manpower intensive. The Border Patrol relies heavily on high-tech equipment, including helicopters and “scope” trucks using infrared cameras, but in the end someone has to be there on the ground to take the aliens into custody.

The amount of traffic is easily seen from the air. Given that there are no livestock herds and there is no reason for people to be in this remote area, well-worn trails are clearly being made by large groups of illegal aliens and drug smugglers. During the day the helicopter patrols look for such trails and direct ground units to those which look fresh.

The impact of illegal immigration in the southwest, particularly Texas, is tremendous. In 1996, the Immigration and Naturalization Service estimated that 5 million illegal aliens were living in the US, of whom 700,000 were living in Texas, a state with a population of approximately 20 million. Many industries, including the construction, farming, and hospitality industries, depend heavily on illegal workers in order to stay in business. While many people complain about the costs of illegal immigration, few seem willing to put in place employer sanctions to punish those who provide the illegals with jobs.

In addition to illegal aliens, the Border Patrol is finding itself increasingly called upon to combat the flow of drugs into Texas. Seizures of drugs are up, with a dramatic increase in the amount of cocaine being seized. In Del Rio, more than US$41 million worth of drugs were seized during 1998, a 12 increase over 1997. This included 41,000 pounds of marijuana and almost 900 pounds of cocaine. The Laredo sector recorded some US$248 million worth of drug seizures in 1998, up from $239 million the year before. Over 112,000 pounds of marijuana and 4,800 pounds of cocaine were seized.

Border Patrol agents usually patrol alone, through desolate and remote country. While the majority of the illegal aliens encountered do not resist arrest, the same cannot be said for the increasing numbers of drug smugglers being encountered. In the Del Rio sector in 1998, there were 12 assaults and armed encounters involving 17 violators and 26 agents. Surprisingly, given the increased amount of smuggling, this represented a 48 percent drop in attacks on agents.

Aliens who are caught, usually several hundred a night in each station area, are processed and have their photos and fingerprints digitally recorded in a Border Patrol computer database. Those who are Mexican nationals are generally detained until there are enough to make a busload; then they are taken to a border Point of Entry and released to walk back across the bridge to Mexico. Nationals of countries other than Mexico face a more elaborate process, since their return to their countries of origin is not so simply arranged.

As the US government seeks new ways to stem the flow of illegal migrants from Mexico and Latin America, the resources of the Border Patrol are stretched thin along the border. The official line remains that the goal is to end the influx of illegals, but as long as desperate, poor people can look across a thin ribbon of river and know that there are jobs waiting for them there, it is unlikely that they will stop trying their luck.

At the time of writing, John Morrow was Consul at the Canadian Consulate General in Dallas.

The 1990 Iraqi Invasion
and Annexation of Kuwait:
A Rooftop View

by Gary Luton

Perhaps now that 25 years have passed, it is time to think again about Kuwait and give shape to events that took place in the summer of 1990 when Iraq invaded and annexed the oil-rich city-state, which sits at the head of the Persian Gulf.

When I was assigned to Kuwait City in early January 1989, my first posting, the Iran–Iraq war was just beginning to wind down after eight grinding years.

By mid-July 1990, a belligerent Iraq had begun to build up forces along its southern border with Kuwait. Most in the diplomatic and intelligence community considered this mere sabre rattling, an act of intimidation, or a method to settle Baghdad’s long-standing financial and territorial claims. Iraq said it wanted Kuwait to cut it some slack on more than $60 billion it owed to the Kuwaitis for war debts and to reduce its oil output – or at least so it was thought.

The new Canadian Embassy in Kuwait had a rooftop terrace and was located close to the Persian Gulf, within sight of the Iraqi Embassy. A view of the central business district, with the emir’s palace in the distance, made the mission ideally situated to observe the Iraqi invasion force.

What follows is an account of the uncertain life of a young foreign service officer taken from a rough, personal journal of sorts, written during three weeks spent under Iraqi occupation, and from my recollections twenty-five years later.

Week 1 (2–8 August 1990)

Thursday’s headlines seemed a bit incongruous as we arrived at the office: “Jeddah Talks End… More Needed.” The night before, I had watched the Crown Prince of Kuwait, Sheikh Saad, return from talks with Iraq in Saudi Arabia. The arrival of the Sheik’s entourage was fascinating to watch, particularly at a time of heightened tension. Everyone of importance arrived at the airport to greet the returning Sheikh with a kiss on the shoulder, a touch of noses, or a simple handshake – each signifying rank, kinship and loyalty.

Iraq said it wanted Kuwait to cut it some slack on more than $60 billion it owed to the Kuwaitis for war debts and to reduce its oil output –
or at least so it was thought.

I awoke at 5:45 on August 2, 1990, shortly after the call to prayer, to the sound of low-flying fighter jets. Soon after, the gate buzzer rang. It was the Duty Officer, Ron Waugh. “Let’s go,” he said, “it’s begun”. Standing outside, glinting into the early morning sun, you could hear a low rumble in the distance of what turned out to be artillery fire.

Late summer in the Gulf meant that most of Kuwait’s leadership, senior officials and Embassy staff were all on leave, including Canadian Ambassador Larry Dickenson. We held our first extended briefing session with Bill Bowden, the Chargé d’affaires; Michel Têtu, Senior Trade Commissioner and his spouse Ingrid; MCO Ron Waugh and his spouse Sharon; Communicator Brian Friebel and his spouse Louise; Marianne Kurjata, the Ambassador’s Assistant, and myself, Second Secretary and Vice Consul.

The Iraqis had crossed into Kuwait around 2 a.m. and were shelling what appeared to be the Dasman Palace at the edge of the central business district. We could hear the artillery in the distance and see black plumes of smoke drifting upward, mixing with the summer haze. The often conflicting information received that day made for considerable confusion: the Emir was dead; no, the Emir was in Saudi Arabia; his palace was on fire; the government had fallen, a new provisional government of Kuwaiti revolutionaries opposed to the ruling Sabah family had been formed….

“Luton to the roof,” Bill said to me. “I want reports every 15 minutes on what’s happening out there.” “Start calling all local staff; we need the translator and at least two Arabic speakers”. I reached Mohammad first. “It looks like we will have to postpone our tennis game for another week, Mohammad.” “Why?” he asked. “The Iraqis have entered the City and are coming our way.”

Rosie, the Ambassador’s maid, had been fielding calls since early morning. Our primary concern was that Canadians, other foreign nationals, and possibly even Kuwaitis might seek refuge at the Residence. The decision was made to bring her to the Embassy along with the Ambassador’s driver, Houcine, his wife and four young children. I was designated to get a Canadian flag onto a car quickly and to go and get them. No cameras, no getting out of the car. We were taking no chances.

The Canadian Embassy is on the third ring road – one of a series of six concentric roads emanating from the city centre. While these modern four-lane highways made the city easy to move around in, they also made it surprisingly easy for the Iraqis to control the capital in less than a day. By 10 o’clock, the invasion force was already in control of the second ring road.

I overheard a telephone conversation with the British Embassy on my way out the door. Their Chancery had taken some close hits due to its proximity to the emir’s palace, which was still under fire, and where some of the heaviest fighting took place.

The roads were relatively empty en route to the Residence. I saw a white flag on a nearby medical clinic, and a pile of bloodied uniforms littered the ground nearby. An ambulance rushed by in hurried silence.

On our return to the Embassy, we passed a convoy of more than a dozen tanks on the Gulf Road, tracks clattering on the pavement – an eerie, mechanized, rattling sound I still recall. The Commander was standing erect in the lead tank. We came at him from behind and held our breath. His mustache, jet black hair, revolver and imposing demeanour made him look like Saddam himself. (Had the tank commander seen Donald Sutherland in Kelly’s Heroes, or was I imagining?) He let us pass by, slowly, without incident. We start to breathe again.

I woke up on day two of the invasion, having slept on the floor of my office and feeling saddened by it all. From the Embassy rooftop, the sky is clear and the temperature surprisingly moderate. The street remains quiet for that hour, and the sun creates a trough of light on the stippled waters of the Gulf, like a child’s painting of an imagined sunrise. On the second floor of the Embassy, the BBC is sounding its sombre tone from the inner sanctum of the Coms Centre: the CIA had missed the threat; stringent UN sanctions have been put in place; no one thought Saddam would actually invade the entire country, which is why the US Ambassador in Baghdad was on holiday.

By Saturday, day three, there were already alarming changes to be seen. Several dozen tanks had dug in, and soldiers filled the median of the Gulf Road. Tank barrels peered out from under soiled and tattered canopies, put there to shelter the soldiers from the intense August sun. Incongruous colours adorned the tanks, showing off goods pilfered en route. Iraqi tanks and troops were also consolidating their positions in the south, close to the Saudi border where most of Kuwait’s oil fields are located.

The Commander was standing erect in the lead tank. We came at him from behind and held our breath. His mustache, jet black hair, revolver and imposing demeanour made him look like Saddam himself. (Had the tank commander seen Donald Sutherland in Kelly’s Heroes, or was I imagining?). He let us pass by, slowly, without incident.
We start to breathe again.

At the brief morning meeting, Bill asked me to follow up on a consular case. “Call on that guy at the Sheraton. I understand he’s been released.”

Driving to the Sheraton roundabout was one of the few areas we ventured into within the battered “war zone” of the city centre. Jammal, our most gregarious of drivers, said a prayer while buckling up. “You scared?” he asked, flashing a silver tooth. “Me too,” he said, without waiting for an answer.

Burnt-out vehicles littered the side of the road as we approached the Sheraton. A water main had been shattered, and we plowed on, axle deep in muddy water. Plants were already beginning to die everywhere under the scorching sun. We pass the Yemeni Embassy, where large crowds of impoverished guest workers have formed since the beginning of the crisis. Very large Iraqi missiles sit on a tractor-trailer stationed in the roundabout in front of the hotel, pointing out to sea.

Sitting in my darkened villa in Bayan, I feel incredibly alone. On day five, I get up in silence, shower and leave my house. The Gulf Road is open from Messila to Salmiya. Troops looked ready to make a move further south as they were already up and packed. Further on, soldiers slept everywhere – in the shadow of walls and along the hedges of the median. A number of tanks were still in place, along with some heavy anti-aircraft guns and a few pieces of artillery. At Salmiya, I am turned back. For a second day, the Gulf Road to the Embassy has been closed, likely the result of Kuwaiti armed resistance nearby.

I report my findings when I arrive at the Embassy and learn more about last night’s consular-related phone calls. The whereabouts of 35 Western hostages still remain unknown. Luckily, none of them appeared to be Canadian.

On August 6, UN Resolution 661 imposed stringent sanctions on all trade to and from Iraq except for medicine and in humanitarian circumstances. While things had been relatively calm previously, the Iraqis now appeared to be toughening their stand and consolidating their annexation of Kuwait. Hussein was quoted as saying that “the Iraqi and Kuwaiti people prefer death over humiliation.” Since a so-called Arab solution to the crisis did not appear imminent, we wondered aloud when some kind of joint military action by our allies could be expected.

The air is grey. A man stands on a corner not far from the Embassy in a haze, half-crazed, directing traffic which does not respond to his rants. A summer dust storm is brewing, and the palm fronds outside our window are lashing around in a gentle frenzy. Suddenly, calm falls over the street and light flickers from a nearby mosque due, in part, to lingering dust and smoke from the invasion.

By day six, we all feel increasingly vulnerable. I have moved to the Embassy. I do not expect to return home to Bayan until the crisis is over. For the first time, I begin to wonder seriously what it would be like to be taken hostage by the Iraqis or to have to take some form of direct action in our own self-defence if conditions deteriorate further.

Later in the day, the news, finally is a bit more encouraging. Turkey has cut off shipments of oil by pipeline from Iraq. Saudi Arabia has deployed missiles on its borders, while naval reinforcements are en route through the Suez Canal. More than 50 warships were reportedly approaching the crisis area. The Americans were sending troops to Saudi Arabia to arrive the following morning, “in defence of US bases.” This later became known as Operation Protective Shield.

Week 2 (9–15 August 1990)

We are now into week two and, incongruously, the Embassy finds itself providing temporary shelter for a parrot named Basel. A blue and white macaw, he is soon able to imitate the sound of the heavy door opening and closing into the secure zone. This provides an unnerving distraction for the watch officer who thinks each time it occurs that a late-night visitor has unexpectedly arrived.

We learn that Iraq has made peace with Iran – giving in on a number of issues which had stalled peace talks for years. On August 9th, UN Resolution 662 unanimously declares Iraq’s annexation of Kuwait is null and void, and the BBC speaks of the rogue state possibly using chemical weapons. Hussein is now calling for Jihad – a holy war of revolution and insurrection throughout the Arab world, including the holy shrines of Mecca and Medina.

Coming north on the fourth ring road, a car has rammed an army truck, and both have exploded and caught fire. In my former neighbourhood, a large crowd of Kuwaiti women are demonstrating loudly. Smoke plumes are seen around the city as abandoned cars are lit on fire. Tracer bullets stream late into the night. Two Kuwaiti resistance fighters who were sniping from a rooftop were killed. Meanwhile, the British Embassy calls to say that there has been a public execution of what we later learn to be an Iraqi soldier, hanging in a square near the Meridian Hotel.

On the afternoon of August 9, the BBC announces that Iraq’s borders are closed to all except diplomats. Later in the day, Baghdad Domestic Service in Arabic, in parallel with Baghdad Voice of the Masses, announces that a decree by Saddam requires all Embassies in Kuwait to relocate to Baghdad before August 14th. Following the announcement, calls began in rapid succession from distressed Canadians as food supplies were running short and mobile phones no longer worked. People wondered what they should do, and if they should try and get to Baghdad by land. The phones also ring with no one on the other end, or with the sound of someone’s disturbed laughter before hanging up abruptly.

By Friday, day nine, we had called local staff not to come in. Heavily armed Iraqi soldiers arrive at the gate of the Embassy, saying they have come to stand guard or, perhaps more accurately, to keep a better eye on us. They are wearing combat dresses, the red berets of an elite unit and red braid on their shoulders.

A British citizen is reported shot while trying to assist Kuwaitis who were fired upon while trying to cross the desert into Saudi Arabia. The Bedouin are charging approximately 375 KD (approximately $1,500 CDN) to smuggle people across the Saudi border by way of the old camel routes that their fathers once travelled. The Embassy advises Canadians not to try “unconventional” routes to escape from Kuwait.

Week 3 (16–21 August 1990)

By mid-August, it was all a bit of a blur really, with long periods of tedium and odd moments of sheer adrenaline. Some Iraqi soldiers were reportedly beginning to trade their guns for clothes and cigarettes. An ammunition truck exploded on the fifth ring road, the cause of the explosion unknown, although the remains of a white Cadillac could be seen among the tangled wreckage.

Iraq announced that the time was to be moved to coincide with “Baghdad time” and to advance our clocks one hour. Hospital names were also changed – Amir Hospital was renamed Union Hospital, while another was named after Saddam Hussein. Clinics and hospitals were now staffed with Iraqi doctors and nurses, apparently picked up at night by the military in Baghdad and driven to Kuwait, not knowing where they would eventually end up.

Turkish and other favoured nationals were allowed to begin an evacuation by bus. Iraqi TV reported the only other countries permitted to leave at that time were Austria, Switzerland, Sweden, Finland, Norway and Portugal.

A Canadian reported Iraqis collecting British and American men when they went to petrol stations and food cooperatives. As a result, he said he and his housemates had gone “underground.” Other Canadians continued to go in convoys to the border each day to try and cross into Saudi Arabia, only to be turned back.

On my way to the warehouse district to continue our search for food and bottled water supplies, burnt-out military vehicles lay scattered about wherever they had stalled. I saw a purebred Holstein cow heavy with milk in the back of a truck. Its companion dead, legs in the air, heavily bloated in the mid-morning sun. A fistfight broke out in an office adjoining where I was trying to make some purchases. The military, also tense from increased attacks by the resistance, now rode “shotgun” with at least one heavily armed soldier watching vehicles that followed too closely to try and stave off any attacks.

The meeting in the Ambassadors’ office on Thursday, August 16, was a decisive one. We all report on our activities with the usual quips and camaraderie; however, that day, we were particularly quiet with the thought of going to Baghdad weighing heavily. Those who will remain in Kuwait, we think, are in for a long haul.

I am not the only one unconvinced about making the 650 km trek to Baghdad when a prolonged war with Iraq seemed imminent. Ottawa was calling it an “evacuation,” but it felt more like flying to Berlin in 1939. In the end, it is decided that Ron and Sharon, Brian and Louise, and, of course, Bill would stay. The rest of us would go to Baghdad.

What would be our fate in Baghdad? It would either be relatively straightforward, and we would proceed to our final destination, or, if our worst nightmare came true, we would be detained in Iraq as bargaining chips. Diplomatic immunity, as we had seen, meant nothing to Hussein.

Bill read out a telex message from Ambassador Dickenson to raise our spirits. The Ambassador had tried to return to Kuwait several times from both the Saudi and Jordanian borders but was turned back each time. He sent us his very best wishes along with a bit of a pep talk. This we found quite poignant, as we moved quietly into the final hours before our departure.

On August 18, UN Resolution 664 unanimously demanded that Iraq allow foreign nationals to leave Iraq and Kuwait and rescind its order to close diplomatic missions in Kuwait. The following day, Saddam in a TV message noted how Baghdad had ruled Kuwait in the past. “If the US and UK pull out their forces from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf and cancel the embargo, or if Bush sends a clear notice saying he has the intention of doing so, then foreigners will be able to travel with no hold-ups.” The European and American people “should advise their governments to pull out, or abide to the above points, or else we will suffer together.” If a war starts, Hussein ominously declared, “we are both going to have thousands of orphans”.

On August 19th BBC news announced that westerners in Kuwait were requested by the Iraqi military to report to the Meridian, Kuwait International and Regency Hotels. The stated aim was to protect them. The Military Authority said it would not be responsible for the safety of those who did not comply. The British First Secretary called soon after saying Iraqi soldiers had rounded up an additional 50 British citizens and put them in military installations and that consular officers were not allowed to see them. The British later called back to report that the Iraqis had taken other westerners and possibly Canadians from the University Apartment Complex in Shuwaikh. Luckily, our wardens reported no Canadians had been detained.

Iraqi TV announced on August 20th that all foreigners in Baghdad must report immediately to the Immigration Department. A speech by Saddam the following day again focused on his detention of foreign nationals and argued that this practice was “averting a greater harm by doing a lesser harm”. He noted that America had interned people during WWII and, while he regretted banning travel for some people, “it is to prevent the crime of aggression which would be committed by the US.”

By Wednesday August 22, 1990, we are left few choices by the Iraqis. Six Canadian diplomats and spouses reluctantly leave for the airport, each with a single piece of hand luggage to catch a flight to Baghdad.

Epilogue: After three weeks living in occupied Kuwait, the Embassy was forced to downsize and the author flew to Baghdad on an Iraq Airways flight. Following his journey to Baghdad he spent three months detained in Iraq as a “guest” of Saddam Hussein. Stripped of diplomatic immunity, the Iraqi authorities did not allow western diplomats from Kuwait to leave Iraq until December 9th 1990 when they and other westerners were released.

At the time of publication, Gary Luton was the Director of the Treaty Law Division. He also served as Head of Mission in Doha, Qatar and, prior, as Consul General in Mumbai.

Cinq mois au MAECI:
Une nouvelle recrue dans
la jungle colombienne

par Joya Donnelly

Lorsque je suis arrivée à Bogota, j’avais à peine quatre mois d’ancienneté au Ministère. On m’avait pourtant dit que je resterais à Ottawa au moins trois ans avant de décoller mais les choses se sont passées autrement : j’ai eu la chance de décrocher une affectation temporaire de trois mois en Colombie. C’est donc ici que j’ai tout appris. Ou presque. Et c’est aussi ici que j’ai dû confronter le mythe du service extérieur à ma réalité découverte sur le terrain.

Avant mon arrivée au Ministère, mes anciens collègues d’une ONG internationale se moquaient de moi en me disant que ma nouvelle vie de diplomate n’allait se résumer qu’à des cocktails et soirées mondaines et que j’allais tranquillement m’y faire en perdant mon idéalisme et mon goût pour l’aventure. On m’avait aussi dit que la bureaucratie allait m’anesthésier et m’enlever l’énergie pour faire les choses différemment... En fait, cela c’est passé autrement.

La tâche la plus importante qu’on m’a confiée en arrivant en Colombie fut l’organisation d’une mission internationale dans la province du Chocó. L’initiative venait de mon prédécesseur Patrice Laquerre mais avait été retardée jusqu’à mon arrivée. Bien que celui-ci partait en congé de paternité, il m’accompagnerait heureusement dans la mission. Entre-temps, il fallait convoquer la communauté diplomatique de Bogota, coordonner la logistique avec l’ONU, préparer le programme avec les ONG, établir contact avec les communautés et les autorités locales que nous voulions rencontrer et informer le gouvernement colombien de nos intentions. Le tout en deux semaines. Ouf! Et moi qui n’avais jamais entendu parler du Chocó! Je ne connaissais rien de son histoire ni de la triste réalité de ses habitants...

C’est donc ça le Chocó... Une complexité extrême de malentendus, de pauvreté, d’opportunités ratées et d’histoires tristes.

Le Bas Atrato, là où se concentrerait notre itinéraire, fait partie du département du Chocó situé dans la zone occidentale du pays. Cette région est isolée géographiquement et historiquement du reste de la Colombie. Elle dispose d’une biodiversité très riche mais paradoxalement d’un lot de misère humaine frappant, qui s’est aggravée par le conflit armé. La population est composée à 85 % d’Afro-Colombiens. Ils seraient d’ailleurs près de 11 millions dans le pays, soit 25 % de la population. Mais pourtant ils sont presque invisibles... Ici, à Bogota, on en voit très peu. Quelques vendeurs de fruits aux coins des rues et c’est à peu près tout. Des autochtones habitent aussi le Chocó, principalement des communautés Tule, Wounaan et Embera. La population est majoritairement rurale et vit d’une économie de subsistance.

La guérilla était déjà présente de manière régulière depuis le milieu des années 80 dans le Bas Atrato, un couloir stratégique pour le commerce illicite vers le Panama et les Caraïbes et vers d’autres régions de la Colombie, en plus d’une zone de retranchement et d’approvisionnement pour les groupes armés illégaux. Jusqu’au milieu des années 90, il y eut peu d’affrontements entre la guérilla et l’armée nationale mais les Forces armées révolutionnaires de Colombie (FARC) prirent le contrôle en ayant recours à des assassinats sélectifs d’opposants et en terrorisant la population.

Les populations essaient d’être neutres, mais sont malgré elles au cœur du conflit.

Les paramilitaires, groupe d’extrême droite très violent apparu en réponse à l’incapacité de l’État à résoudre le problème de la guérilla, ont fait incursion dans la région dès 1996. L’année suivante, les forces armées ont lancé des opérations contre les FARC. La violence des combats a entraîné le déplacement d’environ 15 000 paysans des bassins des fleuves de Cacarica, Jiguamiando, Curbarado, Domingodo, Truando et Salaqui. Cet abandon massif des terres a mené à l’effacement des processus d’organisation existants, interrompant ainsi les efforts déployés par ces communautés pour la reconnaissance des droits de propriété sur les territoires collectifs.

Bref, les populations civiles se retrouvent aujourd’hui dans une région où plusieurs acteurs armés sont présents et bien qu’elles essaient d’être neutres, elles sont malgré elles au cœur du conflit. D’un côté comme de l’autre, on les accuse de collaborer ou d’informer l’opposant. C’est pour cela qu’elles se sont regroupées en « communautés de paix » ou zones humanitaires, dans lesquelles la présence de tout acteur armé est rejetée. Elles tentent ainsi de se mettre en marge du conflit. Malgré cette initiative, la population civile n’a pas réussi à assurer sa protection ni à améliorer ses conditions de vie, qui demeurent très précaires.

[picture]

Photo de groupe dans le Cacarica (Photo: Stas Pasionek)

Le gouvernement ne voit pas d’un bon œil les communautés de paix. Il croit que leurs leaders font partie des FARC, ou du moins en sont des collaborateurs. De plus, l’idéologie des communautés de paix entre en conflit avec sa politique de sécurité. Dans le cadre de celle-ci, le gouvernement veut rétablir sa présence dans toutes les régions du pays, ceci en ayant préalablement sécurisé le territoire par l’intermédiaire de l’armée et de la police. Ainsi, la principale présence gouvernementale se fait par les forces armées et non par des représentants civils. Les communautés refusent d’interagir avec les militaires, qu’elles perçoivent comme des acteurs armés menaçants au même titre que les FARC ou les paramilitaires, et reprochent au gouvernement son manque de présence civile sur le terrain. Bref, l’absence de confiance d’un côté comme de l’autre est flagrante.

C’est donc ça le Chocó... Une complexité extrême de malentendus, de pauvreté, d’opportunités ratées et d’histoires tristes. Je commençais à comprendre pourquoi Nicholas Coghlan, affecté à l’ambassade entre 1997 et 2000, avait surnommé la Colombie « le plus triste pays du monde »...

Les grands hôtels étant rares dans la région, il fallait donc prévoir une logistique se rapprochant beaucoup plus du camping pour la mission que j’organisais. Bottes de caoutchouc, filets, insecticide, sacs de couchage, chapeaux et crème solaire feraient donc partie des bagages. Pas de robe de soirée, bien au contraire. Encore une fois, le mythe du service extérieur se déconstruisait...

Arrivée à destination, la descente de l’avion fut surprenante. J’avais l’impression d’entrer dans un sauna vu la chaleur et l’humidité. J’en avais même les lunettes embuées! Sortis des douanes, un sympathique représentant du Haut-Commissariat des Nations-Unies pour les réfugiés nous attendait dans son véhicule onusien. Pour des questions de sécurité, il nous était interdit de voyager dans tout autre véhicule que ceux de l’ONU. Le Chef de sécurité de l’ambassade avait été clair : que des véhicules officiels et aucune dérogation à l’itinéraire. C’est à ces conditions qu’il nous autorisait à faire la visite dans le Chocó. La sécurité précaire dans la région explique d’ailleurs que la mission ait pris une telle ampleur, puisqu’il est plus sécuritaire de voyager en groupe, accompagnés d’organisations internationales reconnues connaissant l’endroit, que seuls. De plus, il y avait réel intérêt de la communauté diplomatique pour connaître la réalité du terrain. L’ambassade du Canada a donc proposé de coordonner cette mission. Selon le représentant du Haut-Commissariat des Nations-Unies aux droits de l’homme qui nous accompagnait, c’était la première fois, du moins en quatre ans, qu’une mission de la sorte était organisée par une ambassade.

On m’avait pourtant dit que le Canada avait perdu son rôle de leader au niveau international. Andrew Cohen avait presque réussi à me convaincre que le Canada était affaibli et que nous n’avions plus de crédibilité sur la scène mondiale. Et bien ce n’est pas la réalité que j’ai découverte en Colombie. Ici, le Canada est un acteur de premier plan, particulièrement au niveau de la défense des droits humains et de l’appui à la société civile, en plus d’être un important interlocuteur du gouvernement. Mes premières rencontres avec les ONG me l’ont confirmé. Lorsqu’une délégation des Christian Peacemaker Teams a demandé à nous rencontrer quelques jours après mon arrivée à l’ambassade, j’étais un peu inquiète. Je pensais qu’elle serait probablement très critique à l’égard de notre gouvernement, insistant pour un engagement plus important, dénonçant notre inaction... Quelle ne fut pas ma surprise lorsqu’un des délégués, un militant de longue date, nous raconte les larmes aux yeux, que partout où il va en Colombie, rencontrant des leaders menacés et des organisations de défense de droits humains, on lui vante les mérites du travail de l’ambassade dans le pays. Le trémolo dans la voix, il nous dit solennellement à quel point il est fier d’être Canadien. J’étais soudainement très émue moi aussi. Non seulement les efforts de l’Ambassadeur et de son équipe étaient reconnus en Colombie mais ils contribuaient à la fierté de citoyens canadiens. J’étais fière de mon pays et j’avais d’autant plus hâte de me lancer à fond dans ma grande aventure colombienne.

Ici, le Canada est un acteur de premier plan, particulièrement au niveau de la défense des droits humains et de l›appui à la société civile.

Notre visite commençait par une rencontre avec la communauté de San Josécito, probablement celle ayant reçu le plus de support et d’attention de la communauté internationale. C’est ici que se sont regroupés les habitants de San José de Apartado qui n’acceptaient pas l’arrivée de la police dans leur communauté de paix créée en 1997, suite au déplacement massif provoqué par le premier massacre commis par des paramilitaires dans leur communauté.

Au fil des années, 178 personnes de cette communauté auraient été tuées, ce qui représente 20 % de leur population, toujours sous la menace des paramilitaires. Des ordres de capture ont été lancés contre plusieurs habitants et le Président Uribe a affirmé en mars 2005 que certains de leurs leaders étaient en relation avec la guérilla. Comment encourager la reprise d’un dialogue lorsque les interlocuteurs prennent des positions extrêmes? Comment arriver à un accord ou à un consensus alors que les perceptions sont si différentes? C’est un peu comme ça la Colombie. Il semble y avoir ici une dichotomie de bien et de mal, de noir et de blanc... On se demande parfois où sont les nuances, où sont passées toutes les couleurs. Pourtant, paradoxalement, je n’ai jamais vu autant d’arc-en-ciel qu’ici. J’en ai compté neuf en à peine un mois. C’est qu’il pleut souvent malgré le soleil... au sens propre comme au figuré.

Un autre défi auquel la Colombie est confrontée est la démobilisation et la réintégration des groupes paramilitaires. Le Bloque Élmer Cárdenas, présent dans la région que nous avons visitée, n’était pas encore démobilisé au moment de notre visite. Bien qu’il le soit aujourd’hui formellement, il exerce toujours un contrôle important. Par exemple, les paramilitaires vont jusqu’à bloquer le passage de la Defensoría (organisme de contrôle de l’État en matière de droits humains) pour se rendre aux communautés, en lui déniant l’accès à la plateforme permettant de passer d’une rive à l’autre du fleuve. Le chef du Bloque, surnommé l’Allemand à cause de sa stature imposante, logeait justement dans un hôtel voisin du nôtre le soir de notre arrivée à Apartado et se promenait tranquillement, avec ses escortes, dans la ville. Simple hasard? Curiosité de voir ces étrangers qui s’intéressent à cette région souvent oubliée? Tentative d’intimidation? Qui sait. Et puis, comment avait-il été mis au courant de notre présence? Mystère. Tous semblaient pourtant savoir qui nous étions.

Pour se rendre dans une communauté du Cacarica, enfoncée dans le littoral du fleuve Atrato, il a fallu voyager en bateaux, des « pangas » comme on les appelle ici.

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Des enfants du Cacarica tentent de suivre la délégation internationale qui quitte leur communauté en bateau (Photo: Stas Pasionek)

La beauté des paysages et la tranquillité des lieux contrastaient avec les histoires de massacres que nous avions entendues ces derniers jours. Comme la chaleur et l’hospitalité du peuple colombien contrastent avec la froideur du conflit. Arrivés à destination, un cortège pêle-mêle d’enfants nous attendait et rigolait à la vue de ces étrangers qui semblaient si mal à l’aise les deux pieds dans la boue avec leurs bottes de caoutchouc. Eux, nu-pieds, nous devançaient sans problème et sans tomber!

Un des moments les plus marquants du voyage fut probablement cette rencontre que nous avons faite dans les rues de RioSucio. À RioSucio, le fleuve n’a pas seulement l’air sale, il déborde. Les rues deviennent les bras du fleuve et la boue est omniprésente; alors on construit des échafaudages pour circuler d’une bâtisse à l’autre et chacun, devenant équilibriste, vaque à ses occupations. Un soir, après le souper, quelques-uns d’entre nous avions décidé de nous promener. Il faisait très noir et les rues n’étaient pas éclairées. La présence de paramilitaires dans la ville se faisait sentir et je commençais à me demander si cette balade était réellement une bonne idée. Soudain, un éclat de rire plus fort que les retransmissions du match de soccer du Mondial raisonnant dans les petits commerces capta mon attention. Sur le bord de la rue, deux petits enfants, flambant nus, se lançaient corps et âmes dans une grosse marre de boue, dans un fou-rire contagieux. À la seule vue de ces deux petits corps gluants, à peine perceptibles dans la noirceur à part leurs dents blanches qui reflétaient les rayons de la lune, nous nous mirent tous à rire. Encouragés, par notre réaction, ils se lancèrent de plus belle et on eut droit à un spectacle burlesque sans pareil. J’avais les larmes aux yeux tellement la scène était loufoque et mon rire n’était plus contrôlable. En quelques instants, et tout à fait innocemment, ces enfants avaient réussi à nous faire oublier les atrocités racontées au cours de la journée. J’aurais moi aussi aimé pouvoir leur rendre quelque chose d’aussi précieux que ce moment le restera pour moi.

Le lendemain, les visites continuaient. Dans la majorité des communautés rencontrées, il est clair que la problématique dominante n’est pas idéologique mais reliée à la question des terres. Certains paysans ont dû vendre les leurs dans les années 1990 sous la pression des paramilitaires mais la majorité a été déplacée de force. Plusieurs témoignages de paysans nous ont fait état de falsification de documents de vente, ainsi que d’expulsions ou d’assassinats dans le but de s’approprier les terres. Les plantations industrielles, notamment les palmeraies, ont été sans merci pour le territoire, mettant en péril la biodiversité, envahissant et détruisant jusqu’au cimetière des communautés afro-colombiennes. Aujourd’hui, les paysans tentent donc de se rapproprier ces terres qu’ils disent leurs, bien souvent au péril de leurs vies. Certains ont commencé à défier l’entreprise palmicultrice et à couper des palmiers. Je me surprends souvent à me demander à quel moment ils couperont le palmier de trop...

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Navigation difficile : une embarcation de l’ONU prise dans le Delta du fleuve Atrato, dans le Golfe d’Uraba (Photo: Stas Pasionek)

En matière de développement régional, les conceptions du gouvernement et des communautés diffèrent encore. Les plans de l’autoroute panaméricaine pour relier l’Amérique centrale à l’Amérique du Sud via ce territoire clé, n’ont pas fini de créer des remous. Les paysans et les communautés autochtones se préoccupent du sort de leurs terres et veulent préserver le Parc National de Los Katíos. Ils ont même barré la route en mai dernier lors d’un sommet organisé pour réclamer leurs droits et confronter les autorités. Résultat : affrontements violents et un mort.

De retour à Bogota, ma compréhension de la situation est maintenant différente. Je me rends compte de l’importance des visites de terrain; elles permettent de se faire une idée propre de la situation et de ne pas dépendre des informations communiquées par les ONG et le gouvernement, qui sont souvent contradictoires. La mission nous a permis de se familiariser avec les problématiques de la région et de rencontrer les communautés qui y vivent. Nous avons été confrontés à la complexité des enjeux et des positions bien campées des différents interlocuteurs qui ne semblent pas encore prêts à entamer un dialogue efficace.

Aujourd’hui, quand je reçois à Bogota des représentants de communautés et d’ONG, ou lors de rencontres avec les représentants du gouvernement, mon discours a beaucoup plus de crédibilité car j’ai été témoin, ne serait-ce que pour un court moment, de la réalité dans le Chocó. Même dans la rue, les gens s’étonnent qu’une étrangère se soit aventurée dans cette contrée où très peu de citadins de Bogota ont mis les pieds. Les retombées de la mission se font encore sentir, et le leadership de l’ambassade canadienne dans la communauté diplomatique de Bogota ne s’en trouve que renforcé. Cette visite a servi à exprimer l’engagement de notre politique étrangère sur le terrain et de notre vigilance à l’égard des obligations internationales de la Colombie. Le Canada a définitivement un rôle important à jouer ici. Et moi, j’ai tellement appris. Mon expérience au Chocó aura certainement un impact sur ma jeune carrière de diplomate, même de retour à Ottawa. Franchement, je crois que je ne pouvais pas mieux tomber pour une première affectation, même temporaire, à l’étranger.

Aujourd’hui... mon discours
a beaucoup plus de crédibilité car j’ai été témoin...
de la réalité dans le Chocó.

Joya Donnelly a joint le service extérieur en janvier 2006. Après trois mois au Ministère, elle a obtenu une affectation temporaire à Bogota, en Colombie. Stas Pasionek, vétéran de l’Armée canadienne, a servi en mission à Bogota (Colombie).

En marchant à Boston
avec Tocqueville
(après le 11 septembre)

par Bruno Hamel

Aura-t-il fallu le 11 septembre pour nous rappeler que les États-Unis ne sont pas ceux que l’on croit? Ceci dit, il y a bien peu de choses plus risquées que de prétendre écrire au sujet de ce qui nous semble (si) familier. Et pourtant. Alors que nombreux sont ceux et celles qui s’interrogent sur le devenir de nos relations avec les États-Unis, tant comme voisin que comme membre de la communauté internationale, j’ai pensé que de partager mes rêveries d’un samedi après-midi à Boston pourrait sinon éclairer cette réflexion sur le développement de nos relations avec les États-Unis, au moins divertir et intéresser le lecteur de bout de papier.

La complexité et la multiplicité des transformations induites à la suite des attaques terroristes du 11 septembre soulèvent évidemment le besoin de renouer avec une certaine essence des États-Unis. En d’autres termes, au-delà du « rien-ne-sera-plus-jamais-pareil », encore faut-il savoir qu’est-ce qui a changé et par rapport à quoi. Ce retour sur une certaine Amérique originelle n’est pas qu’un impératif logique. Ce retour même est rendu nécessaire par une certaine mouvance politique, dont l’influence ne se dément guère à Washington, et qui se proclame ouvertement néo-conservatrice, peu importe la contradiction dans les termes. Ainsi, avant de parler de retour ou de conservation de l’Amérique, il importe de se rappeler de quelle Amérique parle-t-on.

Autant pour les fins de la justesse de l’analyse que pour les plaisirs de l’ironie de s’en remettre en 2003 à un aristocrate français pour mieux découvrir les États-Unis, pourquoi ne pas retourner sur les traces de Tocqueville à Boston afin de renouer avec cette Amérique fondatrice?

Dire que, aux yeux de Tocqueville, l’essence de l’Amérique tient beaucoup dans cette Nouvelle-Angleterre que forgèrent les Puritains tient presque du truisme. (Tocqueville [1992], De la démocratie en Amérique [tome 1], Paris, Gallimard [Édition de La Pléiade] : 34. « C’est dans les colonies anglaises du Nord, plus connues sous le nom d’États de la Nouvelle-Angleterre, que se sont combinées les deux ou trois idées principales qui aujourd’hui forment les bases de la théorie sociale des États-Unis. ») Par ailleurs, le fait que la lecture de Tocqueville, malgré son enthousiasme évident pour la nouvelle république qui s’érigeait sous ses yeux, continue aujourd’hui encore de rassembler autant d’analystes de la société américaine est sans doute une des meilleures cautions intellectuelles qui puisse se trouver.

Peut-on résumer cette pensée de Tocqueville? À plusieurs égards, il me semble juste que de prétendre ramener son analyse de l’Amérique comme à une société qui aurait réconcilié, surtout à l’esprit d’un Européen, ce qui pourrait très bien sembler être l’irréconciliable : l’esprit de liberté et l’esprit de religion.

J’en ai déjà dit assez pour mettre en son vrai jour le caractère de la civilisation anglo-américaine. Elle est le produit (et ce point de départ doit sans cesse être présent à la pensée) de deux éléments parfaitement distincts, qui ailleurs se sont fait souvent la guerre, mais qu’on est parvenu, en Amérique, à incorporer en quelque sorte l’un dans l’autre, et à les combiner merveilleusement. Je veux parler de l’esprit de religion et de l’esprit de liberté. Les fondateurs de la Nouvelle-Angleterre étaient tout à la fois d’ardents sectaires et des novateurs exaltés. Retenus dans les liens les plus étroits de certaines croyances religieuses, ils étaient libres de tous préjugés politiques. De là deux tendances diverses, mais non contraires, dont il est facile de retrouver partout la trace, dans les mœurs comme dans les lois. (Tocqueville (1992), op.cit. : 47.)

On est immédiatement frappé par la justesse et l’actualité d’une telle analyse. Comprendre les États-Unis, c’est beaucoup comprendre ce rapport complexe entre l’esprit religieux et le libéralisme, au sens profond du terme. Il m’a souvent semblé que ceux qui pointent trop facilement à l’hypocrisie des différentes mœurs américaines ont occulté ce rapport fondamental dans l’essence américaine. À cet égard, on ne dira jamais assez comment est grande la tentation de faire dans l’anachronisme et de rejeter sur les analyses du passé l’avantage que nous confèrent l’actualité et les siècles qui se sont écoulés.

Je ferme les yeux, je repense à Tocqueville et je serre mon parapluie un peu plus fort.

« Deux tendances diverses, mais non contraires »... Peut-on en être si sûr? Il m›arrive parfois de penser l›actualité américaine comme un récit de ces tentatives de renouer avec un esprit religieux qui n›existe plus sinon comme une sorte de réminiscence du passé. Mais il reste que les tiraillements entre ces deux pôles formidables de l›âme américaine restent les meilleurs accès à la compréhension de ce qui définit l›Amérique, actuelle ou originelle. Tocqueville avait bien raison de croire que la liberté et la religion ne sont pas nécessairement contraires. Mais cette complémentarité entre les deux, ce que nous connaissons beaucoup comme la « liberté religieuse », et ce qui a longtemps fondé les États-Unis, commande un immense respect de l›Autre, tant dans ses croyances que dans ses façons d›être, de vivre. Ainsi, Tocqueville nous rappellerait sans doute non seulement les dangers ou la futilité d›imposer à autrui cet esprit de religion, voire même celui de liberté, mais aussi qu›un tel projet risquerait même de miner l›essence fondamentale et constitutive de l›âme américaine.

Nous continuons de marcher en silence dans Boston près du tombeau de Benjamin Franklin. J’aurais voulu demander à Tocqueville si avec les années on se sentait floué. Son regard serait-il le même sur cette Amérique de l’après-11 septembre? Que reste-t-il de cette Amérique qu’une multitude assimile à la Babylone des temps modernes, que reste-t-il de cet esprit de religion qu’il croyait si fondateur? Quelle serait la moue de ces Puritains dans l’Amérique de tous les Enron, WorldCom et autres Arthur Andersen? Et que reste-t-il de cet esprit de liberté dans cette nouvelle Amérique que l’on veut si sécuritaire?

J’aurais aimé m’attabler avec Tocqueville à Boston et lire avec lui Daniel Bell : « Bien que l’on continuât à utiliser le langage de la morale protestante, la culture américaine dans les années cinquante est devenue fondamentalement hédoniste, elle s’intéressait surtout aux activités ludiques, aux amusements, au plaisir qu’elle rendit même obligatoires — fait typiquement américain (...) Cet abandon du puritanisme et de la morale protestante reste sans morale ni éthique transcendante. Il témoigne non seulement de la rupture entre les normes de la culture et celles de la structure sociale, mais aussi de l’extraordinaire contradiction inhérente à cette structure sociale. » (Daniel Bell (1979), Les contradictions culturelles du capitalisme, Paris, PUF : 80-81.)

Mon cousin français aurait probablement été médusé par ces guerres nouvelles qui ne visent plus à défendre des valeurs, puisqu’elles auraient été perdues, ni ne cherchent la justice, puisqu’il n’y aurait plus de morale. Non, ces guerres du XXIe siècle prétendent plutôt, et à défaut de mieux, défendre et protéger un « style de vie ». Que nous reste-t-il de ces étendards avec lesquels le XXe siècle a été construit? Plusieurs pans de nos relations à l’Amérique, ne serait-ce que de façon conjoncturelle, doivent ainsi être repensés à l’aune de ce retour, comme une résurgence, du religieux dans la politique américaine. L’avenir dira si ce retour n’aura été qu’une gymnastique électoraliste ou le dernier soubresaut d’une certaine droite américaine qui n’en finit plus de disparaître.

Au fond, le 11 septembre nous force tous à retourner en nous-mêmes afin de nous reconnaître, ce qui nous fonde comme citoyens et comme être humain, partie plus prenante que jamais à une communauté internationale de plus en plus serrée. Il est bien trop tôt pour dire si l’Amérique réussira ce retour sur elle-même. Cette quête de soi-même n’est jamais chose aisée, ni indolore. Alors que l’Amérique, et le Canada, du siècle passé ont été ceux d’une certaine candeur et d’une exubérance que l’Histoire et le terrible hasard des guerres ont largement rendu possibles, ce retour vers l’essence nous est cependant tellement familier au Canada. Nous en connaissons le prix et les inquiétudes. Ainsi, et au-delà des précieuses contributions au maintien de la paix et à la réinstauration de la sécurité publique dans les pays ravagés par la guerre, il est possible que la plus grande contribution que puisse apporter le Canada à cette communauté internationale empreinte de tensions croissantes soit précisément de partager cette expérience de tolérance et de construction politique dans le respect des diversités.

À plusieurs égards, il est donc vrai que le 11 septembre, tout en nous révélant la face la plus hideuse de la mondialisation, se pose comme un formidable défi à composer avec les insatisfactions des autres, leurs craintes, leurs déceptions et leur exclusion de la communauté internationale. L›ère de la mondialisation souriante est donc terminée. Voilà maintenant venir le moment de composer avec les inconvénients et les corollaires de la libéralisation du commerce et des capitaux entreprise il y a plusieurs décennies : la « gestion » des flux migratoires et le maintien de la sécurité nationale, la poursuite d›un développement durable et la redistribution de la richesse mondiale ne sont que quelques-uns des « enjeux » pour lesquels l’entêtement national est le gage le plus sûr de l’échec.

Plusieurs intellectuels qui foulent les mêmes trottoirs de Boston se plaisent maintenant à réactualiser Kant, à cause d’un certain libéralisme qu’il y trouverait, parce qu’il aurait, entre autres, chapeauté son ordre cosmopolite et universel d’une hégémonie unique. Par contre, ce que l’on tait souvent est que, pour Kant, cette hégémonie ne pourra émerger qu’à condition de faire montre de compassion dans la régulation des rapports entre les états, entre les peuples. Une hégémonie qui serait incapable de démontrer une telle compassion ne ferait que répéter l’Histoire et le destin des autres empires.

Plus que jamais auparavant, le 11 septembre nous a donc rappelé l’importance de la compassion et de (re)découvrir aussi les autres. À commencer par nos amis blessés. Cela est une consolation bien dérisoire que de savoir que faillir à ce devoir primordial, qui est celui de notre temps, équivaudrait à perpétuer cette logique éternelle de l’Histoire. Mais cette logique est aussi aveugle parce qu’elle est celle de la guerre.

J’aurais tellement aimé que Tocqueville m’accompagne dans ce Boston gris de pluie. Mais ses silences m’ont éclairé dans cette Amérique au code orange.

L’auteur s’est joint au Ministère en 1997 et a été Vice-consul à Milan (Italie) de 1998 à 2001. Bruno Hamel a été Consul et Délégué commercial à Boston depuis septembre 2001.

Compagnons de route :
FS Pet Adoption Stories [2]

par Anne-Marie Leclerc

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Fisher and Hunter

Hunter and Fisher from Washington

by Amanda McNaughton

Don and I went to Washington, DC, on our first posting in 1999. He had grown up with pets, but the most our own family had owned were a pair of gerbils. By June of 2000, we had settled into our apartment, and there was the option to have pets, so we started exploring local availability. I found a group named Paw Rescue in Maryland that had just taken in a pair of cats with a litter of seven kittens, newly available for adoption. Hunter, the tabby, looked just like the cat Don had left with his parents in Winnipeg to join me as I started as a Trade Commissioner in Ottawa, while Fisher was just the sort of dainty lady tuxedo that I had always thought was the epitome of “cat.”

Either coincidence or a general recognition of the positive effect cats have on dealing with stress led to all seven kittens being adopted by diplomatic families from various embassies, leading them to be named the “International Litter.”

Fisher passed at the age of thirteen, but Hunter is still with us after two boys, four moves, and fifteen years – both having been far more pampered than many FS.

Mokey from Hsinchu County

by Toby Schwartz

Sometimes in life, timing is everything. My husband and I grew up with dogs and were planning on getting a dog when the time was right. We had decided against getting a dog in Taiwan, despite the fact that there were adorable abandoned puppies to be found around almost every corner. We always came up with the excuse that we were too busy with full-time jobs to give a pooch the care it deserved. When we found Mokey, though, it seemed as though fate had somehow intervened.

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Toby, Mokey and Erin

We were on a camping trip in the forested mountains of Hsinchu County, Taiwan. When we arrived after a gorgeous drive through the Taiwanese wilderness and were just about to park the car, we noticed what seemed like a rather random box discarded on the roadside. When we got closer, up popped a furry black nose, and there she was. The puppy had rather obviously been discarded there, perhaps as the owners had hoped that the men paving the road nearby would take her home. She was tiny, no more than 8 or 9 weeks old, and would likely not have made it if left there for too long. I scooped her up and took her down the riverbank with us for a swim. When we came back up to the car about an hour later, the box had been completely flattened with a massive tire track imprinted on it. One of the paving vehicles had run it over. Timing, indeed.

We weren’t initially planning to keep her, but the vet back in Taipei convinced us that Mokey wouldn’t stand much of a chance if we brought her to a shelter. That was all we needed to hear to tip us over the fence we’d been sitting on, and she was ours. She has brought much joy, warmth and cuddles to our family, and is the best possible souvenir of Taiwan – a place we came to love during our posting.

What’s the lesson learned from finding Mokey? First, timing can often make all of the difference. Second, sometimes it’s easiest to come up with excuses to not do something, but it’s the decisions to go ahead and do something – while invariably harder to make – that can be the most rewarding.

Après l’obtention d’une maîtrise en études théâtrales de Trinity College Dublin, Anne-Marie Leclerc a rejoint les rangs du service extérieur en tant que déléguée commerciale en 2006. Elle a eu le plaisir de servir brièvement à l’Ambassade du Canada au Brésil ainsi que pendant trois ans à Paris.

Work of a Canadian diplomatic spouse
The Canadian Music in the Middle of the World

by Denise Simard-Lapointe

But what if a wife of a Canadian ambassador could indeed match her stay in another country with her husband, activity-wise?

Her responsibility and her duty are certainly to represent, to the best of her capacity, her country, ideally by turning to good account its talents and capacities with the local population, whether as a nurse, a secretary, a professor, a scientist, or a musician.

When I arrived in Ecuador in 2006, I discovered a rich musical tradition shaped over five centuries by the fusion of Hispanic and Indigenous cultures. This cultural blend, known as “metissage,” is visible in daily life, from the people to their food, architecture, and arts. For much of history, this reality was rejected by the dominant class, but over time, it has become a significant source of national pride and identity. Ecuador, once the heart of the Inca Empire, boasts a vibrant cultural tapestry.

Shortly after arriving, I was invited by various musical institutions to collaborate with them. I had no idea how large and rewarding this collaboration would become. I worked with the National SUCRE Theatre, the Brass Band of Ecuador, the Metropolitan Orchestra of the Province of Pichincha, as well as the Symphony Orchestras of Cuenca and Guayaquil.

A particularly remarkable discovery was the National Orchestra of Andean Instruments (OIA), founded 20 years earlier by Patricio Mantilla Ortega. This orchestra is modelled after a symphony orchestra but uses Andean instruments for each section—winds, strings, and percussion. No other orchestra like it exists in the Andean region. I became the first guest conductor of this extraordinary ensemble, which was composed entirely of men. The first time I took the podium with them, I was struck by their enthusiasm and dedication. Over time, I conducted many concerts with them, sharing the podium with their titular director, Patricio Mantilla Ortega, and producing programs that were very diversified in style and in performance.

In four years, I conducted 39 concerts with those six orchestras and four choirs in eight cities, performing in 16 venues. More than 25 of these concerts were broadcast on national television. The National SUCRE Theatre became my “home,” and I was fortunate to share the musical seasons with its other directors.

But where does Canada fit into all of this?

Throughout these 39 concerts, I had the privilege of introducing works by Canadian composers, thanks to a collaboration with Mireille Gagné, Director of the Canadian Music Centre (CMC) for Quebec, and her colleagues across Canada. My partnership with CMC dates back to my orchestral and choral activities in Paris from 1994 to 1998. This led us to broadcast for the first time in Latin America a wide range of remarkable masterpieces of Canadian composers from coast to coast.

One of the most memorable moments was conducting special concerts with the Symphony Orchestras of Guayaquil and Cuenca, titled “100 Years of Symphonic Music from Canada,” celebrating the centenary of Canadian composer Jean Coulthard’s birth. The orchestra’s performance of Coulthard’s Canadian Mosaic was particularly moving. Music critics noted that listening to the piece was like flying over Canada on the back of barnacles, a poetic description of the vastness and diversity of the country.

I aimed to complete this Canadian symphonic project with Jaya Opening by Steven Gellman. This contemporary work exemplifies the maturity of Canadian composers, evolving from the foundations laid by Guillaume Couture in the 19th century. Conducting Jaya Opening was a deeply satisfying experience, and I believe it will become part of the universal classical repertoire. The work was well-received by both musicians and audiences in Cuenca and Guayaquil, who praised its innovation.

In each concert, I sought to present a broad, representative image of Canada’s diverse musical landscape. In Cuenca, I introduced Anne Lauber’s Canadian Opening, a captivating sound painting of Canada’s immense diversity. The audience embraced it, recognizing the richness of Canada’s cultural and musical heritage.

Throughout my career, I have focused on training young musicians and conducting youth orchestras and choirs worldwide. I concentrated on the training of young people in a rigorous and disciplined way for the music. On this plan, I consider myself in the continuation of the work begun by Guillaume Couture in XIX century in Quebec. To conduct “Rêverie” of Couture has allowed me to touch a sensitive and common nerve to the early romanticism period of that time, characterized by similar values found in our two countries. Ecuadorians recognized themselves in this symphonic fresco of 1875, a magnificent image of the rising Impressionism.

One of the most unique projects I proposed was to combine Italian Baroque with South American music. In the autumn of 2007, I suggested that the OIA perform both Vivaldi’s Four Seasons and Piazzolla’s Four Seasons of Buenos Aires. This had never been done before with Andean instruments, and I called upon two Canadian violinists from my alma mater, the University of Ottawa—David Stewart and Paule Préfontaine. Despite their busy schedules, they agreed to join the project, performing in Ecuador after stops in Bergen, Norway, China, and Japan.

To interpret the eight seasons of Vivaldi and Piazzolla also has something very physical, even Olympic, for the musicians and for the musical directors as well. If its intensity invites the listener to a quiet reflection, its execution, on the other hand, empties you of energy as very few other works will do. Furthermore, our violinists had to adapt themselves to the reality of a performance at an altitude of more than 9,000 feet. The small week dedicated to the rehearsal was not excessive for the adaptation. And what to say about the sumptuous fusion of these luxurious sounds.

On December 14 and 15, 2007, the OIA performed the eight seasons at the National SUCRE Theatre. I conducted Vivaldi, while Patricio Mantilla Ortega conducted Piazzolla. The concerts created a powerful cultural bridge between Europe, South America, and Canada, blending classical and tango music with traditional Andean instruments. The audience responded enthusiastically, with standing ovations after each season.

Over my time in Ecuador, I was honoured to introduce numerous works by Canadian composers. One notable example was Four Whims on Canadian Folk Subjects by Robert Fleming, which I conducted with the Metropolitan Orchestra of Quito. I also conducted more than ten concerts with the Metropolitan Orchestra, showcasing Canadian masterpieces, including Calixa Lavallée’s Nuptial Rose, the composer of Canada’s national anthem. Lavallée’s visit to South America in the 19th century marked a pivotal moment in the exchange of musical ideas between Canada and Latin America.

In 2008, I initiated a project of international musical cooperation with the Faculty of Music at the University of Ottawa, helping the Brass Band of Ecuador, a private conservatory focused on brass music. Two Ecuadorian students, Estefania Campania and Cesar Lahuatte, received training from Daniel Gress, the Brass Director at the University of Ottawa. The students were highly praised for their musical abilities and maturity. They led a seminar on Latin American music, which fostered cultural exchange and contributed to the development of the Brass Band of Ecuador. - When the Brass Band of Ecuador appeared in concert at the famous Duke Ellington School in Washington, the teaching staff who attended the representation indeed wondered where this was able to produce such a phenomenal youth orchestra endowed with such striking self-assurance. The reaction was the same during their performance at the Juilliard School of Music in New York.

One of the most rewarding projects I undertook was preparing Quebec Mass by Canadian composer Pierick Houdy for the VIII International Festival of Sacred Music in 2009. Houdy’s Mass, written in the 1970s, incorporates unique Canadian instruments, including spoons. I worked for months to prepare and arrange the piece for the National Orchestra of Andean Instruments and two choirs. The performance, held in the National Theatre and two Jesuit churches, was especially intense in the Compania de Jesus church due to the stunning acoustics. The concert was later broadcast globally on CNN in the USA and Spain, introducing this beautiful work of cultural fusion to international audiences.

In conclusion, my time in Ecuador allowed me to bridge cultures through music, sharing Canadian works with Latin American audiences and strengthening ties between the two regions. Through collaborations with local orchestras, choirs, and musicians, I was able to showcase the diversity and richness of Canadian music. My experience in Ecuador remains a cherished chapter in my career, one that highlights the power of music to transcend borders and bring people together.

Denise Simard-Lapointe was educated in music at Laval University in piano and at the University of Ottawa in music pedagogy, orchestra and chorus conducting. She is married to Christian Lapointe, a retired Canadian ambassador with a 35-year diplomatic career.

The Ugly Canadians –
Sudan, 2000-03

by Nick Coghlan

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The author (L) and CFLI administrator Mohammed Osman (R) with villagers, getting ready for bed; on the road in Sudan; 2001

My instructions from Foreign Minister Lloyd Axworthy as I set off from Ottawa to establish Canada’s first diplomatic presence in Sudan in the summer of 2000 were unusual:

“Do nothing to improve bilateral relations. Make sure you’re never photographed with the President and avoid shaking hands with him.”

I was to have the nebulous title Head of Office – the officially accredited Ambassador to Sudan resided in Addis Ababa – and it would be up to me to recruit such local staff as I felt necessary. Things would be made easier in that, to get started, I was to be lent a suite within the British Embassy.

My brief, the Minister went on, was to “let HQ know how bad things really are in Sudan.”

The reason for Ottawa’s interest was that the operations in the country of a blue-chip Canadian oil company were perceived at home as enabling a dictatorial Islamist regime that was suppressing a long-running rebellion in its southern region. Most Western governments, but especially that of the US, were broadly sympathetic to the rebels, who had in the years following 9/11 cannily cast themselves not so much as separatists but as Christians fighting for democracy and freedom of religion.

[picture]

World Food Programme Hercules aircraft at Lokichokkio, Northern Kenya - the massive UN base from which relief was delivered into war zones for much of the Sudanese civil war; 2001. At this time, "Loki" was the busiest airfield in Africa.

As the Minister had suspected, I soon found out that things were indeed quite bad in Sudan.

My first report to HQ was a long litany of human rights and war crimes that ranged from arbitrary detention and execution to helicopter gunship attacks and indiscriminate high-level bombing of southern villages. About a month after I had dispatched it, the same list came back to me almost verbatim, but with the opening instruction: “Please raise the following issues at the highest possible level, express extreme concern and demand explanations.” This became a ritual that HQ and I would repeat every few weeks.

Once every six months, the Ethiopia-based Canadian Ambassador to Sudan would descend from his highland fastness to the desert, and I would shepherd him around to high-level meetings in Khartoum for a couple of days. The first such encounter set the tone and dashed my hopes of some modest relief from the ordeals I had found myself now exposed to.

After some pleasantries with the urbane Foreign Minister Mustafa Osman, my boss picked up a beautiful coffee-table book of Sudanese antiquities – that the Minister had just gifted him – and, flicking through its pages with feigned interest, said:

“My colleague Mr Coghlan now has a few more items he’d like to raise with you, if you don’t mind.”

Back to the executions, the amputations, the manipulation of aid.

You might think that my efforts would at least win me some favour with the small, brave contingent of Canadians then involved in delivering humanitarian relief in Sudan.

No such luck.

Ahead of my first Canada Day in Khartoum, in line with strictures from Ottawa about how the economy was the order of the day, I reacted with enthusiasm when the Chief Operating Officer of the Canadian oil company in question offered to cover the entire costs for a lavish party in my garden, including a DJ.

“You gotta be kidding,” was the reaction of my good friend Marv, Country Director of the Canadian Fellowship for African Relief. “None of us can possibly come if those guys are sponsoring it, or even if they’re there at all…”

Marv was always gracious with me, even so. Within a few days of my arrival in Khartoum, I’d helped him avoid expulsion from the country by suggesting he refuse to leave until and unless the Government of Sudan supplied him with an air ticket. Predictably, this bought him several months’ respite.

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Meeting over lunch, along with Canada Fund (CFLI) administrator Mohammed Osman, with villagers in Sudan; 2001

But when I visited rebel-held areas in what was then called southern Sudan (now the independent Republic of South Sudan), fellow Canadians were not so friendly.

The massive United Nations-run facility at Lokichokio, on Kenyan territory within a kilometer or two of Sudanese territory, was then the base for the largest humanitarian relief operation ever undertaken, known as Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS). Every morning, in two waves, white-painted Hercules C-130s would roar overhead, carrying supplies to be air-dropped into the conflict zone. Smaller Cessna Caravans and (Canadian-built) De Havilland Dash 7s, Otters and Buffaloes buzzed in and out all day with passengers and more easily perishable supplies. All these flights were UN-sanctioned and were the fruit of never-ending access negotiations on which I and the rest of the Western diplomatic corps in Khartoum spent much of our time. The unpalatable but necessary price for each drop into rebel-held territory was invariably one or more into an area controlled by government-loyal troops.

There were also a lot of non-sanctioned aircraft based in Loki. These were owned and operated by humanitarian Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) that refused to countenance the strictures of the UN and/or – it was sometimes alleged – even transported rebel personnel and weapons. Their pilots were often flamboyant veterans of other wars, notably in Angola, and would prop up the bar at the camp with lurid stories of dodging MiGs over the Nuba Mountains and of hairy, unauthorized night landings at unlit strips.

The most famous of the non-OLS pilots was the glamorous Canadian blonde Heather Stewart, known in admiration as “All Weather Heather.” She was warm enough when I introduced myself, but rapidly cooled as soon as I said where I was based. Others were less polite. Several people got up and walked away from me in the cafeteria, one muttering, “How can you sleep at night?”

It was all on account of That Canadian Company. Even within the UN system at Loki, it was the same:

“Yeah, of course there are dozens of Canadian aircrew and staffers here,” my host admitted when I pressed him. “And even more in the NGO community. But they don’t want to meet with you. They don’t want it to be known they’re Canadian, you see. They usually say they’re from the States. Some even wear American pins.”

Eventually, the rebel bureaucracy delivered the permits I needed, and I flew in a UN light aircraft to Yambio, in territory held by the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA). I was the only passenger to get off here that day, and it was with a sense of both nervousness and excitement as I waved the pilot goodbye and watched him rev his engine for take-off.

I looked over to what was evidently my reception committee a hundred meters away at the end of the red dirt runway.

My pace faltered as I saw it was all men, all about 2m tall, all in camouflage fatigues, and all carrying heavy weapons. I held out my hand tentatively, then dropped it as they just looked back in silence.

Then one, who was languidly chewing a toothpick, removed it to look down at me and say:

“So you’re the guy whose company is killing all our people, huh?”

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A (Canadian-built) De Havilland Twin Otter, under charter to the UN, delivering relief into rebel-held Southern Sudan (now South Sudan), 2002.

As I floundered to come up with a reply, I could hear the drone of the little white Cessna behind me as it accelerated into the air. I feared it might be a long three days in Yambio.

The Canadian Company, facing shareholder pressure at home and a lawsuit in New York, sold up and quit Sudan shortly before my posting concluded.

Around the time of the sale, the time came for one of my regular calls upon Minister Mustafa, with the latest iteration of my complaints list in hand. We exchanged a few pleasantries, I referenced the Company and its impending departure, and just as I was preparing to get down to business, he stood up and held out his hand in goodbye:

“Thank you for coming in, Mr Coghlan. It’s been a pleasure knowing you. But now that your compatriots are leaving us, I don’t think we have anything to discuss, do we? I regret I shall not be available to your Ambassador when he next calls. But please pass on my best regards to him, won’t you?”

Objectively speaking, the further cooling of our already chilly relations with Khartoum was not to be regretted. This was a criminal regime. Its head – with whom I successfully avoided direct contact for the full three years of my posting – was in due course indicted for genocide by the International Criminal Court. And the Company’s withdrawal from Sudan made for much more relaxed visits on my part to southern Sudan. Many years later, when I served as the first resident Canadian Ambassador to the new country, some of the old warlords who had given me such a hard time even joshed, “So when is the Canadian company coming back?”

Meanwhile, back in Khartoum, those NGO types stopped shunning me too.

But I have to say I was a little disappointed that even now, none of them offered to help pay for our national celebrations, let alone supply a DJ. All of the three first Canada Days ever held in Sudan were at least as austere as the accountants at the Pearson Building could have possibly hoped.

Nick Coghlan is a one-time editor of bout de papier (the magazine of the Canadian Foreign Service) and was twice PAFSO’s Foreign Service Officer of the Year. He and his wife Jenny, were awarded the Meritorious Service Cross (MSC) for their role in evacuating Canadians from Juba when civil war broke out in South Sudan in 2013.

The Ghosts of Afghanistan

by Pam Isfeld, President

PAFSO, 2009 - 2011 and 2019 - present

SOUTHERN AFGHANS CALL IT “The American War”. In July, it ended not with a bang but with a whimper, when the Taliban took Kandahar and the district of Panjwayi, where Canadian troops had fought so hard in 2006 and afterward. On August 15, the insurgents arrived in Kabul and entered the Presidential Palace unchallenged, a full two weeks before the planned US withdrawal.

By the time Canada closed our Embassy and evacuated our diplomats, along with Locally-Engaged Staff and their families, Afghanistan had long been out of fashion in Ottawa. Many of us who served there, especially in the early days, learned not to talk too much about it unless we wanted to see colleagues’ eyes glaze over, or worse, have our experience discounted by those who knew better after the fact.

The chaotic final weeks of the war in Afghanistan prompted old friends – Foreign Service Officers, current and former soldiers, interpreters, humanitarian workers and journalists – to reconnect. Some wanted help getting Afghan contacts out of danger, and others wanted to talk to someone to help make sense of what had happened and what it meant. Many were haunted by questions about how “we” had “lost” Afghanistan, and others wondered whether we should ever have hoped to “have” it in the first place.

Many of us were surprised to find how much we still cared, and it’s telling that when I put out a call for friends and contacts to help me with this article, many came forward but did not want to speak for attribution. Still, they were eager to talk about why they went to Afghanistan, whether they had succeeded in their goals, and whether they would do it again.

In August 2003, I found myself with Canadian and German soldiers at a former Soviet airbase in Uzbekistan. The night air was surprisingly cold, and we were too excited to sleep anyway, so we huddled around the fire pit. I had just come from Sarajevo, Bosnia i Hercegovina, where I worked for High Representative Paddy Ashdown, and most of the Canadians had also spent time as peacekeepers in Bosnia.

For a student of Russian and Soviet politics, joining a NATO mission to support a fledgling democratic government in Afghanistan was almost as daunting as it was exhilarating. But, as we boarded the military flight to my new assignment as Political Advisor to the NATO-led International Security and Assistance Force (ISAF) in Kabul, I felt confident in the experience of my military colleagues. Afghanistan would be a challenge, but, as one Canadian officer said, “We thought we were ready for it. Even our most junior captain had three missions under his belt. We were some of the most experienced peacekeepers in the world.”

The pilot invited me to sit in one of the few spots behind the cockpit, giving me a full view of the beautiful terrain below. As the plane navigated between the jagged mountain peaks, I saw a shepherd and his hardy mountain sheep gazing down from above. He smiled and waved at us with what I thought was amusement but, in retrospect, might also have been pity.

When my eyes met that enigmatic gaze, Afghanistan ceased to be an abstraction for me. The mission became intensely personal, as it would to the many Canadians who served over the 20 years of our engagement there. It was that sense of commitment that made many of us, including me, volunteer to return multiple times, even after the US shifted the bulk of its resources and attention to Iraq in 2004.

I returned in 2006 as the Political Advisor to the Commander of Operation Enduring Freedom/NATO’s Regional Command South in Kandahar. At that time, the prevailing wisdom held that it was just a matter of time before we “crushed the insurgency” with a combination of force and political persuasion so democracy could flourish. Canada’s strategy prioritized engagement with the local population through the Provincial Reconstruction Team. My work within the military chain of command involved advising the Commander on the effects of the political environment on military operations and vice versa, including how to support the provincial governors in extending central government authority. A typical day could involve anything from giving input on targets to negotiating with village elders on compensation for civilian casualties in an airstrike to organizing a regional conference. Our mission was called Task Force AEGIS, for the shield carried by Athena and Zeus in Greek mythology.

None of it was as easy as we or our allies had hoped. In Kandahar alone, we faced a complicated web of tribal politics, opium interests, centuries-old conflicts within the local population, regional interference and animosity – some of it justified – towards the central authorities in Kabul. Within a couple of years, Canada had well over 3,000 soldiers and 100 civilians at Kandahar Airfield (KAF) and the Provincial Reconstruction Team struggling to secure the south. The war was urgent and intense, and the most exciting story out there, dominating the 24-hour news stations and the front pages of national newspapers.

For a decade, Canada’s foreign policy revolved around the mission and what it meant to our global alliances and relationships. Although we spent less time and effort understanding Afghanistan itself, our commitment to the cause cost over $3.6 billion and 165 Canadian lives. One of those lost was career diplomat and former PAFSO member Glyn Berry.

The toll on the Afghan side was even more devastating. Within five years, the Taliban killed four of my six governors and injured a fifth in a brutal IED attack. Even after Canada ended the combat mission in 2014, our Embassy in Kabul remained one of the largest in our diplomatic network, and Afghanistan was our largest bilateral aid recipient, but that did little to stem the suffering of the Afghan people. According to the Costs of War Project, Afghanistan and the border areas of Pakistan lost more than 200,000 people between 2001 and 2021, including nearly 90,000 military and police and 71,000 civilians.

Like me, most of those I talked to were not sorry they went, although the reasons for doing so varied depending on the mission’s timeline. For example, James Johnson, an FS02 with Global Affairs Canada, saw his 2010–11 deployment to Kandahar as an advisor to the Governor as “an opportunity to participate on the front lines of diplomacy within a whole-of-government, multinational environment” and “promote Canada and Canadian values.” He returned to Kabul in 2016–18 to do similar work with the Ministry of Interior, NATO and the International Police Coordination Board. Gwen Temmel grew to care deeply about Afghanistan and its people as a new FS in the geographic division. She saw her first posting to Kabul in 2019–21 as “a way of continuing that important work and building relationships.”

According to James, “success is hard to measure because it was always a cat-and-mouse game ... Afghan officials used key phrases, like “women’s rights,” to secure funding without seriously addressing the systemic challenges in their community. The goal was the cash. It was a feeding frenzy better suited to Shark Week ... When I walked the Palace grounds on the weekend and realized many of the provincial leaders were staying at their expensive properties in Dubai – not bad for relatively low-paid functionaries – it was clear long-term success was unlikely, and the house of cards would fall once the international community left.” In one of the defining moments of his time in Afghanistan, he describes preventing the theft of an expensive generator from the Governor’s Palace only to be banned from the premises, with little recourse.

I recall similar feelings of cognitive dissonance in Kandahar at an early briefing for one of our higher allied headquarters on a new series of patrols in a remote area of a neighbouring province. No foreign troops had entered that valley since the departure of the Soviets. Upon hearing that the units had encountered what seemed like hostile fire for reasons unknown, the principal angrily berated the briefer. “I don’t want to hear f---ing unknown,” he sneered. “If it’s drugs, you tell me it’s drugs. If it’s Taliban, you tell me it’s Taliban.” The message was clear: ambiguity and uncertainty were not welcome, even in this murkiest of operating environments.

At the next session, the briefer attributed the entire day’s worth of incidents to the “insurgency.” From then on, any problems in that area would be solved by military might alone, with no prospect for persuasion or the softer methods of an engagement strategy like Canada’s. Within weeks, American A-10s, designed for ripping the bellies out of Soviet tanks, had bombed dozens of mud-walled family compounds, killing civilians along with the alleged enemy. By the time I left Kandahar eight months later, that area was an unambiguous hotbed of Taliban activity. My colleagues and I feared that this represented a pattern across the theatre. After all, if you have a big enough hammer, you might be able to pound anything into a nail.

Most of us also have hopeful memories of our time there. One of mine involved a mob of curious little girls during a visit to Zabul with the Governor, who couldn’t believe a woman could participate as an equal with political or military leaders. A decade later, Gwen hosted an embassy event for female students where a panel of professional women and men spoke about their work in Dari and English. They included two women from the Canadian Military Police detachment in Kabul and the Locally-Engaged Staff of the Embassy. Gwen hopes “the current state of affairs won’t take away all their memories or the way they felt while participating in the programs we supported.”

As one military intelligence officer who served in 2006 and again in 2009 said: “It’s easy to be cynical and sad. We did some good things ... We built roads, schools and hospitals and improved infrastructure. We gave people hope when they had none. In the end, the US did defeat al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and got Osama bin Laden and Mullah Mansour. Everyone did as much as they could at the tactical level, at the human level.”

Although many of us wonder if our governments have absorbed the strategic lessons of Afghanistan, we know the mission changed us personally and shaped our approach to our work forever.

Although many of us wonder if our governments have absorbed the strategic lessons of Afghanistan, we know the mission changed us personally and shaped our approach to our work forever. After all, if those kinds of experiences don’t affect you, nothing will. And, in the words of a senior US diplomat who spent considerable time in the south, “institutions don’t learn lessons, but the people in them do. And we use them every single day.”

In August, I spent a couple of hours on the phone with another friend, who had worked as a security contractor in Kandahar before leaving to train as an emergency-room nurse. Without Afghanistan, she said, “I would never have been ready for the stress and trauma of the pandemic. The war gave me the mental equivalent of calluses on my hands, earned through hard work, and that’s made everything else seem easier by comparison.”

Gwen reports that her time in Kabul made her think about “how we represent the values we promote within our service at home and abroad.” She notes that “many of us dedicate our hearts and souls to serving in extreme circumstances. We get bruised by the stress, the crises, the bureaucratic boundaries and the discrepancies between the public awareness and realities of our work.”

In the end, she concludes that “it’s not easy, but it’s worth it, so long as we continue to take care of ourselves, our families, and one another.”

Pam Isfeld is a career Foreign Service Officer and the President of the Professional Association of Foreign Service Officers. In addition to her assignments in Kabul and Kandahar, she has also served in Moscow, Nairobi, Sarajevo and Warsaw. You can find more of Pam's writing at prisfeld.ca

Hi there! My name’s B
and I’m a Canadian

by ‘Binky’ Coghlan

Now I grew up on the wrong side of the tracks in Ottawa. I used to hang around late at night near the market, cruising for guys - I was barely out of my teens, but I’d already had three or four brats. Then one day I got picked up by this little old lady, says she’s from the Good Shepherd’s or some place like that. Next thing I know, I’m in a cage in a pet shop in the Rideau Centre, with a dumb sign around my neck saying “Help! I need a new home!”

So along comes this dame - the do-gooder type, you know. She pokes her finger in and tries to scratch my nose (God, I hate that!); she fills in these forms to adopt me and - get this - she’s turned down! Turns out that she’s married to some guy in the Foreign Service, and the folks here don’t think that’s the right kind of lifestyle for a cat like me, that what I need is ‘stability’ (whatever that means). What a joke!

She must have paid them off or something, ‘cos soon enough I’m being carted off to their place in New Edinburgh anyway. Everything’s fine for a couple of years. I get to eat President’s Choice No-Name and, when they decide they can trust me, they let me out onto Ivy Crescent. I get to know all the other guys and gals in the neighbourhood, even a few FS cats - Clive, Sam, Lucy, and that fat old tabby at Number 29. The only thing is, I don’t seem to get the same old urges I used to; Sam reckons it was probably something they did to me when they grabbed me and put me under, that day in the market.

Then one day I figure something’s up. There’s this big truck, carting away all their furniture. Then we go and spend a couple of days at Les Suites. I make a break for it, but the maid’s too fast for me; I gotta work on my escape plans. Next morning, first thing, they prise open my jaws - the indignity of it! They force a pill down me, and I’m in the cage again in the back of a Blue Line taxi. It’s out to the airport - I’m feeling pretty groggy by now - and into the hold of a plane. I’m a Frequently Flying Feline now, of course, but I can tell you that first flight to Newark was pretty darn scary - it’s dark, cold, noisy as hell, I was feeling sick from the dope, and there’s this poodle whimpering away in the corner, saying we’ve all gone to hell.

At Newark, they’re dumb enough to let me out for a moment. This time I make it halfway across the lounge, and I’m heading hell bent for leather for gate 16 when Mistress almost flattens me with a rugby tackle; back in the cage. This time it’s seven hours to Bogota. What a place! I’m still feeling dizzy from spending half an hour going around on the carousel and really feeling the altitude when this guy in military fatigues starts peering into my cage and pokes me in the ribs with an Uzi: what have I come to? And over in the corner I can see her paying off the vet, looking furtive - seems there’s some papers I need but haven’t got. ... Welcome to Latin America.

Mistress tells me it’s rough on the streets of Bogota, and she may be right: there’s a few things I see from our 19th-floor living room window that would make the fur on your back rise. And when Master had a reception one night and shut me up in the kitchen all night (said they couldn’t trust me in posh company - what nerve!), all the bodyguards for the ministers were in there, with their radios and their guns, drinking beer from Master’s fridge. They certainly had a few stories to tell! I peed on the shoes of one of them, and he almost put me down the garbage chute - they’ve got their own word in Spanish for this, it’s called ‘disappearing’ you.

So, three years in a luxury high-rise prison, and I figure I’m finally going to get back to Ottawa, with a few tales to tell Sam and Lucy. But no! He accepts another posting, this time in a place I’ve never even heard of (and where it turns out we don’t even have an Embassy, just some bogus thing called an Office; no status whatsoever). Ten hours on the plane, this time, but I get to travel in the cabin. We’re just getting settled, and it turns out the guy in the window seat is allergic to cats ... ha, ha! They move him on, but I notice that the woman in the aisle seat is dressed all in black - I’m moulting by now, and she’s not going to be too happy in a few minutes! Finally, the film comes on. This time I’m ready. I make my move. I flex my forelegs, and it’s out of the cat carrier and onto the cabin floor. I head for First Class - where else? - and I make it up to row 28 before they snag me. Foiled again.

Into a hotel in Frankfurt for the night, then it’s another eight hours on to this dump called Khartoum. I can’t believe how hot it is! We’re in the Hilton for a month, and I daren’t even leave the room - it’s like opening an oven door every time they go out. And they’re all Muslim here, spending half the time fasting; how can a cat be expected to not eat for 12 hours at a time! Finally, we move to the SQ. Sure, it’s spacious, and they do let me out (on a leash - they reckon the dogs round here are a bit rough), but I end up absolutely flat on my belly, panting.

The Foreign Service? Let me tell you. It may be a dog’s life - that’s what Mistress keeps saying, anyway - but sure as hell it’s not a cat’s life.

At the time of publication, Binky Coghlan, seven years old, a grey and white tabby, served as the sole Canadian cat in Khartoum, Sudan.

“One of the Luckiest Men in the World”: an interview with Louis Guay

As we were deciding on the articles to be included in Diplomatic Notes, we realized that while bout de papier had published an excerpt from former ambassador Robert Fowler’s book A Season in Hell: My 130 Days in the Sahara with Al Qaida, we had not heard the story from Louis Guay’s point of view. Louis, who describes himself as “Robin to Bob’s Batman” on that fateful mission, agreed in June 2026 to sit down with me for a wide-ranging interview that covered his foreign service philosophy as well as those months in Mali and their aftermath. Our conversation took place over two hours in both official languages, and I’ve done my best to include as many of his bons mots as possible, editing only for structure and flow.

Q: How did you end up joining Canada’s Foreign Service?

A: Quite by accident, really. I first saw an advertisement for the Foreign Service at the campus of the Université de Sherbrooke in June 1973. A colleague standing beside me said, “That’s for you.”

I passed the exam and interviews, and then nearly went in a different direction entirely. After finishing my business degree, I had planned to pursue graduate studies in sociology at the University of Western Ontario, so initially, I turned down the FS job. But after arriving in London and being greeted as if I was an infiltrator from the KGB, I changed my mind and asked External Affairs if they would take me after all. They said yes. I was 21, the third youngest of my group. I suppose I’m a very lucky man, since these circumstances shaped the rest of my life.

Q: Did you always want a diplomatic career?

A: Not exactly. Ce que je souhaitais vraiment, c’était me mettre au service de la collectivité. J’étais attiré par le service public, l’administration gouvernementale et l’idée de servir l’intérêt général, comme mon père avant moi. Le service diplomatique est devenu le moyen d’exprimer cette ambition. Je ne venais pas d’un milieu diplomatique traditionnel. Mon père était haut fonctionnaire au sein du gouvernement du Québec. Les écoles d’administration publique n’existaient pas encore.

Q: Comment s’est déroulé le début de votre carrière et qu’est-ce que cela vous a appris?

R: Mes affectations en début de carrière m’ont permis de me familiariser avec le fonctionnement du service diplomatique. J’ai commencé par travailler dans le domaine du développement, puis je suis passé aux ressources humaines et à la formation, où j’ai contribué à mettre en place la formation pratique destinée aux nouveaux agents. J’ai fait du consulaire (très bonne école) à la centrale comme à l’étranger. C’était une initiation à la diplomatie par l’expérience plutôt que par la théorie.

I learned that diplomacy is a craft, not a slogan. I have enormous respect for the importance of consular work, which is a foundation of our profession. Consular work is diplomacy at the service of the individual… Young diplomats must be exposed to difficult, real-world duties early in their careers. The kind of training that builds people who can eventually acquire a deep knowledge of a given region or issues to become effective strategic analysts, effective operators and Heads of Mission. Throughout my own career, I learned by doing, and sometimes by improvising.

I did a temporary duty in Mexico and learned Spanish there, expecting to be assigned somewhere in Latin America after that. Instead, the Department offered me an early posting to Greece, where I learned Greek and developed a lasting attachment to the country. I met my wife, a Swedish diplomat, there, and her presence was the best thing in my life until her passing in 2022.

Throughout my career, I maintained broad interests in Latin America and Africa, and thematically, on development and conflict management, corporate and broader social responsibility challenges and “durable development”, a concept I developed and taught, for many years at Saint Paul University. My career is a good demonstration of the benefits of being open-minded, flexible and adaptable, not just for the sake of your own career but for your personal happiness.

Q: Can you tell me what led up to the events in Niger in December 2008, and what happened that day?

A: In 2008, Robert Fowler was named as Ban Ki-moon’s special envoy for Niger, tasked with brokering a peace agreement between the government of Niger and Tuareg rebels. Due to my work on development issues and in Africa, the then-Department of Foreign Affairs asked me to be the Robin to his Batman.

On Sunday, December 14, 2008, as part of our third visit to the region, we travelled from Niamey to visit a Canadian-owned mine. I was familiar with the industry, as a result of a three-year leave without pay loan as a Country Manager for a Canadian mining company in the Dominican Republic. We thought that perhaps mining could be one of those levers that could bring peace and development to Niger and facilitate an agreement. We had no idea this trip would lead to what I call our “safari.”

On the way back from the mine, as we passed through an area called Karma—oui, K-A-R-M-A—we noticed a pickup truck coming up behind us, very fast. It pulled in front of us and forced our driver to stop. Three armed men got out and forced us into the back of another truck. One of them hit me with the butt of his AK-47. They drove us around, into the desert, for several hours and then stopped for tea and prayer. The leader asked if we knew who they were, and very naively, we said yes, you are Tuareg, and you think taking us will give you an advantage in dealings with the government.

“No,” he said. “We have nothing to do with those bandits. We’re AQIM.” [Note: AQIM is the acronym for “Al-Qaeda in the lands of the Islamic Maghreb.”]

I said to Bob that we were better off with people who prayed rather than people known as bandits. I was right, at least for this particular group, but there were two other leaders of AQIM operating in the same region at that time. We learnt subsequently that they treated their hostages very badly. Our captors were not always hostile in the way people might imagine, but some of them were more restrained than others. One had a sister living in Montreal. To me it always felt as though our destiny had already been negotiated. Hints in conversations, attitudes gave us hope.

Q: Bob’s book describes some pretty harrowing conditions in the camp. What practical things did you do to survive captivity?

A: We relied on mens sana in sano corpore routine, daily walks, positive conversations, and an optimistic attitude. Our days were structured, and oddly enough, there was a great deal to do. Thankfully, Bob and I agreed on most things, including the feeling that if we had to be held hostage, we were in each other’s best possible company. We spent a lot of time talking, evaluating people we knew, building shelters (we often move), repairing objects, creating shade, and brainstorming over how to resolve all of the world challenges as ways to pass the hours. Bob was in charge of keeping our sleeping area clean of thorns, a very labour-intensive function. We made a rule that certain upsetting subjects couldn’t be discussed after 3 pm so they wouldn’t interfere with our sleep.

After a while, we received some reading material from the embassy, and our kidnappers had some high school history books too. One of those books contained a picture of Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus. I have that print in our family cottage. I took this convergence as a wink from Destiny to let us know that we would survive.

Q: What happened when you came home? Did you have nightmares or long-term symptoms?

A: None! I had no PTSD. I once did experience a nightmare about a year and a half later. For a few days, after our return, I would wake up thinking I was back in the desert. I always felt great joy when I realized that it wasn’t true.

I believe that PTSD is something from which you suffer before the actual trauma. You are prone to it if you come from a wounded life. Since we both came from a balanced and loving environment, and returned to one, the trauma did not have any accumulating or triggering effect.

Furthermore, the trauma did not come from within, as I also had absolute trust in my wife to manage the situation well, and because I knew she would take charge and do what needed to be done, I knew that our children would also be okay. Incidentally, she was the real hero of this whole story.

Q: What do you think was behind the hostage-taking?

A: I don’t believe it was an act of random violence. The region was a complicated web of regional intelligence services, politicians fighting for survival and power, and jihadist groups operating under tacit understandings with all of them and even with each other. Neither the UN nor Canada really understood this when they sent us in there. Even after we returned, there was limited interest in debriefing us.

Ma théorie, que j’ai exposée aux autorités, est que des acteurs régionaux et algériens se sont livrés à une sorte de marchandage qui a permis aux groupes armés d’opérer, pendant des années, en toute impunité tant que certaines limites étaient respectées.

Notre kidnapping servait les intérêts de plusieurs groupes et individus (perpétuation au pouvoir des uns, réseaux de commerce criminels, des autres, pour d’autres encore, la protection des infrastructures vulnérables et des espaces stratégiques vitaux) dont les intérêts avaient besoin d’instabilité pour se développer et étaient menacés par l’intrusion de diplomates onusiens voués à la paix.

Q: Quels sont les leçons que le Canada devrait tirer de vos experiences?

R: L’ignorance stratégique comme tactique est dangereuse. Nous agissons avec trop peu de connaissances, trop peu de spécialistes et trop peu de respect pour l’expertise. Les puissances intermédiaires comme le Canada doivent pleinement assumer leurs responsabilités envers elles mêmes et envers leur communauté. Elle doive investir stratégiquement dans leur comprehension de ces régions complexes.

Le Canada doit constituer au sein du gouvernement un groupe d’experts capables de comprendre et faire passer des messages pertinents avec crédibilité sur la scène internationale. Si nous voulons obtenir des résultats et promouvoir la stabilité, nous avons besoin d’outils, de formation et d’une mémoire institutionnelle.

As our Prime Minister said recently, at Davos, we need to be able to not simply fight but to “fight right.” Canada is not a superpower, but that’s no justification for passivity. Precisely the contrary. We have a duty, an obligation to contribute to international stability, institution-building, and democratic support, and to maintain and support the expertise and infrastructure that allows us to do that. Too much is done today by underprepared people using shallow analysis.

Our foreign policy also needs a strong moral and ethical foundation, and that’s where, as a middle power, we will find support and credibility.

Q: As you look back on your career, what do you think today’s foreign service officers need to know?

A: You should fully take stock of the very special privilege of having been selected to be part of this critical and unique group of civil servants with a vivid tradition. Nothing short of excellence is required from you by the complex and challenging world in which we live.

Diplomacy should be learned through exposure, mentorship, sustained and focused training and real apprenticeship in difficult conditions. The profession can only function well if it promotes the level of skill, commitment and the permanent quest for excellence needed from its members and its institutions.

You should not be ashamed of the level of “commando” cum “special forces” mentality that such objective warrants. After all, what is an army without its special forces?

The interview was conducted by Pamela Isfeld, President of PAFSO.

12 janvier 2010 - 16h53 HAÏTI

par Jean-François Hubert-Rouleau

Je quitte l’ambassade à 15h30 comme à l’habitude. Ce jour-là, une employée locale qui m’a souvent vu monter à l’orphelinat de Kenscoff servir un repas chaud aux enfants en compagnie de mes amis de la MINUSTAH, m’offre des surplus de nourriture que l’organisation humanitaire de son mari n’avait pu distribuer aux démunis pour la période des fêtes. Je range les sacs dans le coffre arrière du Jeep et direction le Caribéen, la meilleure épicerie en ville.

J’achète de la dinde fumée, des tomates et mon vin blanc. Je paie avec ma carte de crédit. Le reçu de la transaction indique 16h25. Je place le sac dans l’auto et en route pour la maison.

Arrivé chez moi, je me sers un verre de vin, je prends un livre et je monte à l’étage où se trouve mon fauteuil qui est si confortable pour lire.

Je m’assois, au même moment un petit craquement sourd que je reconnais à l’instant. L’expérience du Pakistan en 2005 me fait comprendre qu’un tremblement de terre de forte puissance est prêt à se déclencher. Aussitôt, je quitte précipitamment le fauteuil où je venais de m’installer et part en courant vers la sortie. J’atteins les marches mais je ne suis plus capable de me tenir debout. Je dois me tenir aux murs et peut faire seulement que de petits pas. J’atteins enfin la porte qui est, bien sûr, verrouillée. Le temps de trouver la clé et la maison qui vacille. J’arrive à ouvrir, il y a encore l’abri d’auto en béton à franchir. C’est fait. Je me réfugie le plus loin possible de la maison.

Pour aussitôt constater que le mur d’enceinte de la maison sur lequel je me suis appuyé oscille vers la gauche et la droite menaçant de s’écrouler. Je mesure une bonne distance entre la maison et le mur et je me tiens coi. Le cœur filant à toute allure.

Finalement, 37 secondes plus tard, la terre cesse de bouger. Au même moment j’entends un grand fracas. L’édifice à logements en construction en face de chez moi s’est écroulé. C’est alors que je remarque que le gardien de la maison est en état de panique totale. Il crie dans une langue qui n’est ni française, ni créole. Il gesticule, il lève les bras. Je veux m’approcher de lui mais il tient son arme d’une telle façon que j’hésite à avancer. Après quelques secondes il baisse le canon de son fusil et je vais le prendre dans mes bras pour le rassurer. Je ne le sais pas mais il est le premier de centaines que j’étreindrai. Je le calme, il ne sait pas ce qui se passe. Je lui explique que c’est un tremblement de terre, qu’il y aura beaucoup d’autres secousses mais qu’elles ne seront pas aussi fortes. Que c’est mieux de rester à l’extérieur pour les heures qui vont suivre, une fois qu’il sera chez lui.

Fort heureusement, c’est l’heure de la relève et l’autre qui arrive est plus calme. J’entreprends aussitôt de faire le tour de la maison avec eux deux. La partie avant de la maison est intacte. On se dirige vers le jardin. Tout est en bon état si ce n’est, oh surprise, que la piscine s’est vidée de près d’un mètre d’eau. On s’aventure à l’intérieur. Nous faisons le tour. Alhamdullilah. Aucune fissure. Tout a bien résisté. Quelques cadres, assiettes, verrerie de cassé. C’est tout.

Les réflexes reviennent. Je dois me rapporter sain et sauf à l’ambassade. Les cellulaires ne fonctionnent plus. Le BlackBerry non plus. Je sais que la radio dans ma chambre à coucher ne fonctionne pas, cela fait trois fois que je demande qu’on la répare. Ma radio portative que je garde toujours avec moi. Malheur la pile est déchargée. Je sais qu’on doit se faire du sang d’encre à mon sujet à la chancellerie mais il n’y a rien d’autre à faire que d’attendre que la pile soit rechargée. Aussi, au grand soulagement de mes collègues, je serai le dernier à me rapporter vivant quelques heures plus tard. Nouvelle qui sera bien sûr rapportée à mes proches apeurés.

Après quelques heures à l’extérieur de la maison, je me risque à y retourner. Les secousses sont constantes mais je me dis que si la maison a su tenir pour la plus forte, je ne cours plus de danger. Mais il y a plus qui m’attire à l’intérieur; j’ai faim...

Très tôt, le lendemain matin je quitte pour l’ambassade. Quand je descends ma montagne je ne remarque rien d’inhabituel. Je m’engage sur la route du cimetière et là je vois plusieurs mausolées éventrés. Des gens par centaines qui se tiennent au milieu de la rue. Je m’engage sur Delmas, j’ai peine à circuler, il y a des dizaines de milliers de gens partout. Et puis voilà; le désastre...

Des édifices effondrés, une station service complètement ensevelie, sous le béton des voitures avec leurs occupants. Le Caribéen où je me trouvais le soir précédent à 16h25 est effondré. Mes premiers morts; une petite fille d’environ huit ans gît sur le trottoir et l’accotement, visage tourné vers la rue, la langue tirée. On ne peut être plus morte. A droite, à gauche, des corps, tous dans des positions grotesques, macabres. Je suis sous le choc. Les larmes coulent. Il y a tellement de désolation.

J’arrive enfin à l’ambassade. C’est calme. On se rue dans les bras les uns les autres. Ceux qui sont restés à la chancellerie me bombardent de questions; comment c’est dehors? Ils sont fatigués, ils sont demeurés dans leur auto essayant de trouver un sommeil qui ne venait pas.

Le chef de mission vient vers moi et s’écrie : « ...tu nous as foutu une belle trouille toi hier soir – tu ne sais pas comment je suis content de te voir ». Puis comme nous sommes quelques-uns, il me demande de faire du café avec une collègue.

Réflexe de tout agent d’immigration; je sais que je vais avoir besoin de visas et de vignettes et ils sont dans les coffres à l’intérieur. Je demande au chef de mission de m’accorder cinq minutes pour entrer dans la chancellerie et les récupérer. A ce stade, on ignore les dangers et l’état dans lequel se trouve l’édifice. Je fais valoir mon point et il m’autorise à entrer avec un MP pour aller les chercher. J’entre donc dans la chancellerie, il y a encore des gravats qui tombent. Un petit caillou tombe sur la vitre de ma montre y laissant une petite étoile. Peut-être un signe pour me rappeler ma bonne étoile.

De retour au centre des opérations on s’aperçoit que maintenant des Canadiens arrivent par groupes entiers aux grilles de l’ambassade. Ils ont tout perdu. Ils ont faim. Ils ont soif. Ils sont blessés. Heureusement que l’on a le club canadien où se trouve des réserves de nourriture, de breuvages, je trouverai même une caisse de Corona dans le réfrigérateur. L’ambassadeur me hèle : « Jean-François! Je te nomme en charge de la cuisine. Tu t’occupes de nourrir tous ces gens. »

J’y resterai quatre jours. Avec une petite équipe composée de collègues de l’ambassade et de conjointes je verrai à nourrir mon monde. Après une journée et demie, nous n’avons plus rien. J’en avise l’ambassadeur mais je lui fais part aussi que j’ai dix sacs de dix kilos encore dans mon auto. Aussi ces sacs qui devaient prendre la direction de l’orphelinat viendront nourrir les centaines de personnes que nous hébergeons sur le compound alors que tous les magasins sont fermés. En tout, je servirai 1 400 repas chauds et quelques 800 petits-déjeuners.

Plusieurs des gens sur le compound sont blessés. Certains sérieusement. Je suis celui avec le plus d’expérience dans le nursing ayant exercé cette profession dans une autre vie. Je m’active; réduction de fracture ouverte, pansements, retrait de gravats dans les plaies. J’ai l’assistance de ma collègue de CIC avec qui j’ai suivi le cours de l’ambulance Saint-Jean avant de venir en poste et l’heureux concours d’un policier de la ville de Montréal qui se trouvait miraculeusement sur place. On fait du mieux qu’on peut. Nouvelle sollicitation au chef de mission pour entrer de nouveau dans la chancellerie. Mission : Aller s’approvisionner à l’infirmerie. Nous pouvons maintenant soulager la douleur. Finalement les militaires arriveront et monteront une infirmerie digne de ce nom.

Après quatre jours, je retournerai dans mon poste de gestionnaire de programme de l’immigration, heureux d’avoir pu aider, soulager, compatir.

Les évacuations commencent et une toute nouvelle aventure nous amènera vers des sommets de solidarité avec nos collègues des autres ministères jamais, dans mon cas, connu auparavant.

À tous ceux qui se reconnaissent : Chapeau! Ce fut tout un honneur de travailler avec vous.

Jean-François Hubert-Rouleau a joint le service extérieur en 1989. Il a servi à Koweït, Cuba, les Philippines, en Syrie, en Colombie, au Pakistan, à Trinidad et Tobago et Haïti.

Compagnons de route :
FS Pet Adoption Stories [3]

par Anne-Marie Leclerc

Oréo de Beijing

par Lionel Jobin (10 ans)

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Oréo et Lionel

Nous avons déménagé en Chine à cause du travail de mes parents. Nous, les enfants, voulions un chien. Notre femme de ménage, Mme Kong (là-bas on dit “Kong a-i”) nous a montré la photo d’un bébé chien qu’elle avait recueilli chez elle et elle nous a demandé s’il nous plaisait. Mes sœurs et moi, on a convaincu nos parents de prendre le chien en promettant de le promener et le nourrir nous-mêmes. Ils ont accepté. Un jour, quand Kong aï est venue nous chercher à l’école, elle avait un bébé chien dans ses bras. C’est là que tout a commencé.

On devait lui trouver un nom. Notre petit terrier avait un poil noir/blanc/noir, alors on l’a appelé Oréo, comme les biscuits. La chienne était encore trop petite pour rester chez nous, alors Kong-aï la rapportait chez elle tous les soirs. Ce n’est qu’après une semaine qu’elle a pu rester chez nous, mais la pauvre pleurait. De jour en jour, elle s’habituait à nous. On lui a donné un coussin et des jouets. Elle a mangé le coussin après un mois, alors elle dormait sur mon lit.

La première fois que j’ai promené notre chienne, je l’ai libérée de sa laisse pour lancer un bâton. Je n’étais pas conscient qu’elle pouvait se sauver, mais heureusement elle est revenue avec le bâton. Je me suis tellement attaché à elle que je pouvais jouer des heures avec elle. J’ai supplié mes parents de l’emmener avec nous à notre retour au Canada. C’était compliqué: un ami a dû garder Oréo pendant l’été et on a dû demander à quelqu’un d’autre de la ramener à l’automne. Pendant les vacances, je regardais par la fenêtre et quand je voyais des chiens, ça me faisait penser à Oréo. À notre retour au Canada, je demandais tout le temps à mes parents quand Oréo nous reviendrait. Un jour, ils m’ont annoncé qu’Oréo arrivait. Je ne pouvais pas aller la chercher à l’aéroport avec mon père parce que l’avion arrivait trop tard le soir. Le lendemain matin, quelle surprise merveilleuse j’avais! Oréo était là, devant moi !

Elle est importante pour moi. Tous les jours à mon réveil, elle saute sur mon lit et je vais la promener dehors. Quand je suis triste, elle fait des folies pour me faire rire. Elle aime le Canada. Elle nous suit en voyage. Un jour, à Québec, nous sommes passés devant des statues de lion et elle pensait qu’ils étaient vrais... elle aboyait et a pris du temps à se calmer. L’an prochain, nous allons vivre dans un autre pays et j’espère pouvoir emmener ma chienne. Je vous raconterai tout à mon retour.

Sammy de Washington

par Jonathan Sauvé

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Sammy

Le titre de son éventuelle autobiographie fera inévitablement référence au fait que l’adoption de Sammy a radicalement changé le cours de sa vie. Une « amie Facebook » a publié sa photo quelques jours avant Noël 2010, la veille de notre départ vers Montréal. Enseignante au primaire, elle venait de le recueillir auprès d’une famille qui s’apprêtait à le conduire à la fourrière… Sammy avait alors 13 mois, passé la majorité de son existence attaché à une corde dehors et on l’a d’abord cru gris jusqu’à ce qu’il prenne un bain ! Il n’avait toujours pas trouvé de famille adoptive quand nous sommes revenus à Washington le 28 décembre. Nous sommes donc allés le chercher en banlieue de Baltimore et dès notre arrivée à la maison, il s’est roulé en boule sous le sapin et a dormi pendant deux heures. Sammy a depuis ce temps vécu trois ans à Ottawa où il a fondé son fan club. L’allemand lui donne du fil à retordre depuis notre arrivée à Vienne et les écureuils de Manor Park lui manquent cruellement, mais il s’est bien adapté à son nouvel environnement. Il se la coule douce, est gâté pourri et nos voisins se bousculent pour le garder en notre absence!

Chori from Santiago

by Jessica Hepworth

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Chori

In 2012, I was posted to Santiago, Chile, and adopted my dog Chori (aka Choripan and formerly known as Ralph Laurent) from a shelter there in 2013. He is a Catalan sheepdog/poodle mix and was found on the street as a very young puppy, only about one month old. He was in rough shape, suffering from malnutrition, mange, alopecia, fleas and lice. After spending five months at a veterinary clinic getting his health back, he was sent to a shelter where we met two months later. There were many beautiful dogs, but he brought tears to my eyes, and I knew I wasn’t going to leave without him. I noticed right away that he had a problem with his hind leg and was told that it was nothing serious. After a second opinion and X-rays, it was revealed that the head of his femur was actually smashed to bits. He was operated on to remove that part of the femur and now runs like the wind, pain-free. After a short stint in Canada this past summer, Chori and I are now enjoying the warm beach weather in Havana, Cuba.

Après l’obtention d’une maîtrise en études théâtrales de Trinity College Dublin, Anne-Marie Leclerc a rejoint les rangs du service extérieur en tant que déléguée commerciale en 2006. Elle a eu le plaisir de servir brièvement à l’Ambassade du Canada au Brésil ainsi que pendant trois ans à Paris.

Diplomatic Uniforms

by Rick Kohler and Anne Leahy

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Staff of the Canadian Legation in Tokyo, Japan (1929). From left to right: Kenneth Kirkwood, Hugh Keenleyside, The Honourable Herbert Marler, and Mr. J.A. Langley. Makita Kogabo, Ueno/ Library and Archives Canada/ PA -120407 rs.g

Britain’s new ambassador to the Holy See, Her Excellency Sally Axworthy, presented credentials in 2016 wearing a specially designed diplomatic uniform for female ambassadors. Diplomatic uniforms are a rarity these days, but the Vatican is one of the few postings where envoys are expected to wear full diplomatic dress for formal occasions.

Anne Leahy, former Canadian ambassador to the Holy See, recalls that every January in the Sala Regia of the Apostolic Palace, the Pope presents his foreign policy statement to Ambassadors. British Ambassador Axworthy shines in her uniform but has competition. It is one of those rare moments where formal or national dress with full decorations is in order, and the diplomatic corps fills the scene with sashes and ribbons of all colours. The Canadian Ambassador, Anne Leahy informs, cuts a rather modest but dignified figure in such company.

DIPLOMATIC UNIFORMS HAVE A LONG HISTORY, as long as diplomacy itself. Around 1500 BCE, the Hittites exchanged what came to be known as diplomats with the Canaanites and Jebusites, essentially on a case-by-case basis, to negotiate interstate agreements and treaties. Indeed, the diplomatic term “protocol”, in its early incarnation, represented the introduction to a treaty from the Greek prōtokollon or “first sheet glued onto a manuscript”. The concept of swapping representatives evolved over the centuries until the profession became more institutionalized in northern Italy in the 13th century. The first live-in or permanent representative occurred when Spain assigned a full-time representative to the Court of England in the late 15th century. By the late 1600s, diplomats comprised a network of permanent outposts, first across Europe, then through Central Europe and to Russia. Diplomats were traditionally drawn from the nobility or the aristocracy in order to confer an element of legitimacy on their negotiating enterprises. As such, the clothing worn by those practising this opulent lifestyle was finely tailored, of rich textiles and silks and exotic designs, drawn from the courtly fashions of life surrounding their respective monarchies.

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Her Excellency Sally Axworthy wearing the specially designed diplomatic uniform for Britain’s female ambassadors.

And then a spanner in the works: the French Revolution (1789) with its Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité calling card, cast its influence on the diplomatic profession. Folks drawn from the ranks of commoners moved in on the conduct of French diplomacy, and the matter of fancy clothing was no longer seen as de rigueur. It was around this time that diplomatic uniforms were conceived – like school uniforms, good quality but all the same, representing significant cost-savings and the sparing of stylistic imagination.

The custom of dressing diplomats in standardized livery spread through Europe around 1800 and later to non-European nations such as the Ottoman Empire and Japan. Swanky hats (bicornes with feathery adornments) and tailcoats with braiding became universal. Even consular staff had uniforms, though less ornate.

Fashion-conscious diplomats began to compete with each other by affixing all manner of add-ons, knee-breeches, patent-leather pumps with silver buckles, ceremonial swords and gold braiding of complex intertwinement.

Folks drawn from the ranks of commoners moved in on the conduct of French diplomacy, and the matter of fancy clothing was no longer seen as de rigueur

Janice Cavell of GAC’s historical division advises that diplomatic uniforms were worn by Canadian officials when conditions called for it, up until the Second World War. Canadian tunics were dark blue with gold embroidery, sometimes covering the entire chest area as depicted in the photographs, one showing colleague Sir Herbert Marler, then envoy to Japan. The uniforms that Canadian diplomats formerly wore were based on the British court uniform and were sometimes accompanied by knee breeches or, occasionally, with trousers that had stripes down the sides.

American diplomats, in contrast, tended to stick to evening dress (white tie and tails), which was considered “Non-U” by many if sported in daylight hours.

Former Chief of Protocol of Canada, Rick Kohler, informs that the dress code for new ambassadors to Canada, when presenting credentials to the Governor General, consisted in the 1990s of formal tail-coat/striped pants attire. Today, it is less formal – business attire or national dress is all that is required.

Russia’s Peter the Great introduced civil and military uniforms in the 18th century as part of his transformation of Russia. Uniforms are still important today. In Foreign Affairs Minister Lavrov’s words, they reflect recognition of service and pride of those who wear them. Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MID) diplomats have worn the uniform since the 19th century. There are three versions: dress, work and travel. The Soviet diplomatic uniform was fixed during WWII, and the current modern one by decree of President Putin in 2001 – no small matter! Anne Leahy, a former ambassador to Russia, shares a special recollection dating back to 1992 of a Soviet/Russian Ambassador in uniform at the levée of the President of Cameroon. It took place about two weeks after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The Russian Ambassador’s rather drab blue military-like suit paled in comparison with the flamboyant livery of the British Ambassador.

Like the specially tailored diplomatic uniform fashioned for British Ambassador, Her Excellency Sally Axworthy, in 2016, some foreign service organizations maintain the practice for special, ceremonial occasions. And remnants continue to prosper in other domains, an example being the Académie Française that goes back to the mid-17th century. These 40 “Immortals” who protect the integrity of the French language to this day wear what is called l’Habit Vert, consisting of a long black coat, a bicorne hat with black feathers, and covered all over with lush green embroidery in the shape of leaves.

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Vincent Massey in diplomatic uniform, 1927.

Probably one of the best-known Canadian diplomatic uniforms was that allegedly worn by His Excellency Vincent Massey. “Allegedly” because there is no proof that the uniform discovered in a cedar chest in the attic at the Canadian residence by Glen Bullard – a Canadian, locally engaged, who worked at the embassy in Washington, DC, for 48 years (1966 to 2014) – was actually Mr. Massey’s. Glen made the find in the late 1960s while Ed Ritchie was ambassador, but the uniform stayed there until Glen was showing newly arrived ambassador Derek Burney around the residence’s holdings. When he saw the uniform, he determined it should take pride of place, mounted in the lobby of the Ambassador’s sixth-floor reception area. When Ambassador Burney left, it was relocated to the embassy’s theatre lobby until wear and tear regrettably relegated it to a return journey to storage in the Chancery basement.

Anyone wishing to look into more detail surrounding diplomatic uniforms – there is plenty of reference material on library and Amazon bookshelves – a special gem is Uniforms of the World, published in 1929 by Fred Gilbert Blakeslee.

During Rick Kohler’s 40-year diplomatic career, the only uniform he got to wear was that of a Beaver Leader (Beaver handle: Rusty).

Anne Leahy never wore a uniform during her 40 years as a diplomat. She did so on rare occasions as Honorary Captain (N), Colonel Commandant of the Royal Canadian Chaplain Service.

Compagnons de route :
FS Pet Adoption Stories [4]

par Anne-Marie Leclerc

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Jen and Hudson

Hudson from Tripoli

by Ryan Ward

Going on posting in Libya, I left behind my wife Jen, two cats, and a dog in Ottawa. I went with the idea that seeing my wife every three months on reunification leave would be tough but workable, and the belief that I could go two years with no animals for company. I was wrong.

Three months into my posting, I got back to our housing compound after work and saw a tiny stray ginger kitten lurking around my apartment block. I managed to coax him out from under a bench and got him up on my lap. It didn’t take long to decide that he was going to come live with me, and I catnapped him back to my apartment.

As the situation in Libya deteriorated, Hudson and I dealt with the growing danger together. He spent days locked in the bathroom when there was inter-militia fighting around our compound, and CBS were moved to the ACP. He slept on the floor in the hall with me when the shelling was bad, and we were afraid of the windows being blown in. He rode across the Libya-Tunisia border in our armoured vehicle when it came time to evacuate the mission. And he flew back to Canada under my seat when our time in North Africa was over.

Hudson and I are now reunited with my wife and other pets, and are living comfortably in Kenya. He has lived in four countries and has looked after me as much as I looked after him. He is currently dealing with our decision to foster six Kenyan street dogs that were abandoned in someone’s hedge. He’ll survive – he’s been through worse.

Miles from Tel Aviv

by Sabrina Yoong

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Miles

About a year into my first posting in Tel Aviv, it seemed everyone I passed walking down Rothschild Boulevard had a dog or a stroller. I wasn’t ready for a stroller, but knowing two of my colleagues had adopted dogs in Israel, the former seemed like a good idea.

My husband and I set off to the SPCA in Ramat Gan and met the adorable 6-month-old puppy who would make us a family. He was the only dog in the whole place not to bark at us when we approached his cage. We suspect he lived on the streets before coming home with us, and we made up an impressive backstory to explain his many fears. (If you’re curious, we pretend he was lost during an exercise while training to be a canine intelligence agent for the Mossad, and that is why he is so skeptical and suspicious of bicycles, garbage cans, wide-brimmed hats and trench coats!) We named him Miles after Mr. Davis, and he answers commands in English and in Hebrew. Four and a half years later, he lives the charmed life of a diplo-dog in Los Angeles, racing off-leash in Runyon Canyon with the canines of Hollywood celebrities and nobodies, and frolicking in the Pacific at Rosie’s Dog Beach in Long Beach.

Après l’obtention d’une maîtrise en études théâtrales de Trinity College Dublin, Anne-Marie Leclerc a rejoint les rangs du service extérieur en tant que déléguée commerciale en 2006. Elle a eu le plaisir de servir brièvement à l’Ambassade du Canada au Brésil ainsi que pendant trois ans à Paris.

Postcards from the (diplomatic) edge: A Diplomatic Mission To North Korea

by James Trottier

Canada has had diplomatic relations with North Korea since 2001, managed through the Canadian Embassy in South Korea. While directing the political/economic program in Seoul, I was cross-accredited as the Political Counsellor to North Korea. I led four Canadian diplomatic missions to North Korea in 2015 and 2016, where I was the first Canadian diplomat to visit since 2010.

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James Trottier outside the Victorious Fatherland Liberation War Museum in Pyongyang. Photo: Kevin Jo.

NORTH KOREA, 10 AM, DECEMBER 16, 2015. On a chilly sunny day, I attend the criminal trial of Reverend Hyeon Soo Lim, a Canadian citizen imprisoned since his arrest the previous February. He comes into the courtroom escorted by two tall uniformed state security officers, dressed in the winter jacket I provided him on a visit in October. He appears calm, if resigned.

Though held in a modern courtroom with the familiar set-up of judge, prosecutor and defence counsel, this trial is anything but conventional.

First, I was notified of the trial late the previous evening in a cryptic message delivered to my Pyongyang hotel from the North Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA). The message advised that the trial would occur the following morning at an undisclosed location and that our delegation would be picked up at 9 am and brought to the court.

Second, we are the first diplomats – and, in my case, the first lawyer – and among the few foreigners ever to attend a trial in North Korea. From their dress and demeanour, most people in the courtroom appear to be North Korean state security officers.

Third, the stakes could not be higher. The defendant is charged with “crimes against the state,” and the prosecutor is asking for a death sentence. The defence counsel offers no evidence, admits his client’s guilt and joins in the condemnation... but proposes a life sentence instead.

After testimony by three witnesses, a video lifted from the internet of a speech by the defendant in Philadelphia presented in evidence, an aggressive cross-examination by both the prosecutor and the judge, a one-hour trial and a three-minute deliberation, the judge finds the defendant guilty and sentences him to life at hard labour.

Immediately after the trial, I hurry to the Swedish Embassy and report to Ottawa. Events unfold quickly. By the time I return for separate meetings with North Korean officials and the defendant, the North Korean side is aware of Prime Minister Trudeau’s statement expressing concern about the trial and Reverend Lim’s well-being.

I have a very animated discussion with North Korean security officials. They ask me what I think of the trial, and they respond vigorously to the Prime Minister’s statement, slamming the table to emphasize points. Yet they remove their overcoats, which seems to indicate an intention to remain and continue our discussion. I reiterate the Prime Minister’s concerns and urge my interlocutors to resolve this case.

In my meeting with Reverend Lim, I am impressed by his stoic dignity and his resilience. I assure him of Canada’s absolute commitment to resolving his case.

These visits and discussions were significant steps in an ultimately successful effort to free Reverend Lim. On later visits, my colleagues and I continued to press North Korean officials regarding his well-being and release. He was returned to Canada in August 2017, after serving 32 months at hard labour. This case was resolved after a relatively short but arduous period of imprisonment, a pattern that is the norm for foreign prisoners in North Korea. However, the tragic case of Otto Warmbier – a young American who died in June 2017 shortly after being handed over in a coma by North Korean authorities to US officials – was a sad reminder of what can go wrong in such situations. In contrast to foreign prisoners, North Koreans are routinely punished without trial and imprisoned indefinitely.

Fellow passengers on the Air China flight from Beijing to Pyongyang include tourists going on group tours organized by companies from inside China (including one headed by a Canadian who facilitated former NBA basketball player Dennis Rodman’s visits). A voice on the intercom announces: “Welcome to Pyongyang and thank you for flying Star Alliance. We hope you have enjoyed your flight.” Aeroplan points are earned for travel into Pyongyang but, curiously, not for travel out.

Although a direct flight between Seoul and Pyongyang would take one hour, access to Pyongyang is through Beijing. Two airlines fly into Pyongyang: North Korea’s own Air Koryo and China’s Air China. Visiting involved flying from Seoul to Beijing on Sunday, obtaining a visa from the North Korean Embassy in Beijing on Monday morning, and then flying to Pyongyang early that afternoon.

Each visit to North Korea entailed a lengthy process involving Global Affairs Canada, the Foreign Ministry in Pyongyang, our respective Permanent Missions to the UN in New York, and our embassies in Seoul and Beijing. Generally, we found out whether our visas were approved on Saturday at midnight. This meant either scrambling to make the flight on Sunday or cancelling our arrangements.

Generally, we find out whether our visas are approved on Saturday at midnight. This means either scrambling to make the flight on Sunday or cancelling our arrangements

On landing at Pyongyang’s new airport, our delegation is whisked through customs unlike regular travellers who are subject to thorough examination, including for written material. Contraband goods can mean confiscation, expulsion or worse. Despite having diplomatic immunity, I have left in Seoul any written material that could be problematic, including a copy of The Economist, which mentions North Korea.

We are met by our two MFA Liaison Officers (the “minders”), who will be a ubiquitous albeit courteous presence throughout our stay. They book themselves into our hotel for the duration of each visit and bring us to meetings. They also recommend restaurants and landmarks.

The minders take us to the vehicle and driver provided by the MFA. As we drive down the highway, there is light traffic with pedestrians and cyclists sometimes hurrying across the road. Agricultural workers toil in the fields along the highway. As we approach the capital, high-rise apartment buildings appear, and there is increased traffic. Some people crouch in front of apartment blocks, trimming the grass; residents are responsible for maintaining the space in front of their building.

Our hotel, the Koryo, is located near the central railway station. There is a large screen in front, where people gather to watch the latest in North Korean cinema, including sentimental dramas, as well as footage of missile and nuclear tests. We check in and pay in advance in euros (other options are US dollars and Chinese yuan; non-resident foreigners are not allowed to possess North Korean currency). There is a DHL kiosk at the counter for sending or receiving packages.

On top of our hotel is a revolving bar which is notable for its friendly staff, smudged windows, absence of customers, lack of most of the drinks featured on its menu and pricey scotch.

Rooms are expensive, clean, simply furnished, and so dimly lit that it is difficult to read in the evening. TV channels are local, with two exceptions: RT, Russia’s propaganda network, and, more surprisingly, the BBC World Service. No need for an alarm clock as loudspeakers throughout the city broadcast a loud and eerie ballad every morning at 6 a.m. Musical ensembles serenade commuters outside the railway station and at key intersections.

Although there are a few guests in the cavernous lobby and the hotel restaurants, our floors are always eerily quiet. Agility and vigilance are required in elevators as the doors snap shut suddenly. A store adjoining the hotel has alcohol, food and clothing; the clerks do not allow photos of alcohol.

The Koryo is Pyongyang’s top hotel, used for official delegations. After my visit in 2015, there was a major fire; guests had to flee. North Korean authorities at first denied that a fire had occurred despite internet footage of billowing smoke. They instead focused on apprehending those who photographed the fire.

At my request, our minders make arrangements for access to the diplomatic quarter, so I can meet with the Swedish Ambassador, one of several such meetings on each visit. We also consult with the British and German Ambassadors. The diplomatic quarter is not fortified, but authorization is required for entry. The minders explain our destination to bored sentries posted at key street corners; they check our credentials and itinerary and wave us through to the Swedish Embassy.

The Swedish, British and German Embassies share a building that formerly housed the East German Embassy. The building and its compound reflect Soviet-era East German architecture and design.

Sweden serves as Canada’s protecting power in North Korea. International law bestows upon Sweden the right and responsibility to intervene with local authorities to protect Canadian citizens. The concept is well-established under the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, but some states purport not to understand it.

Foreigners usually come and go to North Korea without incident. Still, the Swedish Embassy remains especially vigilant during such events as the Pyongyang Marathon when several hundred foreigners visit.

In Pyongyang, we rent a mobile phone to set up meetings with embassies, UN agencies and foreign NGOs operating in North Korea. For obvious reasons, it is not used for substantive or sensitive conversations. This phone cannot be used to contact any North Korean, including our minders or the driver, because it operates on a network restricted to foreigners. If I want to reach our driver, I call a resident diplomat who speaks to a North Korean staff member who then calls our driver.

A mobile phone is a status symbol for North Koreans. There are an estimated three million in use in the country. There are two parallel mobile telephone systems, one for locals and one for foreigners. Users on one network cannot reach users on the other.

On each visit, we left our electronic devices at the Canadian Embassy in Beijing. In addition to the obvious security reasons for doing so, our iPads and phones would not work in North Korea anyway. North Korea has its own intranet, which is inaccessible to foreigners, whereas access to the World Wide Web is restricted to a tiny fraction of the population. Visiting foreigners have access to neither.

The morning after our arrival, we drive to the Foreign Ministry. We are escorted down an ornate corridor to a conference room adorned with photos of North Korea’s founding father, Kim Il-sung, and his son and successor, Kim Jong-il. Their images are ubiquitous in North Korea, including on badges worn by Party cadres. We meet for 2.5 hours. The meeting is conducted through interpreters, though our interlocutor speaks colloquial English. While exchanges deal frankly and fully with the range of contentious subjects that are of concern to Canada, discussions are civil. Some meetings occur over coffee and lunch at our hotel.

The MFA is located at a corner of the iconic Kim Il-sung Square, the heart of the North Korean state. The square is dominated by images of Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il and is the setting for mass choreographed performances and military parades. Sometimes on our visits, the square would be filled with thousands of students and workers in colour-coded caps rehearsing future performances. The mood at these rehearsals can be quite relaxed, as opposed to that at the official performances themselves.

My meetings at the MFA were considerably longer than the norm for my meetings at foreign ministries in other capitals. This reflected North Korea’s interest in speaking directly to Canada after not having had diplomatic visits since 2010 – despite not relishing what we had to say.

On Friday, I attend the weekly meeting of embassies, UN agencies and NGOs held at the office of the UNDP representative, who reminds participants that the weekly movie night will be held that evening at the Polish Embassy and that attendees should pay attention to parking rules, lest they be ticketed by the police. All are invited to attend and encouraged to bring samples of their national food. In Pyongyang, these social events are a welcome diversion for the foreign community.

There are six UN agencies operating in North Korea, including the World Food Programme and UNICEF, as well as a number of foreign NGOs. Canada and other countries provide funding for programs that feed infants, small children, pregnant women and nursing mothers. Though food security is considerably better than during the famines of the 1990s, malnutrition remains a serious issue in North Korea.

Diplomacy in North Korea is a mixture of the familiar, the unusual and the surreal

The Canadian delegation pays a visit to the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun. Formerly the official residence of Kim Il-sung, the 115,000 square-foot mausoleum now hosts the embalmed remains of Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il.

We are processed through an elaborate security protocol by North Korean officials in black suits armed with visible revolvers in shoulder holsters. The building is thronged with North Koreans coming to pay their respects. All visitors stand motionless on moving sidewalks that transport us slowly down long corridors, some a kilometre in length. Everyone is dressed in their best clothes, for this is a place of pilgrimage.

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The unopened 105-storey Ryugyong Hotel in Pyongyang. Photo: James Trottier.

As we proceed down the hallways, our North Korean minders try to persuade us to bow at the statues and remains of the two leaders. I explain that we mean no disrespect, but, in conformity with diplomatic practice and precedent, we will refrain from bowing.

We walk through a grand chamber with statues of the two leaders, through rooms equipped with giant dust-blowing machines meant to remove lint, and into the chambers housing the embalmed remains behind glass.

Kim Il-sung’s head rests on a Korean pillow, and a Workers’ Party flag is draped over his body. All around us are solemn North Koreans and foreigners bowing; despite the social pressure, we hold our ground and stand erect. I remind myself of the Victorian-era British envoy who respectfully declined to kowtow before the Chinese Emperor.

Being a diplomat in North Korea, as elsewhere, provides privileged access and glimpses of a reality screened from most foreigners. Diplomacy in North Korea is a mixture of the familiar, the unusual and the surreal.

In a world of hyper-communication, working as a diplomat in North Korea is also to be thrust into a different age – the ultimate digital detoxification. Visiting diplomats in North Korea have the rare luxury of being on their own, detached from day-to-day oversight from capitals and freed from the “administrivia” of a normal workday. In this respect, it is reminiscent of the diplomacy of an earlier era. Paradoxically, such “freedom” occurs in the ultimate security state.

James Trottier directed political/economic programs at Canadian Embassies in Korea, the Philippines and Thailand, with cross-accreditation to Myanmar and Laos. He also served at Canada’s Permanent Mission to the UN in New York. He led four diplomatic missions to North Korea in 2015 and 2016. Since leaving the Foreign Service in 2016, he has written regularly on international affairs in print media and has commented extensively on TV and radio.

Tremors Above, Stillness Below: Consular work in Ecuador in the wake of the 2016 earthquake

by Tara Bickis

As soon as the shaking stopped, I turned to my 3-year-old son and calmly told him that everything was going to be okay. He looked up from his Disney movie with a puzzled expression on his face before quickly turning back to his movie. Reassured that he was fine, I quickly turned my attention from motherhood to work, getting to the job of confirming that all staff and dependents were safe and accounted for. It was April 2016, and Ecuador had just been hit by a 7.8 earthquake. Luckily for embassy staff, the epicentre had been in the province of Manabi, so while we felt the earthquake in Quito, we did not experience the destruction that we would later witness in Manta, the capital of Manabi province, and the surrounding area. In the hours that followed, emails would start to arrive with the horrifying news that Canadians had been killed as a result of the earthquake. My consular officer and I immediately booked a hotel in Manta. We knew that we would be asked to deploy, without yet knowing how we would get there or what was waiting for us. Without understanding the personal toll that this experience would take, or how previous trauma would be triggered.

It goes without saying that there is never a good time for a natural disaster or emergency.  But, if you are going to have to manage one, then dealing with it towards the end of a 3-year posting has its advantages. We had travelled to Manta to carry out consular outreach recently, and had developed key contacts and identified where many Canadians lived in the region. We had carried out training exercises and simulations to familiarize everyone with their roles. And perhaps most importantly, we had purchased consular backpacks to facilitate a quick deployment, which ended up being the only way that we managed to catch, on only a few hours’ notice, the first humanitarian flight to Manta.

While many things went really well on that first day, others did not go as planned. When we arrived at the airport, the transportation that we had arranged with the hotel was nowhere to be seen. Our cell phone batteries, which we had constantly used throughout the day, were running low, and phone service was not working very well. We couldn’t reach the hotel, and there were no taxis to be found. Our satellite phones, which had been charging, were forgotten in the rush to catch the only possible flight. We learned from others, also stranded at the airport, that there were huge line-ups at gas stations, and that people were trying not to use their vehicles for fear of fuel shortages. We eventually caught a ride into town in the back of a pick-up truck, far from ideal, but better than being stranded at the airport overnight.

When we arrived at the hotel in Manta, my mind immediately flashed back to a year and a half earlier. In late July, 2014, I had flown with my husband and 20-month-old son to a small town in Manabi, famous for whale watching. We had a tremendous time watching 5 humpbacks breach over and over again, but later that afternoon, an unexpected and implausible tragedy would occur. My husband would enter the water, surrounded by more than a dozen tourists, for the snorkelling section of the excursion, and despite zero signs of struggling, when the guides would pull him out of the water, his lips would be blue and his body limp. None of the tourists or crew on my boat knew how to do CPR, so I passed my son to a stranger and made every possible effort to resuscitate my husband. Though it didn’t work, I can only imagine the guilt that I might have felt if I had never learned to do CPR; at least I felt like I had done everything that I could in the circumstances to try to save his life. The night he died, we travelled from the small town to Manta, graciously assisted by hostel owners whom we had only met the night before. I felt completely numb inside and don’t know how I would have been able to get myself and my son to Manta without their help. During the earthquake response, I arrived at the same airport, stayed at the same hotel, visited the same morgue, and was constantly reminded of my trauma. However, I wasn’t ready yet to acknowledge or feel that loss. I was still too ‘strong’.

For better or worse, there was no time to dwell on what I had been through; the emergency demanded my full attention. Or perhaps I relished the opportunity to dive headfirst into the emergency, to ensure that there was no time or space for emotions or thoughts. Over the next week, my consular officer and I did everything that we could to help the Canadians affected in the area. We drove from town to town identifying them, confirming their well-being, and getting the news back to their families and loved ones who were worried about them in Canada. We visited Canadians in the hospital who didn’t speak Spanish, couldn’t communicate with the doctors, and didn’t know where they were being transferred to. We accompanied Canadians who had lost loved ones, feeling impotent that we couldn’t alleviate their suffering or provide more support, but tried to facilitate their needs, such as helping them to figure out how to manage funeral homes and death certificates, in Ecuador. We helped families with young children who were left homeless by the earthquake. And we checked on Canadians for whom we had addresses, who were registered in ROCA. Every Canadian that we met was happy to see us; many were also surprised; that appreciation and joy, amidst the tragedy, kept us going during an incredibly difficult week.

We established a temporary office in Manta, offering Canadians as much support as two people covering a large area following a major disaster possibly could. When the DART precursor team arrived, I briefed GAC and military officials on the situation. We collaborated with American, British, Spanish, German, Swiss and other diplomats, sharing information on citizens that we had identified, sharing resources, and keeping each other safe. We collaborated with the UK to send a caravan of vehicles by land to get additional supplies and staff from Quito to Manta. And when we had finally all returned to Quito, we organized a therapy session together to share our nightmares and anxiety.

Consular work can be one of the most difficult roles played by anyone working at an Embassy. You are literally accompanying Canadians, who are strangers, through some of the darkest days of their lives, with little to offer apart from your knowledge, contacts and best wishes. But somehow my tragedy turned into my superpower during the earthquake. As difficult as it was to support Canadians who had lost loved ones in the earthquake, I felt prepared, and I felt credible. My heart hurt for them because while everyone’s experience is different, I had a sense of what they were likely going through and how much it hurt. And selfishly, I was also grateful that I wasn’t back there, that I wasn’t going through this again. Two of the Canadians that I assisted lost young children. I can’t imagine anything more painful.

After a week in Manta, working 18-hour days, I flew back to Quito on a military aircraft. I was still numb to the weight of what I had been through, both following the earthquake and my husband’s death; I wasn’t ready to process or face the trauma.  Walking the streets of Manta, seeing the buildings in rubble, and knowing that there were people inside the wreckage calling from their cell phones for help will be etched in my brain forever, leading to claustrophobia that I haven’t been able to overcome.

As a society, we value strength. For some reason, many of us continue to perceive tears or signs of emotion as a weakness; that has to change.  Emotions are not weakness; they are authentic, powerful and healthy. For years following the death of my husband, I was able to recount details of what happened that day without any emotion. Many viewed me as ‘strong’ or ‘resilient’, congratulating me, but not realizing that this was actually the result of a coping strategy to disassociate and not feel the pain. Encouraged by this positive reinforcement, I kept suppressing the trauma for years, until my body screamed so loudly that I knew that I couldn’t keep going. The disassociation was necessary in the short term, because it was too much to face or deal with initially, but over the long term, it was not healthy. After years of therapy, ironically, I am more sensitive now than I was within weeks of the trauma, easily triggered, with tears rolling down my cheeks as I write and re-write these words. 

While I have managed to find a path towards healing, I can’t help but feel that GAC should be doing more to support the mental health of foreign service officers. Throughout my personal tragedy, the trauma that I experienced while helping Canadians in the earthquake, as well as other challenging experiences that I have faced abroad, I have been surprised and disappointed by the lack of support and services available to foreign service officers. Too few support staff are available; there can be long wait times and limited sessions, and some just don’t appear to have the experience or training required to provide appropriate support. Consular officers and other foreign service officers are resilient, generous and incredibly dedicated, but they also live and work in war zones, poverty-stricken countries, and face challenges and experiences that would never exist in Canada. We have so much work to do to properly support a healthy foreign service.

With six postings to date, largely in Latin America, Tara Bickis has built a diplomatic career grounded in service to Canadians abroad. Her contributions have been recognized with the PAFSO Award, the Readiness Award, and the Canada–Australia Consular Services Award.

Twenty-Five Years On, Some Ghosts Are Still With Us

by Mark Allen

In the winter of 1992, in these pages, an article entitled “The Ghosts Among Us” appeared. Contrary to this publication’s policy, the author was allowed to remain anonymous. “Imagine what it would be like,” that person asked, “if your lifetime companion were deemed not to exist at all in the eyes of the Department. Would you abandon him or her?”

The article was both a commentary on the evolving realities of LGBT staff and an eloquent plea, in advance of the triannual review of Foreign Service Directives, to extend relocation benefits to same-sex partners. The substantial costs and administrative burden associated with their partners accompanying employees to posts were being routinely met by those couples themselves. And yet, absurdly, the Department would pay the cost of bringing your pet with you, but not your partner. By 1992, the dark days of the Cold War purges, mostly of gay men, were a thing of the past. As the article contended, the “plan for identifying and then firing gay personnel had to be abandoned after preliminary investigations revealed a significant level of gay staff, including some of the brightest and most prominent individuals of the time.” But a substantial economic burden remained, which needed to be addressed, and it eventually was.

The ensuing years saw a steady progression in recognition for the rights of gay and lesbian employees, thanks, in large part, to the courts and to significant changes in social attitudes towards the LGBT community. Equality with respect to benefits was won in 1999, followed by recognized partnerships and finally marriage equality in 2005. The Public Service adjusted, as did the Department. And as the battle for same-sex civil rights in countries like Canada appeared to wind down (though transgender rights continue to require attention), the issue emerged as a foreign policy priority in the mid-2000s, as we turned our talents and attention to the pursuit of respect for rights in the many parts of the world that continue to criminalize and punish same-sex conduct, sometimes with the death penalty.

But three broad areas remain where the Department has been working to re-focus its attention on the rights of its LGBT employees and now has the opportunity to make real progress: (1) by acknowledging us officially as an identifiable group with unique needs and circumstances and providing a channel to address those needs; (2) by pro-actively augmenting posting opportunities for LGBT staff and their families and, by extension, allowing managers to deploy the best people available; and, finally, (3) by confronting the legacy of the past and participating in the Government’s planned apology to the LGBTQ2 community.

While the Department has embraced the promotion of diversity and inclusion as a foreign policy and development priority in other parts of the world, in addressing it internally, we have the opportunity to catch up to our peer departments, many of whom view employment equity legislation not as a mandatory requirement, but as the minimum basis on which to build a thriving diversity policy. In recognition of this, the 2016 Public Service Award of Excellence was presented to the proponents of the “Positive Space Initiative”, which is aimed at creating safer and more welcoming environments for LGBT employees and client groups by providing training to volunteers who become champions of workplace inclusion. No less than thirty departments and agencies are implementing the initiative, and many have gone a step further to include those involved as departmental LGBT champions, alongside their statutory employment equity counterpart groups (women, people with disabilities, Indigenous peoples and visible minorities) as part of their regular corporate machinery to promote employee diversity and inclusion. This year, at the initiative of our thriving, employee-driven Pride Network, the Department is beginning to organize for “Positive Space”, which should see training roll out across our network, including in missions. This is important since for many locally engaged staff, this may be the only such safe space they have access to. Another recent and important visible demonstration of the Department’s growing commitment to LGBT people, including among its staff, was the decision to join our own missions around the world to fly the Pride banner from headquarters this year on the International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia.

The private sector has been leading the way for corporate diversity and inclusion initiatives, with the benefits to any organization’s bottom line of a diverse and engaged workforce becoming increasingly apparent. Initiatives across the talent pipeline, from recruitment and retention of specific groups, including the LGBT community, to their mentoring, upward promotion and leadership development, are moving forward across the country. Increasingly, in both the private and public sectors, the culture of authenticity as a leadership style is being acknowledged, and for the LGBT community, this means not leaving an important part of your identity at home – or back in Canada. Currently, the handful of brave Canadian HOMs who are visibly serving their country in partnership with their same-sex spouses are doing so of their own volition and not in response to any incentives; the all-too-familiar burdens on diplomatic spouses are often magnified and multiplied for same-sex partners and their families.

GAC LGBTQ2+ Pride Network

Employees at Global Affairs Canada (GAC) recently launched a volunteer-run group to represent the LGBTQ2+ community within the Department, called the Pride Network. The Network aims to foster a workplace inclusive of employees of all sexual orientations and gender identities. It is open not only to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning and two-spirit people, but to all GAC employees who support these objectives. Members of the Network share ideas and information, arrange social events and networking opportunities, discuss issues of concern, and promote equality in the department.

The current co-chairs Melanie Bejzyk and David Da Silva are available to answer questions and would be delighted to hear of expressions of interest.

This brings us to a second identifiable need. The number of rotational positions abroad where staff and their families can serve while enjoying full recognition for their diplomatic status can be augmented, while also enhancing the quality of information available to them regarding conditions they will face. Our like-minded partners, including the European Union and the United States, clearly view their efforts to gain LGBT accreditation as filling a broader policy need and enhancing their overseas reputation. The State Department annually instructs all of its missions to lobby to increase the number of assignment opportunities for gay and lesbian, as well as transgender, staff and has undertaken this advocacy in capitals, under successive administrations, and at the most senior levels. As a result, more countries offer accreditation and the diplomatic immunity it brings to U.S. diplomats than is available to their Canadian counterparts. As attitudes in many countries around the world slowly shift for the better, much of this distance can be covered simply by making regular, formal requests of host authorities. Some missions have taken the initiative themselves or partnered with like-minded countries, but clear direction needs to come from headquarters, and efforts are now underway to provide it more regularly.

As the stigma associated with same-sex relationships lifts, we need to acknowledge that it cannot be easy or painless for those whose lives were ruined generations ago to relive such suffering once again in the telling.

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The LGBTQ2 Pride flag flies at the Pearson Building to mark the International Day against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia.

Finally, the Department now has the opportunity to confront the legacy of its past and participate meaningfully in the Government’s planned apology, expected later this year. Before leaving office in January, U.S. Secretary of State Kerry issued a formal apology to LGBT staff “who were impacted by the practices of the past”, including discrimination against job applicants and forced resignations of employees on the basis of perceived sexual orientation, which “were wrong then, just as they would be wrong today.” Here in Canada, last November, the Government named Member of Parliament Randy Boissonnault as Special Advisor to the Prime Minister on LGBTQ2 Issues with a mandate to address current and historical discrimination against this community. In March, he announced that the Government would apologize to LGBTQ2 communities before the end of the year for actions it took, including those against thousands of workers in the Canadian military and public service, notably from our Department, during the Cold War era.

This presents an excellent opportunity for meaningful engagement and recognition of historical suffering, both of our colleagues at all levels, including among the best and brightest, and also of their partners and lifetime companions who, through the rotational nature of our work, were made to continue to live as ghosts, well after the arrests and firings had stopped. For this to be most meaningful, and so that future generations do not repeat the mistakes of the past, those affected may wish to share with us their stories – and even their names.

As the stigma associated with same-sex relationships lifts, we need to acknowledge that it cannot be easy or painless for those whose lives were ruined generations ago to relive such suffering once again in the telling. Only through confronting the past, however, and planning consciously and proactively for a better future, can we hope to exorcise every ghost once and for all.

Mark Allen served as Executive Director of Human Rights and Indigenous Affairs Policy at Global Affairs Canada. As a Canadian Foreign Service officer, he had served abroad in Rwanda and the United Kingdom. He had also served as Canada’s Permanent Representative to the International Civil Aviation Organization in Montreal.

We Believed: How Canada Resettled 25,000 Syrian Refugees in Three Months

by Zal Karkaria

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Syrian families wait to be interviewed at the Canadian settlement processing centre in Amman, Jordan.

The mood was somber amongst the small group of officers meeting to discuss lessons learned. We huddled in the middle of a massive airplane hangar, cold, hungry, tired and overwhelmed. It was past 7 p.m., and the last families of refugees interviewed on that first day were just leaving the building. Plastic chairs were being stacked along partition walls. Staff lingered outside, chatting and smoking as they waited for their buses to leave. A vacuum cleaner whirred somewhere in the distance.

We went over the accomplishments of our huge team, consisting of staff from various Government of Canada departments and the International Organization for Migration (IOM). We had successfully interviewed, fingerprinted and photographed 250 refugees in one day, a seemingly impressive number. We had even completed the painstaking task of filling in their lengthy immigration forms. But we had finished very late – too late – and needed to get a lot faster at running the refugees through our makeshift processing center if we were going to meet the 10,000-person target assigned to Amman by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) headquarters in Ottawa. 250 was great, but in just three more days, that number would need to double. The question lingered in our minds as we discussed the first day of operations in Amman: how on earth were we going to process 500 Syrian refugees per day for one month straight in a frigid airplane hangar on the northern edge of Amman? And if we couldn’t figure out the answer to that question, how would IRCC meet the government’s publicly announced pledge to resettle a mind-boggling 25,000 Syrian refugees by February 29th?

It is difficult to overstate the challenge presented by the newly elected Liberal government’s plan, dubbed Operation Syrian Refugees (OSR). It called for identifying, interviewing, vetting, medically clearing, transporting to Canada and then housing 25,000 Syrian refugees in a space of around three months. It would mean establishing operation centres from scratch in three countries at once – Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon – on the periphery of a calamitous civil war in the heart of the Middle East; undertaking thousands of laborious, lengthy interviews, including many involving complex security issues; chartering dozens of planes during the holiday season and finding thousands of homes for the newly-arrived refugees in Canada in the dead of winter; resettling in three months close to the number of refugees Canada normally resettles in two years; and mobilizing hundreds of Government of Canada officials and deploying scores overseas. Ultimately, for the 2015–16 fiscal year, IRCC personnel completed 1,111 weeks on assignments related to resettling Syrian refugees, equivalent to 254 months or 21 years of work.

Visa officers have a proud tradition of processing refugees from across the globe, often under very challenging conditions. Whether in muggy Southeast Asia, the remotest parts of the Horn of Africa or war-torn corners of the Middle East, visa officers have answered the call of duty for decades.

After the October elections, it became evident that the Trudeau government was serious about its election promise to resettle 25,000 Syrian refugees by the end of 2015.

The general sense within IRCC was that this was impossible. Different plans were floated and then wisely discarded, notably the one to transport refugees on massive cruise ships and process them while they sailed across the Atlantic. Though elegant in theory – the refugees could be interviewed and medically cleared en route and then remain on the boats while docked in Canada until proper housing was found – it featured a fatal flaw: what to do if a refugee was rejected by a visa officer while chugging toward Canada in the middle of the ocean? As such, there was widespread relief when, in early November, it was announced internally that the deadline was extended to February 29, 2016 and that plans were being drawn up to charter planes and not boats. Visa officers immediately began to parachute into the Middle East. But even the new target presented a massive challenge.

Luckily, resettling refugees was nothing new for the department. Visa officers have a proud tradition of processing refugees from across the globe, often under very challenging conditions. Whether in muggy Southeast Asia, the remotest parts of the Horn of Africa or war-torn corners of the Middle East, visa officers have answered the call of duty for decades. They had already undertaken other large-scale refugee resettlement projects, including the ones to bring Hungarian, Chilean, Ugandan, Indochinese and Kosovar refugees to Canada during the second half of the 20th century. Visa officers have been selecting immigrants since the 1800s, playing a behind-the-scenes role in building our country.

What made OSR unique were the timelines, described variously as “ill-advised”, “crazy” or, simply, “impossible”. There were also logistical challenges, including a massive one presented by Transport Canada regulations prohibiting direct flights from Lebanon. This meant that the planeloads of refugees departing from Beirut would have to change planes somewhere on the way to Canada – Amman was eventually chosen as the transit location – adding a time and resource-consuming complication to the transport logistics. Foreign Service Officers and other government officials spent hours adding and deleting names on flight manifests, sending emails back and forth between Beirut, Amman and Ottawa and overseeing the boarding and unloading of the planes. It meant a lengthy and difficult journey for the refugees that began with a bus from their temporary home in Lebanon many hours before their first flight, and ended with touchdown at a cold Canadian airport countless hours later.

The Special Operations Forces Exhibition, or SOFEX, is a cavernous airplane hangar on the outskirts of Amman. It shares a runway with Marka Airport, where the refugees would be boarding their flights to Canada. It was an unorthodox refugee processing centre to say the least. Normally used to park planes and play host to multi-day arms fairs, the facility was offered to Canada as a possible venue for OSR by the Jordanian government. SOFEX was located in a bleak part of Amman, far from attractions, restaurants or suitable hotels. But SOFEX proved an inspired choice and was an important factor in the Amman Operation’s overall success.

There were drawbacks, however: it was cold, drafty and leaky. Airplanes roared just outside, and noxious jet fumes sometimes drifted into the building. The food was mediocre. And birds sometimes dropped their business around the workstations, dangerously close to officers and refugees alike.

But all of these problems were manageable, and the exhibition hall had one quality that outweighed all disadvantages: its size. No matter how many people entered the complex, it never felt cramped. Hundreds of dividers were erected and different stations were set up: a vast waiting area, prayer room, daycare and diaper change area; form filling, interview and biometrics collection booths; medical examination and x-ray machine rooms; a section for office supplies, in a separate building in the back, basic offices and a conference table for the Director of the Operation and IT staff; and a “back office” for the visa processing operation, where files were tracked and finalized, and where every refugee case ready to be issued a visa and travel was squeezed out of the electronic system and flagged as soon as it appeared. There was even room left over for the original occupants of the hangar: two Jordanian Air Force planes parked inconspicuously at the rear of the building.

I found out I would be heading to Amman in mid-November. I packed my bags and traded my downtown Ottawa workplace for a temporary visa office in the middle of nowhere.

Prior to leaving Canada, I had spent the few days before my departure madly running around Ottawa, buying Christmas presents and stocking up the house with as many supplies as I could to reduce the burden on my spouse. Just before departing, I was given the assignment of “Logistics Lead” for the Amman operation. I had no idea what this meant and was terrified that whatever it was, I would not be very good at it.

Like the rest of the officials deployed to OSR, I learned on the job. While I am not sure if it was in fact logistics, in Jordan, I found myself performing tasks well outside the normal duties of a visa officer. Amongst many other things, I helped arrange shuttles for officers between the hotel and SOFEX, ordered office supplies and furniture, wrote reports and updates for headquarters, negotiated heating with venue management for the frigid hangar, tried to protect officers from the bird droppings, in addition to interviewing refugee families. I think I had the best job in Amman for those six weeks. Every day presented a new challenge and a new adventure; I even found myself in a room with the IRCC Minister during his second visit to Amman, briefing him on the operation, something normally unheard of for someone at my level. Whatever “Logistics Lead” was, it was the highlight of my career.

So at the end of that first tough day – which, on top of everything else, included the visit of three federal ministers to SOFEX – we didn’t despair, but instead worked on solutions and learned from our mistakes. Everybody got faster at their jobs, and by the middle of December, we were moving hundreds of refugees through SOFEX every day in an orderly fashion. Every department and organization involved played their part – CBSA set up shop near the entrance, pre-screening applicants and flagging any issues to interviewing officers; Canadian Armed Forces personnel efficiently ushered refugees through the maze of trade-show dividers that enclosed the various stations; Global Affairs monitored the fragile IT systems and mobilized transport; and IOM, contracted by the government of Canada to assist with OSR, filled forms, provided interpretation and kept us supplied with food and tea, amongst many other tasks.

It helped that the team was excellent, including experienced officers such as Sian Upton. Sian approaches her work with fierce devotion tinged with the weariness one might expect from someone who has spent years involved in refugee processing while moving from one hardship post to another. She was part of the small team that initially designed the Amman Operation Centre and also managed IRCC’s relationship with UNHCR Jordan. We had presented the UN refugee agency with the unprecedented challenge of feeding Canada’s refugee referral pipeline at a massively accelerated pace, and the relationship required a diplomatic and practical hand.

Sian was a crucial resource on the ground, owing to her local expertise. She had just completed a two-year posting in Amman; before that, she had helped shut down the Damascus refugee program in 2012 and subsequently started the refugee program in Beirut. Thus, she had recent, on-the-ground experience with Syrian refugees, and so, along with partner agency personnel, knew the conflict. She was able to brief us on security and eligibility issues pertaining to this population. After completing her temporary duty (TD) in Amman, Sian returned to the Middle East to manage the Beirut Operations Centre and thus had the privilege of participating in the OSR project in both Jordan and Lebanon.

Sian guided officers through the interview template, a thorough document sometimes cursed for its length and seemingly tedious detail. But while following the template line-for-line could be excruciating for both interviewer and interviewee alike, doing so ensured a rigorous examination. With visa officers assigned the front-line responsibility of screening out refugees who may pose a safety or security risk to Canada, the better-safe-than-sorry template provided a critical tool for ensuring that decisions were sound.

Though conditions in Amman were unusual, there were even greater challenges in Beirut. Lebanon has not had a properly functioning parliament since 2014. The government is unable to even arrange garbage collection for the citizens of its largest city, and large chunks of Beirut – including the airport area – are controlled by the militant group Hezbollah. There was the issue of flight routing, and obtaining exit permits in Lebanon was complex, compared to Amman, where the Jordanian authorities agreed to issue exit permits to the refugees at the airport just prior to departure. And whereas Canada had nearly exclusive use of the quiet commercial departure area at Marka Airport in Amman, in Beirut, flights had to run out of the chaotic commercial terminal.

Like me, Paul Jamieson was not sure what he was going to be doing when he was told to pack his bags for Beirut. He had lots of experience processing refugees in Africa and the Middle East so he was well-placed to assist. He also knew Syria, having been posted to Damascus on his first overseas assignment. However, the six weeks he spent in Beirut were like nothing he had experienced before. A blur of late-night taxi rides, frantic negotiations, tedious data entry and very little sleep, Paul and his partner, Gary Wallace, ensured that the planes taking off from Beirut were filled. They were the liaison between the Beirut Ops Centre and the IOM, taking on the role of co-Departures Lead.

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Children’s drawings at the Amman airport, while they await their flight.

By the time Paul arrived in late November, Gary – a member of the Foreign Service since 2004 – was already a veteran of the makeshift Beirut operation. He had been dispatched to Lebanon in early October (before the federal election) as part of a wave of officers who were to implement a Conservative government plan to increase the number of Syrian refugees resettled in Canada. However, the Departures assignment was far different from the interviewing he had been doing until then. Gary and Paul found themselves thrust into a role where time pressures were immense and the margin of error, razor thin. One night early on in the operation, they were confronted with the alarming news that 17 exit permits for an extended family of refugees had not made it to the airport for a flight due to depart imminently. At 1 a.m., the pair jumped in a Beirut “white taxi” and sped off to Lebanese General Intelligence Service (GIS) headquarters on the edge of Hezbollah territory. Barred from entering and with gunfire echoing in the distance, Gary and Paul conducted what Gary called “sidewalk diplomacy”, talking their way into the heavily guarded compound and into a meeting with the officer in charge of the permits. After some tense discussions, the permits were released, and the relieved visa officers rushed to the airport with a police escort, pulling up to the doors with a screech of tires. The flight had been held, and the 17 Syrians were able to board and travel to their new lives in Canada. Both officers are convinced that their unorthodox methods on that stressful night cemented their relationship with the GIS and, crucially, the IOM.

Indeed, the unsung heroes of the operation were the tireless staff of both IOM (which has been around for over half a century, providing services and advice to governments on migrants) and the UNHCR. As Gary Wallace put it in reference to IOM staff, “for every 23 hours we worked, they worked 24”. To describe these organizations as crucial partners in OSR is an understatement: they were essential and irreplaceable in all three locations. IOM took on responsibilities big and small, everything from ordering staples to chartering planes. Staff were always on call, professional and courteous, impressing everyone involved in the operation. Their dedication ensured its success.

Meanwhile, the UNHCR also played an integral role in making OSR possible. UNHCR Staff worked nights and on weekends, sending tens of thousands of text messages to prospective candidates for Canada’s refugee resettlement program. They then pre-screened the thousands who signalled interest; personally explained Canada’s OSR program to them; and helped negotiate exit permits with local governments.

Tyler Arrell had returned to Ottawa after an eventful decade abroad during which he oversaw the closure of IRCC’s visa office in Tehran and managed the network’s busiest Temporary Resident Unit in Beijing, where he oversaw huge changes in the distribution of processing work throughout the IRCC network, earning a PAFSO award for his innovative work. Perhaps hoping for a more mundane assignment after two years in the Beijing pressure cooker, he returned to Ottawa in August as a Senior Analyst for Refugee Resettlement. Instead of a 37.5-hour work week and strolls along the Rideau Canal, Tyler found himself working evenings and weekends almost from the moment he stepped into the hospital-green corridors of IRCC headquarters. Tyler began his assignment mere days before the photo of the lifeless body of Alan Kurdi was published around the world, thrusting refugee resettlement into the middle of the Canadian federal election campaign and to the top of the priority list for IRCC. It was an extremely busy time for anyone involved in refugee affairs within the department.

Once the election was over, Tyler’s work only intensified. He helped engineer the massive refugee processing machine that had to be constructed on the fly in order to meet the newly elected government’s pledge to resettle 25,000 refugees by the end of February. Once constructed, Tyler found himself at the very centre of this huge apparatus. He was a crucial component that provided direction to the operations on the ground in the Middle East, briefed senior managers, gave instructions to other government departments involved in the operation and liaised with staff leading the in-Canada side of the operation. He was a walking-talking command centre, and he worked non-stop for weeks, breaking occasionally for a few hours rest in his flat, conveniently located a mere block away from the office. His work is a reminder that visa officers and other officials served the operation proudly in Canada as well as overseas.

The operation in Turkey presented logistical challenges of its own, ones that ultimately led to it being wrapped up after only a few weeks. The Ops Centre was set up in Adana, close to the Syrian border in southern Turkey, but hundreds of miles away from where the refugees to be processed were located. It was also far from the nearest Canadian mission (located in Ankara), unlike the operations in Beirut and Amman, cities that also host visa offices. Because of security concerns, the visa officers assigned to Adana were not permitted to leave their hotel. Despite these challenges – or perhaps because of them – the Adana Ops Centre introduced unique operational procedures that leveraged the one advantage it had over both Amman and Beirut, and even Ankara: a fast, reliable Internet connection.

The backbone of IRCC operations is its unloved electronic file management system, GCMS (Global Case Management System). Clunky and bandwidth-hungry, it has endured its fair share of curses and insults since its deployment overseas in 2010. However, deployed effectively and connected to a reliable Internet provider, it can be a powerful tool for just the type of operation Adana needed in order to deal with its unique logistical challenges.

Innovative staff developed a unique solution to the problems they faced: they went paperless. IRCC forms were completed by IOM at a facility in Gaziantep, closer to where the refugees were living, and then uploaded into GCMS. Fingerprints were taken simultaneously and also uploaded into the system. This saved huge amounts of time (and countless trees). When the refugees finally appeared for the interview, visa officers needed to simply open the electronic file where they found all the information they needed to process the application. With two screens open, it was easy to navigate between the forms and GCMS. This innovative approach, after a brief period of skepticism, was enthusiastically supported by the Adana officers.

Despite such innovations and a strong spirit of camaraderie amongst the staff in Adana, the decision was made to wind down the operation earlier than expected. The logistics were too daunting, and the security of staff was a concern. Despite the inconvenience of being holed up in a hotel for weeks on end, staff were disappointed, and many would have preferred to push on in Adana. There were a few tears, the intensity of the previous weeks and the exhaustion that had built up overwhelming some staff. Many were flown to Beirut or Amman to join the operations there, while others headed home.

A few went back to their postings in Ankara, where they set up a smaller “pop-up” Operations Centre staffed by 6–8 officers. They worked long hours through the bleak winter months, closing up shop at the end of February after having successfully interviewed around 2,500 refugees to go along with the 1,800 or so interviewed in Adana.

Operation Syrian Refugees succeeded due to strong cooperation between various government departments, the herculean efforts of IOM and UNHCR, and the leadership and dedication of the staff involved, including the Foreign Service Officers who conceived and managed much of the operation in Ottawa and overseas. The operation was exhausting – staff worked long days and through weekends, and spent the holiday season on the job away from their families. Many went home burnt out and sick, the adrenaline of the mission finally draining from within them as their assignment wound down. But officers interviewed for this story expressed pride in what was accomplished and admiration for their colleagues. The team I worked with in Amman impressed me every day with their enthusiasm, professionalism, creativity, and stamina in myriad ways. As one officer described it: “People really believed – as a result, they delivered.”

And what was it they believed? That bringing these refugees to Canada was the right thing to do. As Sian told me, “I can’t think of a richer working environment, or of a project that was so meaningful that we felt it in our bones.” Concerns were expressed amongst us about the pace of the work, the stress on the refugees having to move to Canada so quickly and how they would manage and settle once they arrived, but there was a strong sense that this was an historic mission, whether we worked for the Canadian Armed Forces, IRCC, Global Affairs Canada, the Canada Border Service Agency or another department or partner such as IOM.

Whatever reservations we may have had, there was no doubt that the refugees we were resettling needed help. The stories they told us made this abundantly clear. The narratives become depressingly familiar: the lives of innocent families shattered; friends and relatives killed; parents unable to get to work through an unpredictable and dangerous maze of checkpoints; arbitrary arrest and detention, and for the unlucky, torture and beatings; random shelling and bombing; finally, a building dangerously close to home destroyed by the war, making it clear it had become too dangerous to stay at home. Families scattered – a sister in Lebanon, in-laws in Turkey, a brother in Germany.

A life on the edge in the country of asylum – irregular work on a building site or driving a taxi; more ominously, daughters married off at increasingly young ages to reduce the financial burden on the family.

Life in Canada will be challenging for these families – many don’t speak English or French, have limited education and know little of the world outside the towns and villages they fled. But the children they brought with them will enrol in school; they will quickly learn the language, make friends, attend birthday parties, and join a sports team. Their parents may struggle, but the children will be given the opportunity to flourish and contribute to their new country.

Thus, the mission to resettle these refugees – exhausting, exhilarating, extraordinary – was a nation-building one, in many ways the job we, as visa officers, have always done, albeit at a vastly accelerated pace. Entrusted with the responsibility to select the immigrants that will help tell the next chapters of Canada’s unfolding story as a nation, visa officers are proud to have been entrusted with such a noble and important task.

Zal Karkaria has been a member of the Foreign Service since 2004. He has undertaken assignments in Nairobi and New Delhi. At the time of publication, he was posted to London as the Risk Assessment Officer for IRCC.

Defending Democracy
in Honduras

by Neil Reeder

When I became Head of Mission in Costa Rica in the fall of 2007 (cross-accredited to Honduras and Nicaragua), Honduras hardly seemed a likely setting for Canadian diplomatic activism. This was to change dramatically.

Months of political crisis and street confrontations were to follow the early morning removal from office of President Zelaya by the military on June 28, 2009. Honduras suddenly became a focus of intense regional diplomacy, of debate in the Organization of American States (OAS), and of international media attention as images of violence on the streets of Tegucigalpa and other parts of the country beamed out to the international community. Canada came to play a central role in attempts to resolve the crisis due to a number of convergent and coincidental factors, consistent with the Government’s enhanced engagement with the region under our Americas Strategy.

What transpired in Honduras on the 28th and in following months has been widely debated. Regional experts will argue for years about responsibility for what happened and the rationale behind the intervention of the Armed Forces to remove Zelaya (on orders from the country’s Supreme Court and with the support of the Honduran Congress). He was replaced by Roberto Micheletti, President of the Congress and next in line under the constitution.

The signs of tension were all there in the months leading up to the crisis. Honduras returned to civilian rule in 1982 after over 20 years of military-dominated governments. It continued to suffer from chronically weak political institutions with deep political and class cleavages, extreme disparities in income and among the weakest socio-economic indicators in the Americas. National institutions proved incapable of coping with the severe pressures generated by tensions between Zelaya and other branches of government.

Following presidential primaries (declared free and fair by the OAS), Zelaya pushed for a controversial public consultation on constitutional reform. Many believed he meant to open the door to his re-election, which is not permitted under the Honduran constitution. Zelaya was sent into exile. Members of the Honduran middle and upper classes, business community and elites argued the intervention by the military was a legal “constitutional succession” necessary to remove a President who had violated the Constitution. However, a significant number of Hondurans, primarily campesinos, unions, teachers and blue collar workers close to President Zelaya, protested strongly. They developed a resistance movement seeing these events as a golpe de estado against a democratically-elected President.

In a region where many countries are consolidating democratic institutions after decades of military dictatorship, the Honduran crisis opened up old wounds and debates. It also raised fundamental questions about the responsibility of governments and leaders to respect democratic and constitutional frameworks: while the forced removal of a sitting president is not acceptable it must also be recognized that even democratically-elected leaders are accountable and are not above the law and the constitution.

We ventured from the hotel – with private security personnel – only when it was safe, and met with diplomatic colleagues, civil society representatives, Catholic Church leadership and political observers.

After the crisis erupted Canada quickly stepped up. We engaged bilaterally and through regional institutions to restore democratic order, including the return of Zelaya to the presidency. Through various means we tried to convince the de facto regime under Micheletti to step down, but a solution could not be found despite our best negotiating efforts and those of international partners, and the pressures of extensive international sanctions against Honduras.

The de facto regime was to last seven months until the democratically-elected government of President Porfirio Lobo took office in January 2010 (following elections in November 2009). Thankfully, the crisis did not spiral out of control into serious violence or death, or spread to other countries. In the end, despite the trauma of what took place, the death toll and injuries from months of confrontations were limited by comparison to more traditional Latin American standards.

At a personal level, the first coincidence in this drama was that my wife Irene and I happened to be in Tegucigalpa the day of the coup. I was calling on Ministers and diplomats, and preparing to host the Canada Day reception a few days later. It was quickly cancelled. We proceeded to spend the next few days stuck in our hotel, monitoring the movements of soldiers and protestors in the streets below. Violent street clashes (including tear gas and water cannon) took place between pro-Zelaya protestors and security forces. Overhead, constant sorties by Honduran Air Force helicopters with gunships patrolled the area near the President’s palace, a major site of demonstrations a block from the hotel. Military personnel and police were stationed in large numbers in strategic locations throughout the capital and the country; a dawn to dusk curfew was put in place for a number of days. It made life extremely difficult for the local population. The curfew was on and off for months on end.

In this volatile environment, my initial instructions from HQ were clear: stay put, stay safe, find out what is going on, report back as needed and wait for further instructions. Keep a close eye on the mission staff, mostly from the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), as well as resident Canadians and our business community. We worked out of the hotel and the nearby Embassy office with excellent support from colleagues in the Honduran capital, Tegucigalpa, and from our mission in San José, Costa Rica. We engaged with local interlocutors, keeping attuned to news sources and information (at those times when the de facto authorities permitted Internet service and television broadcasts in what was a heavily censored environment). We ventured from the hotel – with private security personnel – only when it was safe and met with diplomatic colleagues, civil society representatives, Catholic Church leadership and political observers.

Thus began an important but little noticed chapter in Canadian diplomatic history. We benefitted from a truly whole of government approach to crisis management, with the leadership of DFAIT Americas colleagues including Assistant Deputy Minister Alex Bugailiskis, Director General James Lambert and Central America & Caribbean Director Alexandre Leveque and his capable team. We cooperated closely with DFAIT Headquarters and key partners such as CIDA, with our OAS mission headed by Graeme Clark, and with a network of key Embassies in the region. Our consular staff in San José and Tegucigalpa, under Management and Consular Officer Julia McNeill, worked closely to ensure the safety of Canadians.

I benefitted from extensive support from CIDA staff in Honduras, particularly from the Head of Aid, Daniel Arsenault. Mission staff in Honduras helped us prepare our daily situation reports, messages and demarches, and monitor the security situation. The CIDA Post Support Unit contributed political scenarios and analyses given their strong networks into the local communities particularly in the countryside. We also benefitted from PERPA temporary duty officers from Caracas, Mexico City and Buenos Aires – an example of the New Business Model in terms of aligning resources with highest priorities to help out a small mission in time of crisis.

At the political level, Peter Kent (our former Minister of State of Foreign Affairs for the Americas) – played a key role throughout the crisis. He relished the opportunity to engage and show leadership, drawing upon his own extensive background as a former television correspondent in Latin America. He was engaged in this crisis from the beginning. He took part in the OAS debate in early July 2009 that led to the suspension of Honduras from the OAS and participated in two Foreign-Minister level OAS missions to Honduras led by OAS Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza. The Minister engaged directly with Zelaya and Micheletti, advocating a solution at regional meetings and during his bilateral visits. I believe OAS Secretary General Insulza saw Canada, along with countries like Jamaica and Panama, as moderate and well-respected regional players that could undertake an important “broker” role; he brought us into the OAS conciliation effort early on.

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Carlos Lopez Contreras, Honduran de facto Minister of Foreign Affairs, Minister of State Kent and Victor Meza, Head negotiator for Honduran President Manuel Zelaya, at the inaugural session of a national dialogue seeking to find a solution to the political crisis in Honduras.

During my second and last meeting with President Zelaya he spoke warmly of the role of Minister Kent and Canada throughout the crisis, including his months of refuge at the Brazilian Embassy (after he made a surprise return to Honduras on September 21 and sought refuge there). It was the very day he was given safe passage to the Dominican Republic. He said some of his most important memories from the “struggle” he had gone through were the “timely and important calls” he received from the “Canadian Minister”. Zelaya thanked me for Canada’s “principled position” and our “solidarity” with the Honduran people in our efforts to promote dialogue and political reconciliation, and to implement the Tegucigalpa-San José Accord.

Throughout the months after the coup, Canada’s efforts were meant to restore democratic order including the return of Zelaya to the presidency. We pushed for signature of the Tegucigalpa-San José Accord between representatives of Zelaya and Micheletti, a comprehensive agreement with a road map forward to reconciliation. It built upon the initial mediation efforts of then-President Oscar Arias of Costa Rica. However, this agreement proved stillborn shortly after signature as it provided too much flexibility and not enough deadlines (or detail) on compliance. Neither of the camps proceeded to implement its provisions. They blamed the other for its failure. However, reflecting the regard for Canada and our key role in this negotiation process, I was invited to witness the signing of the Accord both in my capacity as the Canadian representative and President of the G-16 Group of Donors.

In this volatile environment, my initial instructions from HQ were clear: stay put, stay safe, find out what is going on, report back as needed and wait for further instructions.

The importance of the donor community in Honduras deserves mention. It is an understated lever that may have relevance in future crises in other countries. Canada has been a major donor there for over 40 years, providing over $400 million in official development assistance. In another coincidence, we took over the six-month rotating presidency of the Group of 16 donors on the very day after the removal of Zelaya from power; our term as donor President was to coincide with the worst moments of the political crisis.

Donors are an important constituency in Honduras but never really played to their strength until this crisis. International assistance to Honduras totals $650 million annually and constitutes 18% of the national budget. By force of circumstance and due to the intense engagement of donor nations, the G-16 became a key player in information gathering and advancing a peaceful resolution to the conflict, and in pressuring the de facto regime through aid restrictions and sanctions.

Carlos Lopez Contreras, Honduran de facto Minister of Foreign Affairs, Minister of State Kent and Victor Meza, Head negotiator for Honduran President Manuel Zelaya at the inaugural session of a national dialogue seeking to find a solution to the political crisis in Honduras.

Under Canadian leadership donors engaged key players including the Resistencia movement supporting President Zelaya’s return, civil society, human rights organizations, the business community, the Catholic Church and important evangelical movements. Donors took a pro-active public position, communicating regularly to the Honduran public on the need for accommodation and reconciliation between the two camps, and for greater respect for human rights. We pressured the regime to actively investigate reports of human rights abuses. In so doing we worked closely with regional and international human rights officials, including the Inter-American Human Rights Commission, whose work and reports in this period were stellar.

Another coincidence in timing that helped position Canadian leadership was that then-Ambassador Graeme Clark also presided over the OAS Permanent Council, the main decision-making body in the organization. We were in the chair in early July when the tough debates and decisions on Honduras had to be taken, including the suspension of Honduran membership in the OAS (because a disruption in the democratic order in the country had taken place).

I cannot understate how our contribution during this crisis was appreciated across Honduran society, irrespective of one’s position on the origins of the crisis. At the 2010 Canada Day reception (my last in Tegucigalpa before returning to Canada), I was struck by the outpouring of emotion and recognition for our role from both Ministers and other guests, including the kind words for our Ministerial engagement. That high esteem for Canada also was reflected in the decision of President Lobo to nominate Michael Kergin as one of two International Commissioners on the Peace and Reconciliation Commission he set up shortly after taking office. Michael is a well known former Ambassador to Washington and career foreign service officer; he played a very constructive role in the work of the Commission, which submitted its report this spring.

The Honduran drama is still not over, Zelaya remains in exile, but a healing process and a national dialogue on what happened and lessons learned from the crisis is underway (Honduras remained suspended from the OAS until June of this year). The Honduran crisis also continues to be a hot button issue in the hemisphere, provoking serious differences of opinion among regional governments. Nonetheless, consistent with our fundamental objective of promoting respect for democracy and human rights in the hemisphere, Canada’s role was widely appreciated both in the region and in Honduras.

In the longer-term there is a need to consolidate democracy in Honduras and strengthen trust in national institutions. Citizens need to engage in civil, peaceful discussion on sensitive issues such as constitutional reform. While we can all agree that the ouster of democratically-elected governments is not acceptable, at the same time democratically-elected governments and leaders cannot assume they are omnipotent and act above the law and the constitution, or try and manipulate the constitution once in office, in order to remain in power. That remains an ongoing, broader challenge for Canada and its hemispheric neighbours, across the Americas.

LESSONS LEARNED

Canada counts internationally, and we have a positive image in the Americas. Sometimes we forget this. We also are unique: a North American actor neither American, nor Latino nor Caribbean.

Ministerial engagement is key; our Minister for the Americas played a high-profile role from the outset, appreciated and constructive.

Donors in heavily aid-dependent countries like Honduras have more influence than they may think and should not be shy to act in support of democratic principles and practice.

CIDA programming can pay off politically – 40 years of ODA to Honduras has made us a major and respected player in the donor community.

All mission staff must contribute in a crisis: no stovepipes, all hands on board. Staff including OGD representatives can help manage operations with their varied skill sets.

Close cooperation and communication with HQ and across the missions involved is key.

We largely failed to communicate our independent role to Canadian media, academic circles and NGO pundits. Although seen positively by most Hondurans and regionally, and reported by international media, some Canadian observers criticized our engagement and failed to appreciate the nuanced and effective role we played. This inability or unwillingness to grasp the complexity of the crisis led to simplistic if not erroneous assessments that Canada was not taking a principled position in support of a democratically elected government.

The crisis showed the limitations of the OAS and its sanctions mechanisms; once Honduras was suspended and prevented from receiving development funding from regional IFIs, the OAS’ powder was dry and had little influence on the de facto regime.

The UN was not a player, it saw the crisis as a regional problem for the OAS and not a threat to international peace and security (although local UN officials were engaged throughout the crisis).

Some countries exploited the crisis to discredit U.S. leadership and undermine the OAS in favour of narrow national interests or to benefit opposing regional organizations.

President Obama sought a consensual role, working through multilateral institutions like the OAS. This was not what Honduran elites expected or wanted, and they were somewhat disappointed with U.S. diplomacy.

Smart sanctions are key. Canada and others imposed sanctions but none had immediate impact except the cancellation of U.S. visas for regime leaders. It hurt Micheletti, his Cabinet and others involved in the coup with family and property in the U.S. Regardless, backed by Honduran elites and armed forces the regime did not budge until Zelaya’s term was over.

Keep the foot on the accelerator – when a solution seemed near, regional partners trusted the two parties to act in good faith and abide by agreements. As international pressure eased, the parties delayed, obfuscated or put up roadblocks. Egos, enmity and distrust on both sides made it difficult to implement any deal. Had pressure been maintained throughout key periods, the crisis might have come out differently.

At the time of publication, Neil Reeder was Director General of the Latin America and Caribbean Bureau at DFAIT. From 2007–10 he served as Ambassador to Costa Rica, Nicaragua and Honduras.

“Get the Bridge” Real Life Diplomacy in Detroit

by Roy Norton

En septembre 2010, j’ai eu la chance de devenir consul général à Détroit, à la suite de deux mandats à notre ambassade à Washington (tout récemment à titre de ministre responsable des relations avec le Congrès et des relations publiques et intergouvernementales) et deux affectations au niveau de SMA au sein du gouvernement de l’Ontario. Détroit s’est révélée une expérience enrichissante sur le plan professionnel, au point de m’inciter à partager avec les lecteurs quelques perspectives personnelles de la diplomatie dans la « vraie vie » sur le terrain.

If Canada is “top of mind” in Detroit, it is for good reason: the most important border crossing between our two countries is here; Canada’s and Ontario’s ownership position in GM and Chrysler gives us immediate standing; and, not least, commerce and investment flows between Canada and this four-state region are staggeringly high. However, transportation links have not kept pace – we badly need a new bridge. I expected that getting a new bridge across the Detroit River actually underway would not be easy. My expectations have been met! It turns out that doing the self-evidently right thing for the economic future of both sides of the border is not universally embraced in Michigan. However, with many allies in Michigan’s government and private sector (some longstanding, many newly cultivated), I believe real progress is being made. Common sense will prevail.

A little context: the transnational or “intermestic” nature of the Canada–U.S. relationship means our missions in the USA advocate on many objectives for which Foreign Affairs and International Trade does not have the policy lead. A new bridge across the Detroit River at Windsor, often described as “Canada’s #1 national infrastructure priority,” is one of those. The Detroit River International Crossing (DRIC) project (now referred to in Michigan as the New International Trade Crossing or NITC) has been in development by Transport Canada for more than a decade. The need was accentuated by greater screening and the advent of trusted traveller and cargo programs in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. Customs plazas at the existing Ambassador Bridge, especially on the Canadian side, simply can’t be expanded to deal with those new security realities or with anticipated traffic growth.

The Detroit-Windsor linkage is vital to the economies, today’s and tomorrow’s, of central Canada and the U.S. industrial heartland.

The Detroit-Windsor linkage is vital to the economies, today’s and tomorrow’s, of central Canada and the U.S. industrial heartland. It is the infrastructure centrepiece of the Canadian Government’s Continental Gateway – which complements the Government’s strategic Atlantic and Asia-Pacific Gateways. Fully 25% of all Canada–U.S. trade crosses the 83-year-old Ambassador Bridge (making it the most important border crossing, by value, in the world).

While Canada’s overall dependency on trade with the U.S. may be declining (relative to historic highs in the 1990s), trade with the U.S. nonetheless grew more than 20% in 2010 over 2009; traffic over the Ambassador Bridge was up 11%. Today, there are no satisfactory alternatives to a new bridge: the Blue Water Bridges at Sarnia-Port Huron carry 16% of all U.S.–Canada trade (and, essentially, are at capacity), and the Peace Bridge, at Fort Erie-Buffalo, is 360 miles away from Detroit and itself is awaiting the construction of a twin span.

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Roy Norton (left), Governor Snyder, and Perrin Beatty, President of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, who visited in March for Bridge advocacy.

In my view, it’s impossible to overstate the importance of the DRIC/NITC. More than a million Canadian jobs – overwhelmingly in Ontario and Quebec – depend on manufacturers’ and shippers’ ability to efficiently move goods at Windsor–Detroit. The four Midwest states for which the Consulate General in Detroit is responsible – Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, and Kentucky – themselves consume more than 15% of all Canadian exports to the world! Enduring uncertainty about the reliability of transportation options going forward could deter companies from locating (or expanding their operations) in this highly integrated cross-border economic region. The Government and Transport Canada (the lead department) are determined that a second route be created, or “strategic redundancy” be achieved, at Windsor–Detroit. If, for any reason, the Ambassador Bridge were to become inoperative for a protracted period, the unemployment implications would be catastrophic on both sides of the border.

Transport Canada has done a tremendous job of quickly securing all of the necessary concurrences from the Centre to permit me virtually unrestricted contact with the media throughout 2011 (notwithstanding the Canadian election).

A little history: The Canadian environmental review of DRIC was completed during Robert Noble’s tour as Consul General (2006–2010). He ensured that promoting Michigan’s embrace of this project became a major advocacy priority for the mission. Michigan’s then-Governor (Canadian-born Democrat Jennifer Granholm, 2003–2011) supported the concept during her second term, but invested limited energy or resources in bringing it to fruition. Michigan’s support is crucial: further to legislation passed by the U.S. Congress in 1972, new border crossings have had to be agreed, in the first instance, between Canada and the “receiving” state.

In the spring of 2010, the Hon. John Baird, then Transport Minister, took two unusual steps to move the project along. In recognition of Michigan’s parlous financial situation, he secured Cabinet approval to increase our equity stake in the project by up to $550 million (equivalent to Michigan’s share of the project), an amount Canada would recover later from toll revenues. He also testified before a Committee of the Michigan House of Representatives – something Canadian elected officials generally refrain from doing. The House subsequently endorsed the project. However, the legislation was never taken up in the Senate.

Fast-forward to the November 2010 Michigan elections. Venture capitalist Rick Snyder (Republican) was elected Governor; Senate Republicans strengthened their hold on the State Senate. Control of the Michigan House (whose Democratic majority passed the DRIC-authorizing legislation in May 2010) flipped to the Republicans.

Governor-elect Snyder took no position on the new bridge during the campaign (his Democratic opponent, who accepted campaign funds from the Ambassador Bridge Co., broke with Jennifer Granholm and opposed DRIC). Chuck Strahl, John Baird’s successor as Transport Minister, travelled to Lansing to meet Snyder during the period between Election Day and Inauguration Day (January 1). In his State-of-the-State Speech on January 19 (akin to the President’s State of the Union – or a Canadian Throne Speech), Snyder made extensive reference to Canada. He stunned Michigan’s body politic, including his own Republican Party, by making completion of the NITC (as he calls it) a high priority of his Administration.

However, he had a number of other major legislative priorities for his first months in office – passing a balanced budget and reconfiguring a tax structure that he felt was killing jobs, to name two. Something of a vacuum was thus created in the winter/spring which the owners of the Ambassador Bridge filled with a multi-million dollar advertising and public relations campaign designed to poison Michiganders against the NITC and get them to press legislators to vote against it. Objective analysts note that this campaign was in no way constrained by “truth in advertising” strictures.

Advocacy 24/7: On my selection as Head of Mission, then Minister Lawrence Cannon and Deputy Minister Len Edwards could not have been clearer about my top priority: “Get the Bridge”! With that mandate, yours truly has spent 2011 in non-stop bridge advocacy. Like any Head of Mission, I relish a scenario in which my key mandate dovetails precisely with a principal policy objective of the Head of Government of a jurisdiction to which I’m accredited. That’s been the case in Michigan during my first year. Close collaboration directly with the Governor and his Administration has been the order of the day.

At the time of writing, I have given more than 50 speeches to influential audiences across the state (including testimony to the Michigan Senate and the Detroit City Council). Supportive resolutions invariably emanate from the target audiences (e.g. local Chambers of Commerce) within weeks of my having had the opportunity to share the facts with them. It turns out that the need to build a new bridge is a classic “no-brainer” – unless, that is, you happen to own an 83-year-old bridge and are determined never to face competition.

Apart from giving speeches and holding many individual meetings with legislators in this campaign to reach out to key communities, I’ve also given more than 100 media interviews over the course of the year. Transport Canada has done a tremendous job of quickly securing all of the necessary concurrences from the Centre to permit me virtually unrestricted contact with the media throughout 2011 (notwithstanding the Canadian election). It’s been an outstanding example of tight, whole of government cooperation between a Consulate, Foreign Affairs Headquarters, and an “Other Government Department” with the policy lead on a major file.

Apart from the owners of the Ambassador Bridge (and the Michigan Tea Party organizations that they fund), virtually the entire Michigan private sector now supports the NITC. That includes Michigan’s Chamber of Commerce, Chambers in all major municipalities, the Detroit-3 auto assemblers + Toyota and Honda, major auto parts manufacturers, major West Michigan firms, all significant organizations representing Michigan agricultural producers, all major unions, and all major newspaper editorial boards. It’s noteworthy, however, that neither individually nor collectively are these organizations spending any significant sums in support of the NITC. As is often the case, the “anti-” side is highly motivated to protect vested interests while the “pro-” side, by contrast, largely leaves it to government to get the job done.

Challenges still abound: in a procedural vote at the responsible Senate Committee in mid-October, Michigan’s Lieutenant Governor (designated by Governor Snyder to be the lead) failed to secure sufficient votes to proceed. The Governor immediately called for a “cooling-off” period. Two weeks later, speaking at a conference in Ottawa organized by the U.S. Ambassador and Canada 2020, Governor Snyder publicly committed that the NITC will be built, with authorization coming “in months, not years.”

After 45 years or so, on a bridge built to last 125 years, Michigan should expect an annual return from toll revenues of approximately $50 million.

While still preferring legislative approval, it may be that even without it, the Governor could enter into an agreement with Canada to allow the bridge to be built (by a private contractor, according to a Public-Private Partnership model). That would be controversial and undoubtedly would be challenged by the Ambassador Bridge Co., whose owners are notoriously litigious. Assuming approval (whether by the Legislature or the Governor), Washington D.C., could soon become the next advocacy theatre. A presidential permit is required to proceed. The Obama Administration appears supportive, but has insisted on waiting for action in Michigan before officially embracing the project. Federal money will be required for the U.S. Customs Plaza; the Ambassador Bridge folks are already lobbying heavily in D.C. – and recently placed T.V. commercials in Iowa, presumably to influence Republican presidential candidates against the NITC.

Until such time as the bridge becomes a federal matter (with the Embassy assuming carriage of this issue), we can all reflect on the extent to which stopping things from proceeding seems, increasingly, so much easier than getting things done in the U.S. system. The bridge will cost Michigan nothing. The State will assume no liability associated with it. For the 4–5-year construction period, approximately 13,000 direct (and 25,000 indirect) jobs will be created in Michigan – a state with unemployment above the national average. A massively enhanced investment climate, once the NITC is completed, will entice industry to Michigan. “Insurance” will have been taken against the ramifications of potential catastrophic failure of the Ambassador Bridge (built in 1929 to last 50 years!). After 45 years or so, on a bridge built to last 125 years, Michigan should expect an annual return from toll revenues of approximately $50 million.

Advocating a cause that is a “no-brainer” like the DRIC/NITC may not seem glamorous, but that is real-life diplomacy as seen from Detroit. The stakes are high: never mind Canada’s interests, two million U.S. jobs depend on trade moving efficiently at the ageing Ambassador Bridge. The national interest of two G-8 countries can’t forever be held hostage to the self-interest of one company. I am hopeful we’ll get there soon – although probably not before this article goes to print. Getting there, though, is proving instructive – and for me, all consuming. It causes one to reflect on how challenging advocacy has become on key issues that aren’t “no-brainers”. The nature of diplomacy may be changing, but the need for professional diplomacy in pursuing the national interest seems as strong as ever.

At the time of publication, Roy Norton was Canada’s Consul General to Michigan, Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky – based in Detroit.

Last Days of DMCUS

by Andrew Turner

Malgré l’image populaire qui continue de véhiculer des longs métrages comme Argo, de plus en plus de diplomates canadiens ne sont que trop conscients du fait que l’évacuation d’une ambassade dans la vraie vie est beaucoup moins prestigieuse que Hollywood ne le dépeint. On passe beaucoup moins de temps à des sauvetages par hélicoptère qu’au déchiquetage de documents. Telle fut du moins mon expérience en mars 2012, lors de la fermeture de l’ambassade du Canada à Damas (Syrie) – DMCUS dans la nomenclature interne du MAECI. Compte tenu de la fréquence croissante à laquelle les diplomates canadiens doivent composer avec de tels scénarios, il y a quelques leçons utiles à tirer de l’article « Last Days of DMCUS » – surtout la nécessité de déployer tous les efforts voulus pour prêter assistance aux employés recrutés sur place (ERP), qui pourraient aider d’autres personnes susceptibles de se retrouver dans des circonstances semblables.

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Damascus Immigration Section, January 2012

Prior to the evacuation

I arrived in Syria in July 2011, several months after the start of the crisis, but just in time for Bashar Al Assad’s regime to launch a dramatic and violent intensification of its security crackdown to quell growing unrest. The Arab Spring reached Syria in March 2011, when the government’s heavy-handed response to what were very small incidents in the town of Dara’a triggered much larger protests that spread throughout the country. The Assad regime responded with military force and repression, which eventually pushed the peaceful protestors into taking up arms, transforming demands for limited political reforms into a full-fledged civil war. The tragic consequences of Assad’s obstinate brutality are likely to be felt in Syria for years to come.

For months, Damascus remained an isolated bubble, protected by the regime’s security forces; people carried on while much of the country descended into chaos. As things gradually deteriorated, many embassies started to reduce staff levels and evacuate families, particularly after a few orchestrated pro-regime demonstrators attacked several diplomatic missions, including France, Turkey, and the United States. While none of these incidents resulted in casualties or massive damage, clearly the regime could not be counted upon to respect its obligations under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations. It also imposed restrictions on diplomatic movements, effectively preventing diplomats from going anywhere in the country except for Damascus and, on rare occasions, Aleppo. Canadian and American diplomats were singled out, needing special permits to travel to Jordan and Lebanon.

In mid-December, DMCUS organized a month-long “voluntary evacuation” of Canadians from Syria. We offered extended hours and special procedures for processing documents for Canadians and their dependents returning to Canada. It was made clear that once the operation ended, the Embassy could not guarantee the provision of services – presciently as things turned out.

Later that month, several large bombs exploded in Damascus, raising concerns about possible terrorist attacks (whether the opposition or the regime was responsible for the bombings remains unclear). It was significant for us, given our exposed location on a major road, with very little setback to protect against car bombs. Moreover, our role as the regional hub for Citizenship and Immigration (CIC), combined with significant staff reductions at other countries’ embassies, meant that we were one of the largest diplomatic missions in Syria and a potentially tempting target. It was decided to close the CIC program and reduce to core staff by early February 2012.

By this point, security deteriorated even further. I often heard gunfire during my short walk to the Embassy, and awoke to the sound of explosions during the night – still distant but drawing closer. More and more, we found ourselves placed on security lockdown. The situation prompted the evacuation of several embassies – the US, UK, France, and Switzerland. Canada decided not to linger, and the evacuation of DMCUS began.

The evacuation

Fortunately, our evacuation resulted from a crisis that worsened over the course of nearly an entire year, giving us plenty of time to plan, organize, and practice procedures. That would not have been possible had the evacuation been triggered by a sudden, unexpected event. Advance planning helped us develop detailed contingency plans, familiarize people with unusual procedures (such as setting up alternate command posts (ACP) and using satellite phones), and identify any gaps. Details of the evacuation did not necessarily unfold as anticipated. Some scenarios (such as using an ACP) did not arise. However, with plans in place (even if we deviated from them when needed), chaos became much easier to manage without overlooking important details that otherwise could have been missed.

We will not always have sufficient advance warning to develop evacuation plans and training exercises, so more Canadian missions should prepare for such contingencies now. Planning needs to be as extensive as ours, and it is always difficult to prioritize contingency planning when we are faced with so many other competing demands, but advance preparation can literally make the difference between life and death in emergencies.

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Damascus Flag Lowering Ceremony, March 5, 2013

Fortunately, the decision to evacuate DMCUS was made well before the mobs were at our gates. We had time to implement our deliberate closure plan, rather than the 24-hour emergency scenario. Despite this, it was a very difficult and stressful operation that would not have been possible without the tremendous effort of the embassy staff, the support we received from other Canadian missions, people at HQ, and most especially the DMCUS LES. They not only faced the loss of employment (of over 20 years for some) and much of their social network, but witnessed their country descend into chaos and were often at personal risk due to the fighting in their neighbourhoods.

Despite our advance work, the evacuation decision triggered a total effort to meet the rapidly approaching deadline. With the departure of spouses and non-core staff, DMCUS was down to 10 CBS and approximately 20 LES from a team that had numbered around 100 people prior to the crisis. We were evacuating by land to Lebanon, which allowed us to bring a lot of valuable equipment and material to our mission in Beirut – but sadly meant that we did not actually get to smash very much! That left much work to be done: dismantling equipment, shredding documents, administering LES severance packages, making arrangements for a protecting power, organizing the evacuation convoy, sorting out our personal packing, coordinating with Ottawa, continuing to monitor the situation in Syria, and countless details.

The search for sensitive materials turned up a few real surprises, including a Hezbollah flag in an old filing cabinet. Most interesting to me were old diplomatic cables (and I encourage everyone to switch to a paperless office and electronic records immediately to cut down on shredding), about Hafez Al Assad’s death and Bashar’s succession to the presidency in 2000. They highlighted the considerable uncertainty surrounding the transition but hinted at optimism about the potentially reformist new leader – even their bleakest forecasts stopped far short of the catastrophe that the younger Assad has become. There was certainly no expectation that his actions would lead to the closure of DMCUS in little more than a decade.

I developed a healthy respect for “Murphy’s Law” as things that could go wrong frequently did. A fire alarm went off shortly after we finished shredding all the system guides/maps, forcing us to search the entire building to find the source. Once found, we could not notify anyone right away because we had already disconnected the phones! The SIM cards for several of the satellite phones intended to provide emergency communication for the convoy vehicles expired the day before we left. Our evacuation route to Lebanon nearly had to be abandoned due to a snowstorm in the mountains (trapping the Swiss evacuation convoy for nearly a day). Attention to detail kept minor hiccups from becoming major problems.

To avoid any possible reaction from the Assad regime, evacuation preparations were made in secret (to the extent possible). The scale of the operation made this nearly impossible, and we were not helped by some CBS posting farewell messages on Facebook. Explicit guidance on the use of social media is definitely called for: Syrian news reported our departure as we were preparing to drive away on the morning of March 5. Fortunately, the authorities chose not to interfere. Following a brief flag-lowering ceremony, our convoy set off for a thankfully uneventful drive to Beirut. I phoned my parents from the Syria-Lebanon border to let them know the evacuation was underway. It was an unusual conversation, anecdotal material for the annual family Christmas letter!

The LES and the evacuation

Our evacuation was successful, but we left the LES behind – newly unemployed in a collapsing economy facing conditions that we deemed too dangerous for us to live in. Normal staffing policies and procedures are not really designed for these types of situations. We quickly learned to cooperate closely with relevant HQ divisions (notably the Locally Engaged Staff Services Bureau) to ensure sufficient flexibility was incorporated in decision-making. Excessively rigid application of Foreign Service Directive provisions can create serious delays and inconveniences for CBS on issues of relocation, personal effects, and dependants. A similar rigidity on issues of LES severance can literally determine whether they will be able to feed their families. Happily, the support from HQ was outstanding. Between the CIC closure in January and the Mission closure in March, HQ made every effort to ensure timely decisions, immediate response to queries, early provision of severance information, flexible interpretation of policy and other actions to assist the LES.

Take severance pay. Our policy is to pay in local currency, but with civil unrest or other problems significant enough to force the evacuation and closure of an embassy, it is hardly surprising to find that the local currency often loses much of its value – precisely when the price of many basic commodities is increasing. Our LES requested that severance be paid in $US to preserve its value. While our policy normally precludes it, given extreme circumstances in Syria, HQ authorized such payment. This practical action sent a strong message of Canada’s commitment to our LES while acknowledging their very difficult circumstances.

As LES were let go through no fault of their own, the Mission decided not to rub salt in the wound. We eliminated the policy of individually escorting staff out of the Embassy once their employment was terminated. We sought to treat the LES as we would wish to be treated ourselves and consulted with them. They asked to be allowed to leave as a group, to preserve their dignity, support each other, and say farewell to their Canadian and Syrian friends. While key aspects of the evacuation – such as the date of our departure – were kept secret for security purposes, the LES were generally kept informed of what was happening and given the opportunity to provide input when possible. The staff literally worked up to the hour before closure, and we had no issues or concerns regarding their loyalty or security. They respected Canada and viewed the Embassy experience with great affection: both the CIC staff and the remaining LES asked for group photos before closure and created a “Former Employees of the Canadian Embassy” association.

For me, the three great lessons of our evacuation were: at the first sign of real trouble, plan ahead; work as closely as possible with HQ as we all wish to do the right thing; and, last but not least, treat the LES as you would want to be treated yourselves – their dilemma is almost certainly far worse than yours. As for Syria itself, once touched by its beauty and its people, the nightmare of its descent into chaos remains very hard to set aside. I should like to be there the day we reopen.

Andrew Turner joined DFAIT in 2002. He served as Political Counsellor in DMCUS from July 2011 until the evacuation in March 2012, returning to become Deputy Director responsible for Syria.

Seduced by Belonging

by Kari Jones

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Michael reading to Rowan in the hammock.

It was the package that arrived in the mail that started me thinking about past and present. It was wrapped in brown paper with my son Rowan’s name printed in heavy black ink. “What is it?” he said. We cut open the packing tape with kitchen scissors and tore at the paper. He looked at me, and with both hands, ripped open the package.

Inside was a history of a family. Not a written history traced chronologically from day to day, but a history in stamps. This collection of thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands of stamps, was sent to Rowan by his grandfather, who collected them in the 1970s and 1980s during his years at the High Commissions in India and Kenya, and the Embassy in Washington. The stamps tell stories of travels to Afghanistan, Tibet, Mauritius, Poland and Tanzania. They whisper of letters from Peru and Honduras and the Solomon Islands. They hint at furtive visits to wars in El Salvador and Pakistan, and troubles in Ethiopia. They remind us of sojourns to countries that no longer exist: Czechoslovakia, Tanganyika, even Newfoundland. They speak of a life so large it travels the whole world.

Rowan wanted to look at the stamps right away, so we sat right down on the living room floor and sifted through the bundles. My husband Michael and I were both instantly transported. As children of diplomats these lands are familiar to us, and we have either visited many of these places or known people from them. We sat and reminisced about the time we ate lobster on the beach in Costa Rica with Michael’s family. I found a colourful stamp of a lizard from Ghana, and laughed as I spoke of my brother Bruce chasing them with his friends. Michael held up a stamp from Kenya and told us about his school there, and the friends he had. We spent hours that day looking at stamps and reminiscing.

It has been 20 years now since Michael and I left our family homes and started our own lives as adults. We have lived in Victoria, B.C., for 11 years, Michael has his own business focusing on outdoor leadership and training, and I am a freelance and fiction writer. Periodically we say to each other, “Let’s move. We always wanted to go back to New Zealand.” But the thing is, we never do. Seeing these stamps from around the world brought back that strong desire. I looked at Michael. I could see he was feeling it too.

A quick look outside on a summer’s day tells the story of our current lives. Our yard is crisscrossed with ropes, strung from the tree house to the deck, from the deck to the fence. Wetsuits and spray skirts and life jackets hang from them like flags. Michael teaches kayaking to guides and instructors from across Canada who come to paddle on the wild west coast and learn. Each week as Michael comes back from another trip the wetsuits and other gear will change, but they will be there all summer. He brings treasures home with him too. A moon snail from Nootka Sound. A fossilized sea star from a beach at Tofino. The jaw bones of an otter, long bleached by the sun.

Rowan and I have added to this collection too. We bring shells of sea urchins home from our camping trips at Sombrio Beach along the west coast of Vancouver Island, and half clams from nearby Salt Spring Island. Sometimes we find rusty nails the size of pencils, once used to build telephone poles and railway tracks.

Over the years our house has become cluttered with these treasures. They lie in piles in the windows and along the mantle. But every year when we return to our favourite camping spots, or venture on a kayaking trip to a new part of the island, we replenish our collection, adding a geode or simply a beautiful rock or shell.

This is the texture of our lives these days. We have replaced the exotic with the deeply familiar. Where once we were thrilled with the adventure of climbing the turrets of a castle in a country we had never been to before, now we are excited to plan our seventh annual family camping weekend at French Beach on Vancouver Island’s west coast. Where our memories of childhood are filled with new countries and cities, Rowan’s will be filled with details of the island we live on.

What we have really done is replaced transience with roots. These changes don’t always sit easily with me. Sometimes this life seems too small. Sometimes I think if I have to walk down the same streets to the same school or corner store one more time I will scream. Sometimes, I think we made the wrong choice. But then, coming home from dropping Rowan off at school I bump into Joanne, a friend I made when our boys were babies, and she asks, “Do you have time for a coffee this morning?”

We walk her dog back home on our way to the coffee shop at the corner. “Oh, by the way, I’ve dug up those day lilies for you. You can get them whenever you’re ready,” she says, and in a second I am once again seduced by the power of belonging.

Shortly after the stamps arrived my brother came to visit. He flew in looking tired. “Look at my stamps,” said Rowan, and the two of them disappeared for hours into his room. Later, when I got a moment alone with Bruce I told him of my musings about the past and the present.

He lay back on the sofa and closed his eyes. Without having to think about it he said, “I consciously miss having a home city in my life. It is something I have never had.” Bruce has never stood still. From the time he went away to London for his graduate degrees until now, he has worked all over the world for the UN and other international organizations on peace-related issues. “The thing is,” said Bruce, “as the kids of diplomats, we are always aware of the duality.”

It’s true. Duality is always with us, and the pros and cons of each choice. I look back now and feel the poverty of not having friends who have known me since I was two, or being able to walk down the street to the house my grandparents grew up in. I can see the actions of my neighbours who take umbrage when a new development threatens the character of the village nearby. They have faith they will be here in this neighbourhood to witness the change. And at the same time I see how our friends turn to us to ask questions when something happens in another part of the world. “What do you think?” they ask.

Recently, Rowan burst out of school at the end of the day and said, “Guess what Mum? I got the highest score on our Canada test. The highest score.” He was so proud of himself, and I was proud too. He knows this country well. He’s been to all of the provinces, and has plans to visit Auyuittuq National Park in Nunavut as soon as he’s old enough to carry his own backpack on a hiking trip.

And as for the rest of the world? We are aware of it every day. In the books we read and the movies we watch. In conversations with friends; in our awareness of where things we buy are made. In the food we eat. In the things we write and the volunteer work we do. For years we’ve been involved in a project working in El Salvador and Bolivia. It’s the bright side of duality. The largeness that our lives still hold.

A life’s tapestry can be woven out of many things. One day we might pack up our house and move to New Zealand. The possibility is always there. But for now, we’re happy growing roots here in Victoria. The stamps have given us a way to talk to Rowan about our childhoods and the countries and people we met. He loves to listen.

Kari Jones is the daughter and daughter-in-law of two retired foreign service officers, Terry Jones and Gar Pardy. She grew up in Australia, Trinidad, Ghana and Denmark, and may some day return to a nomadic life.

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Kari and Michael on the beach.

The Alienation of Shamus Dikk – Answers

The full chart is below

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Full chart, left to right by column: Column 1, Morley Callaghan, born Canada, 1903, famous work That Summer in Paris, fun fact: fight with Hemingway. Column 2, F Scott Fitzgerald, born USA, 1896, famous work A Farewell to Arms, fun fact: Star Spangled Banner lyricist. Column 3, Franz Kafka, born Czechia, 1883, famous work The Castle, fun fact: insurance clerk. Column 4, Virginia Woolf, born UK, 1882, famous work Mrs Dalloway, fun fact: Taylor-Burton film. Column 5, James Joyce, born Ireland, 1882, famous work Ulysses, fun fact: exile in Zurich. Column 6, Hermann Hesse, born Germany, 1877, famous work Steppenwolf, fun fact: Canadian-American rock band. Column 7, Marcel Proust, born France, 1871, famous work Remembrance of Things Past, fun fact: Guinness record for longest novel.

The incorrect item is the famous work in column 2 – A Farewell to Arms was written by Hemingway. So the author in that column – F Scott Fitzgerald – is the rogue revival.

The first line of the puzzle is an inversion of the first line of Kafka’s Metamorphosis: "As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect." The insect is generally interpreted to be a cockroach.

En Thaïlande à l’heure
de la COVID-19

par Grégoire-François Legault

Je me souviens encore de la journée du 8 janvier 2020. Notre nouvelle ambassadrice est arrivée du Canada ce jour-là. C’est aussi la première fois, à la suite d’un article paru dans le Wall Street Journal, que j’ai brièvement discuté avec des collègues de cette étrange pneumonie s’apparentant au SRAS en Chine et des implications pour la Thaïlande, une destination touristique hautement prisée par les Chinois qui représentent en temps normal environ 25 % des 40 millions de touristes y voyageant chaque année. Le 13 janvier, les autorités sanitaires confirment durant une conférence de presse qu’une personne d’origine chinoise arrivée à Bangkok le 8 janvier a testé positive au nouveau coronavirus. Cette annonce marque la première fois que le virus a été détecté à l’extérieur des frontières de la Chine. L’ambassade en Thaïlande se met alors en mode précrise et commence à réviser ses scénarios de contingence en cas de pandémie. Avec du recul, j’affirme que nous n’avons ménagé aucun effort pour affronter cette crise qui demeurera certainement un événement marquant de ma jeune carrière. Le texte qui suit offre un bref retour sur une année charnière, vue d’une des plaques tournantes de l’Asie du Sud-est.

Comparativement à la majorité des pays membres du « Five Eyes », sauf pour la Nouvelle-Zélande, la présence diplomatique du Canada en Asie-Pacifique est relativement minimale. Ce n’est qu’en activant la cellule de gestion de crise en février que nous avons pu mobiliser les ressources des autres ministères hébergés sous le même toit que l’ambassade du Canada à Bangkok afin de répondre à l’urgence. En fin de compte, la Thaïlande, ainsi que le Cambodge et le Laos, deux pays gérés en partie à partir de la mission à Bangkok, auront échappé au pire de la première vague. La Thaïlande et le Cambodge n’ont jamais complètement fermé leurs frontières, ce qui a permis aux vols commerciaux de continuer, bien qu’à fréquence largement réduite. Grâce à notre fantastique équipe consulaire et aux efforts déployés par nos « renforts » internes, il aura été possible de répondre à l’explosion de demandes de services consulaires. Que ce soit pour recevoir des mises à jour sur les vols disponibles pour rentrer au pays, mettre la main sur des laissez-passer pour traverser les frontières interprovinciales, ou encore obtenir un prêt d’urgence, la section consulaire a répondu à des milliers de demandes en l’espace de quelques semaines, du jamais vu pour une équipe qui en situation normale est déjà débordée.

L’événement le plus marquant pour une bonne partie du réseau diplomatique canadien dans ce coin du monde fut la saga du bateau de croisière MS Westerdam. Arrivé à Sihanoukville au Cambodge en mi-février après s’être fait refuser le droit d’accoster au Japon, à Taïwan, aux Philippines, à Guam et en Thaïlande, bien des efforts, incluant un coup de fil du ministre Champagne à son homologue cambodgien, seront déployés pour permettre aux 279 Canadiens d’être rapatriés au cours des deux semaines qui suivirent.

Pour être franc, notre équipe n’avait tout simplement pas les outils nécessaires pour travailler à distance au tout début de la pandémie

Les deux aspects les plus difficiles durant la première vague en Thaïlande furent la technologie ainsi que la santé mentale. Pour être franc, notre équipe n’avait tout simplement pas les outils nécessaires pour travailler à distance au tout début de la pandémie. Nous n’avions pas assez d’ordinateurs portables, les réseaux étaient horriblement lents en raison de leur surutilisation; à bien des reprises, il m’aura fallu faire des journées de 12 à 14 heures pour terminer l’équivalent du travail que je suis normalement capable de compléter durant les heures régulières de bureau. Avec l’incertitude grandissante au fur et à mesure que la pandémie a pris de l’ampleur, de la parenté âgée au Canada faisant partie des groupes vulnérables, et le fait de se sentir physiquement coupé du monde, je me suis retrouvé plusieurs fois à broyer du noir. Heureusement que la gestion à l’ambassade a rapidement reconnu l’importance de s’assurer de la bonne santé mentale de tous les employés et que des mesures ont été rapidement mises en place pour atténuer les aspects les plus dommageables du confinement – pratiques qui ont été partagées ailleurs dans le réseau diplomatique du Canada en Asie du Sud-est.

Avec plus d’une douzaine de coups d’état depuis 1932 et une situation politique depuis les années 2000 des plus instables, une affectation en Thaïlande pour un agent politique promet toujours d’être haute en rebondissements. Bien que des élections aient eu lieu en mars 2019 mettant fin à la période la plus récente de gouvernance par junte militaire, le retour vers une véritable démocratie n’est pas encore complété. La dissolution d’un parti politique d’opposition en février 2020 soutenu par la jeunesse thaïe, l’enlèvement d’un jeune dissident politique au Cambodge en juin 2020, ainsi que la gestion mitigée de la pandémie, en particulier de l’économie, a encouragé des milliers de personnes à manifester contre le gouvernement tout au long de la deuxième partie de l’année. Le reportage politique, ces fameux « câbles diplomatiques », sur les manifestations en Thaïlande a donc repris énormément d’importance, reléguant la COVID-19 au second plan.

Dès le départ, l’équipe politique a su tirer profit de son réseau de contacts pour comprendre la crise. Anticipant les développements à suivre, la mission a rapidement mis sur pied un plan de contingence au cas où la situation déborderait. Pendant plusieurs mois, jusqu’à la mi-octobre lorsque la police a finalement commencé à utiliser la force pour disperser des manifestants, le renouveau de l’instabilité politique en Thaïlande n’a pas généré beaucoup d’intérêt. Tout d’un coup, en partie en raison de la médiatisation des développements politiques et les comparaisons aux manifestations à Hong Kong, la centrale a soudainement essayé de comprendre les causes du renouveau de l’instabilité politique en Thaïlande et les implications pour le Canada. Avec un réseau diplomatique à l’étranger poussé au bout de ses limites par la pandémie et beaucoup de missions encore en état de gestion de crise, il ne restait simplement que peu de bande passante pour faire face à des pressions additionnelles.

Le fait que la Thaïlande a échappé au pire de la première vague nous a permis durant la seconde partie de l’année de reprendre nos activités courantes... ou presque! Il faudra quand même quelques mois pour que nos contacts locaux aient de nouveau confiance pour participer à des rencontres en personne – avec bien sûr de nouvelles mesures sanitaires en place telles que le port du masque ainsi que la distanciation. Contrairement à certaines missions dans la région fonctionnant à ras bord, nous avions les ressources nécessaires pour aller de l’avant avec l’organisation d’événements complexes lors de la seconde partie de l’année. Par exemple, en moins de trois semaines, nous avons mis sur pied une conférence régionale sur la liberté de presse en Asie du Sud-est pour préparer le terrain à la 2e Conférence mondiale sur la liberté de presse. Les participants de la Thaïlande ont pu nous rejoindre physiquement au Club des Correspondants étrangers à Bangkok, tandis qu’une vingtaine de participants se sont connectés en ligne pour prendre part à l’événement dont le rapport de conférence se trouve en ligne.

La nécessité est mère d’industrie; malgré toutes les discussions sur « la fonction publique 2.0 », ce sera une pandémie mondiale qui finalement forcera le réseau diplomatique canadien à s’adapter en l’espace de quelques mois. Une autre des leçons importantes à tirer de cette crise est que malgré l’avancement des technologies, ces dernières ne peuvent entièrement remplacer les interactions physiques, car après tout, l’homme demeure un animal grégaire.

Au moment où je mets mes réflexions sur papier, la Thaïlande fait maintenant face à une deuxième vague. Après six mois passés à travailler de façon quasiment normale, le retour au confinement est dur pour le moral de toute l’équipe. Cette année devait être passée à célébrer le 60e anniversaire de l’établissement des relations diplomatiques entre le Canada et la Thaïlande. Déjà, nous avons dû reporter ou modifier la plupart de nos événements pour le premier trimestre, et ce, malgré tous nos efforts de planification. Armés de notre expérience lors de la première vague, je crois que nous sommes quand même beaucoup mieux préparés, et ô combien plus sage, pour faire face à la tâche.

Le fait que la Thaïlande a échappé au pire de la première vague nous a permis durant la seconde partie de l’année de reprendre nos activités courantes... ou presque!

Grégoire-François Legault était deuxième secrétaire et vice-consul (politique, économie et affaires publiques) à l’ambassade du Canada en Thaïlande.

Hello From Delhi
9 May 2020

by Martina Stvan

... BY MID-MARCH, THE SITUATION in India and the global pandemic had become increasingly serious. Most of the Canada-Based Staff and their dependents were evacuated on what would be the last commercial flights to leave India. March 22 was a national curfew day in Delhi. Before the day ended, a nationwide lockdown was announced. This lockdown would last until the end of May.

In Delhi, there are some pleasant aspects to the lockdown ... there are no cars, buses, taxis or auto-rickshaws on the streets of Delhi. The metro and the train system are shut down. For those of you who have been posted here, this is an incomprehensible image, I know. Our mission drivers have never driven on empty streets – it took them some time to become comfortable with it.

There are very few people on the streets of Delhi and no more families living in the streets, parks and sheltering under the overpasses of the city. Again, an apocalyptic image of emptiness. The lockdown prompted an exodus of millions of day labourers from the large cities – with no work and no wages, and no public transport, they had no choice but to begin walking to their home villages several hundred kilometres away. It took the government a few days to react – they rounded them up and returned them to the cities to stop the potential spread of coronavirus, but many are living in camps on the edges of megacities. Trains would eventually be organized to take them home.

The street dogs have taken over Delhi. They sleep in the middle of the roads during the day because there is no traffic. I can hear packs of dogs howling and barking at night because there is no traffic noise to muffle the sound. At the empty airport in the middle of the night, the sound of barking reverberates through the empty terminals and buildings. I even saw a cow in the median on the way to the airport the other evening. During the day, it is so quiet that all you can hear is the sound of birds. For the first time in decades, the air in Delhi is clean (well, relatively clean. It is what a summer day in Toronto would be registering at, under 100 on the Air Quality Index.) During the last two weeks of March and early April, when the temperatures were still pleasant, I would actually open the windows in my apartment during the mornings for a bit of fresh air. Never imagined being able to do that while on posting here!

Why this reference to airports at night and empty terminal buildings, you might ask? All commercial flights into and out of India are suspended. But the Government of Canada has embarked on what is now the largest repatriation of its citizens since WWII, with India accounting for an exercise of unimagined magnitude, 11,000 people (and counting) over 36 flights (and counting). There are 30-some Canada-Based Officers who remained at the mission and are all part of our Emergency Response Team, working in tandem with our small group of seven immigration officers in Delhi and three evacuated colleagues in Canada who are the operations team for this consular repatriation effort. We have a small team going out to the airport for the flights departing Delhi because there may be consular issues or passengers not properly ticketed or documented with visas, despite our hard work going through each name on the flight manifests. For flights departing from other cities in India, our Consuls General have been assisting at the airports, and we follow the process remotely through groups set up on WhatsApp. This has also meant, however, that the operations team has been working non-stop since the lockdown began, averaging 14–16-hour days, without much of a break.

Our mission has negotiated and organized three different phases of special flights – a charter-commercial with Air India to London Heathrow and then onwards with Air Canada using specific travel agents for bookings; a more commercial model with Qatar Airways via Doha to Montreal, where passengers have to book themselves online; and now a charter model using Qatar via Doha to either Toronto or Vancouver and booking through a travel agent. We also did a flight in collaboration with our Australian colleagues to evacuate stranded Canadians in Nepal and have been able to put Canadians in more remote areas of India on flights operated by the British or French. These flights are all going empty in one direction, so the price is high, between $2,500–3,000 per passenger, which means we have a team approving some 1,500 emergency transportation loans. We spent many late nights at the office doing online bookings on behalf of passengers holding transportation loans with our mission acquisition cards, since there was no time to allow for funds to be transferred into bank accounts. The team here is responsible for organizing ground transportation approvals from the government for each passenger, as due to the lockdown, curfew passes are needed to travel to the airport. We have done geomatic surveys to determine where Canadians in India are physically located, so that we could better plan which airports to use for our flights. And we work with many, many spreadsheets to track all the details – those holding transportation loans, vulnerable passengers referred by MPs or the Minister’s Office – to build passenger manifests for each flight.

Who are our stranded Canadians in India? There were, of course, Canadian tourists in India who were stranded when commercial flights were suspended, as backpackers or visiting over March break holidays or those at yoga retreats. But the vast majority are Indo-Canadians, visiting family for several weeks. And then there is the snowbird population, mostly in the Punjab, retirees who spend six months of each year during the Canadian winter back in India. With the lockdown now at two months, most people are anxious to return home. The weather is very hot, they are running out of medications, pregnancies are progressing, families, jobs are waiting in Canada. The majority of our flights are from Amritsar (the Punjab) and average 40% senior citizens on each load. The oldest person we have carried so far was 106! The airports in India are amazing with their wheelchair brigades ready to take passengers from their vehicles, through the check-in process and all the way to the plane. The long lines of passengers in wheelchairs waiting to board are unique to this country. My favourite task has been assigning business class seating on these flights. While there is no real business class experience as such on our charter flights, I take great pleasure in putting the oldest and most infirm passengers into the more comfortable seats.

With this consular operation now going much longer than originally planned, we set up a mirror team in Ottawa at Global Affairs, who continue all our tasks during Delhi night-time hours. We wish we had thought of this much earlier in the crisis, but of course, during a crisis, you just try to put out fires and get things done, one day at a time. With this mirror team, we can now plan for mandated rest periods, but a solid week off won’t happen until this operation is finished with the last flight on May 21. We are managing a day off here and there, but I must admit that I sometimes fantasize about having to self-isolate for 14 days with nothing to do …

Postscript

These impressions were written to friends in the midst of an eight-week blur where the days blended into one another, with each morning feeling like the movie Groundhog Day – wash, rinse, repeat.

Being part of this consular repatriation flight operation during lockdown conditions was both a privilege and a feat of endurance, as the members of the Emergency Response Team – Operations put in incredibly long hours over a sustained period to fill 40 flights with 11,695 Canadians/PRs repatriated from India.

Under the leadership of our High Commissioner, Nadir Patel, and our Operations Chief, Christopher Kerr (who put aside his IRCC Area Director and Program Manager duties for the duration of this repatriation operation), the entire India network across all government programs worked together to pull off this amazing achievement, to support the Canadian community, and to keep information flowing to and from Ottawa.

Having a large High Commission compound in Delhi made our daily lives easier and this large-scale operation easier to run. But it also meant that we needed local staff and contractors to continue to come into work during this lockdown period to be on site to guard entrances, to ensure the physical plant was kept running, to drive us to and from our staff quarters or the airport in the wee hours of the morning or late at night, and to operate the club restaurant so that those working 16–18 hour days did not have to worry about shopping for groceries when everything was closed, never mind finding time to prepare meals. We had about a dozen locally-engaged staff reporting in, many on motorcycles, which had an easier time getting through road blocks and curfews, to assist on consular cases or help with answering phones and emails (25,000 by early May alone!).

The Canadian staff who remained in Delhi, as well as in our consulates in Mumbai, Bangalore and Chandigarh, did so as members of Emergency Response Teams. Many worked during this difficult time while separated from their spouses and children, who had been evacuated to Canada. That separation would last until early September in the case of Delhi, when dependents and some of our evacuated colleagues were permitted to return. The situations in Mumbai, Bangalore and Chandigarh took longer to resolve, and they remain at critical service levels only.

After this initial series of Government of Canada special flights during lockdown, repatriation from India continued until the end of July on mission-assisted flights, where the travellers could largely make their own bookings. The final tally was 27,688 repatriated individuals from India and 381 repatriated individuals from Nepal.

Martina Stvan has been an IRCC Foreign Service Officer for 32 years and has served in Singapore, Hong Kong, Taipei (during SARS) and Beijing. At the time of publication, she was posted to New Delhi.

Hockey Sock Diplomacy
Striking gold in the Philippines

by Ian McGrath

WHEN I RECALL THE CONVERSATION that led to me coaching the Philippine Men’s National Hockey Team, I can only smirk. I had been playing shinny with players from the National Hockey Team for a few months, got to know them pretty well, and was welcomed to their invitational golf tournament. We were sitting in the clubhouse after our round of golf, enjoying our San Miguel Lights, when the topic of the team roster came up. Feeling confident, I looked at the team captain, Steven “Swiss” Füglister, and said, “I could definitely crack this lineup. Who do I have to fight?” When the laughter died down, he calmly explained that they didn’t need another player; they needed a coach.

As much as I’ve grown to love Swiss, I remember hating that answer. I was a player, not a coach. My hockey career was a long one, and I had had some minor success playing junior hockey and at Carleton University. While I had a decent slapshot and a physical game, I did not have Philippine citizenship. The more I thought about it, though, the more the idea of coaching began to appeal to me. I had to face it; I wasn’t getting any younger, and the opportunity to build a hockey program in Southeast Asia was a challenge I couldn’t resist.

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Celebrating our victory in front of the Philippines’ flag and fans after the final game against Kuwait.

Whenever I mention that I’m a hockey coach on the Philippine National Team, everyone has the same two reactions: “The Philippines has a hockey team?” and “Isn’t that cute!” Not a traditional hockey nation, Manila features one hockey rink in a country of 110 million people located at a shopping mall on Manila Bay. When I started playing here, the hockey community was very welcoming but fractured. A lifetime of hockey politics had splintered a small community into even smaller parts. In the absence of a “governing body”, pre-pandemic hockey in Manila had been marred by scandals and in-fighting generated by over-involved parents, expats, and organizers. In hockey terms, the locker room was divided and with no possibility of trades. Even a bronze medal at the Southeast Asia Games in 2019 in Manila could not fully repair the growing rift, as shortly after this win, the pandemic put a stop to hockey in the Philippines altogether.

When I arrived in 2021, hockey was just restarting, but it was struggling, as participation was low. Many of the expats who had played in the league had left during the pandemic, and the turnover in the head coach position created a lot of uncertainty within the hockey community. There was no league, there was no ice time, and the outlook for restarting the league was bleak. After a great outpouring of support at the grassroots level from the hockey community, the Philippine Ice Hockey Federation hired Juhani Ijas as the Head Coach. In Southeast Asia terms, this was a major signing as Ijas had won gold with Thailand in 2019 at the Southeast Asia Games as Head Coach. Given all the turmoil within the hockey community and the fact that the National Team had spent the last three years in lockdown, the announcement of Juhani’s arrival was met with muted optimism.

Having spent my life in the hockey world, I knew immediately what a coach with Juhani’s pedigree could do for hockey in the Philippines. For anyone still doubting his impact, they needed to look no further than what was happening on the ice. The league became organized, the game was being marketed to the curious locals, and players were getting better with his coaching. More importantly, he was a “no-nonsense” coach who did not care about the internal conflict and whose sole focus was on building the best possible team to go to the World Championships in Mongolia.

After chatting with Juhani one day, it became clear that winning a gold medal would be the best thing for hockey in the Philippines. Nothing would let bygones be bygones like a victory on the world stage, so this is exactly what we set out to do. When I look back now, I think I had accepted to be his Assistant Coach before he even offered me the job. When he did offer me the job, I accepted before thinking about what it would mean for my wife and four kids. Caught up in all the excitement and the possibilities, I momentarily forgot my responsibilities.

Fortunately, my wife is a former professional hockey player herself and well understood that the opportunity to win gold at the World Championships is truly “once in a lifetime”. As any great hockey player will tell you, it is hard work and the support of friends and family that make success possible. While I was coaching hockey four nights a week for the past three months, she managed a household of four kids under eight years old. Had she not been so supportive and understanding, my story would end right here. As it turns out, though, her backing of this adventure made all that came next possible.

It is probably not a surprise to learn that the Philippines has never competed at a World Hockey Championship. Faced with the Division 4 World Championships in Mongolia three months away, Juhani and I set about to finalize the team roster. Having already played with many of the players vying for a roster spot, I had a good sense of the talent we were working with and felt cautiously optimistic about our chances of winning. We knew from past games that the Philippines could probably beat Indonesia and Kuwait, but that the real gold-winning game of the round-robin tournament would be against Mongolia. With the competition set in our sights, the weeks leading up to the tournament were a grind as both players and coaches set out to prepare themselves to beat Mongolia on home ice.

As the Assistant Coach, my assignments were to work with the defencemen and special teams. In a sort of good cop/bad cop divide, Juhani and I also decided that the Assistant Coach who had played with the team for years could be the person players turn to when they have an issue they are too shy to bring to the Head Coach. I like to think that this approach created a positive atmosphere in the locker room and made a more receptive audience for coaching the team on defence, power plays, and penalty kills. While we worked with the team four nights a week to refine their game, the team really began to mesh, and the excitement leading into the World Championships was palpable.

Before hosting the World Championships, Mongolia had never had an indoor rink. For the occasion, the President of Mongolia commissioned the construction of the Steppe Arena. Designed by a Canadian architect, the arena was truly a state-of-the-art facility that seated 3,500 fans and featured a giant video screen and scoreboard. When we first stepped into the arena, our jaws dropped at the quality of the dressing rooms and saunas. By contrast, our team had been dressing in a room at a shopping mall that had doubled as a storage facility. The ice surface itself in Mongolia was professional grade and maintained by two state-of-the-art Zambonis. The players actually took some time to get used to the speed of the ice surface. Again, for contrast, Filipino hockey players are used to playing on ice that is melting quickly and skating through thick fog for most of the third period.

Based on the quality of the rink and the police escort our bus received to and from our hotel, it was clear that we had arrived on the big stage. As coaches, we can only get the players ready and have to let them play when the time comes. Would our guys be ready for the bright lights and roar of the crowd? We had been playing in near total silence and for a handful of curious mall shoppers up to this point. We ran through a few practices before our first game against Indonesia. Our message to the players at this point was that the pressure was all on Mongolia and we needed to play “loose”, have fun, and no fighting. Mongolia had a new million-dollar rink, the President of Mongolia would be in attendance, and the game with the Philippines was marketed on national TV for the Saturday night time slot. For Mongolia, losing on home ice would not be an option, and it was clear that the pressure was all on them.

After practice, we returned to the dinner buffet at the Holiday Inn and checked out some local TV. Much to our surprise, we found that our team practice had been recorded and that a panel of pundits were dissecting our goalie’s weak spots. Growing up, I had heard of this sort of thing happening in international hockey events, but had never imagined that I would be featured. In a way, it was both alarming and satisfying. If they were going to record our practices, then it was clear that they viewed us as a major threat. Let the head games begin!

Fast-forwarding through the March 23, 2023, Indonesia game, which we won 14-0, we were getting ready for the big game on March 25, 2023, against Mongolia. I should point out an interesting cultural difference between Filipino and Canadian players. Usually, before a big game, Canadians like to put on loud music and build up some energy before hitting the ice. While Filipinos love music (and sing better than anyone I’ve ever hung out with), they stop all music in order to say a team prayer before taking the ice. This brief moment of introspection and gratitude is something I had never seen before with a hockey team, but really did help to center them and momentarily remove any distraction.

For our goalies (who happen to be cousins), this quiet moment probably meant much more since the matriarch of their family (and the first Miss Philippines ever) had passed away the day before. With the added inspiration of playing for her, the stakes could not have been higher, but our goalies remained mentally strong. Their goalie coach, J-P Lassila, had helped them with a few of the finer points on technique that set our goalies apart from others at the tournament. Despite the loss of their family’s matriarch, our goalies looked cool and confident as the bright lights and loud music welcomed them to the ice.

I still don’t know the words of the Filipino national anthem, but the moment I heard it played before this game, I felt an incredible honour to be standing beneath the flag with my team. While fighting back nerves, I had come to appreciate that my team had come together around a single goal, worked tirelessly to prepare for it, and was on the verge of achieving its objective. Win or lose, this was a truly special moment. The pride I felt at this moment was amplified by the enormous pride I felt as a Canadian diplomat. For better or worse, the world associates Canada with its love of hockey, and here I was sharing this passion with the Philippines. I was not the only Canadian badly wanting hockey gold for the Philippines, as the support I received from my colleagues at the Embassy was overwhelming. Reading their messages of support on my phone while I took my position behind the bench (and should have been setting the lineup) only made me want to win the game even more. By all accounts, the stress of the situation was written on my face while I tried to play it cool.

All too often, a big game hyped up like this one tends to disappoint, as it can never match our expectations. Without any doubt, the Mongolia game against the Philippines will forever be a classic. If you haven’t seen it, you can watch it on YouTube. It features an amazing back and forth, endless parades of minor penalties and high drama ending in OT.

As we were headed into OT, a strange thing happened. The crowd was deafening and shouting what I can only imagine are obscenities at the Filipinos. At this point, I had lost my voice from trying to shout encouragement over the roar of the crowd. Just when I had an inkling of doubt, I looked at my goalie and defenceman and saw them smiling. All I could think was, “Who smiles in a game like this?” Two minutes later, it was clear that only champions could smile at a moment like that because they had assured themselves of victory. We won the game 7-6.

Banged up and bruised, we defeated Kuwait 14-0 on March 26 and commenced the ritual celebrations. The contents of these celebrations will remain up to the reader’s imagination and will inevitably fall short of the reality. We returned to a hero’s welcome with photos and interviews at the airport. Clips of the game were all over the news in the Philippines, messages of congratulations from celebrities, and even a meeting with President Bong Bong Marcos himself. It felt surreal to see myself on the news and in messages, especially since I’m usually pretty closed off to social media. Unfortunately, I caught COVID and missed the opportunity to meet the President, but such is life. Most importantly, I learned that my kids watched me coach on TV and cheered every time they saw me. Even now, when my toddler sees hockey on the screen, she points and says “Dada!” This is exactly what I want my kids to think of when they see hockey on TV.

After all was said and done, the Philippines had won its first-ever world championship and has been promoted to Division 3B. For now, it’s the off-season, and we will restart the work of winning again in a few months. It’s not clear what the roster will look like next year, but hockey is gaining traction here. I was amazed to learn that kids are writing in their yearbooks that they would like to play on the Philippine National Hockey Team. It seems that the “spark” needed to grow the game here has been found, and it will be up to us, as coaches, to keep the fire lit.

Ian McGrath is a Foreign Service Officer. At the time of publication, he was on his third posting in Manila.

People-to-People Ties

by Avril Espinosa-Malpica

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With my mother and visiting family at the University of British Columbia near the Clock Tower during my parents’ time in Canada as international students, shortly after I was born.

Over thirty years ago, my parents arrived in Canada from Mexico for the first time so my father could pursue PhD studies in Statistics at the University of British Columbia. Newly married, they moved to Vancouver for what they expected would be a temporary chapter abroad.

There, they became part of a close-knit community of international students. My father biked across Vancouver to campus, my mother navigated the occasional unintentionally hilarious English mistake, and they built friendships that lasted long after they left. They came to love the diversity of the city, the sense of safety they felt there, and the openness with which they were welcomed.

During that time, I was born in Canada.

However, barely a year after I was born, a change in government in Mexico created new public sector opportunities, and my father ultimately chose to pursue one of them rather than complete his degree. He built a career in government, and my mother went back to teaching in the public school system. Canada became part of our family history more than part of our day-to-day life. Beyond my dual citizenship, there was little reason to think we would ever return other than perhaps for a visit.

Still, small traces of that connection remained, mostly because I wanted to create a link to a country I didn’t remember but knew I was a part of. As a child growing up in Mexico, I clung to the limited things that made me feel Canadian – insisting on taking ice skating lessons despite it being rare as we lived in a warm climate, doing school projects about Canada, and becoming an Avril Lavigne fan simply because we shared a name and nationality. I also had to explain way too many times that my name was the French version of April (the version my parents saw while living in Canada), not a grammatically incorrect version of the Spanish Abril – a distinction that felt very important to me, representing a bilingual country.

We spent the next nine years in Mexico, where my parents built their careers and a life for our family. My sister was born then, and in many ways, we grew up very fortunate. But as we got older, my parents began thinking more seriously about the kind of future they wanted for their daughters – one with more safety, opportunity, and equality for women.

Canada had left a lasting impression on them. As international students, they had experienced a country where they felt welcomed and supported, and where they believed my sister and I would have broader opportunities to grow independently and safely. So, when they began considering a future abroad for our family, applying for a Canadian Permanent Residency felt like the right choice.

I was ten years old when we moved back to Vancouver, speaking barely any English (could only count numbers and say things like “mom” and “apple”) and no French at all. As my parents built a new life for us in Canada, they never imagined that one day their daughter would go on to represent the new country they had chosen to make their home.

Growing up between Mexico and Canada shaped the way I saw the world from an early age. I was constantly navigating between cultures, languages, and ways of seeing things – sometimes translating literally for my parents, other times trying to explain one culture to another, or simply figuring out where I fit within both.

At times, this meant explaining Mexican traditions to Canadian friends: why it took so long for me to come outside and play because dinners at my house revolved around sobremesa and extended family conversations, or why we built Día de Muertos altars each year and viewed death with love and colour.

Other times, it meant explaining aspects of Canadian life to relatives in Mexico, like why I cared less about finding a novio and much more about my school and jobs – including working at a coffee shop and movie theatre to help pay for trips and gain responsibility, something not always viewed the same way back home. When relatives visited Canada, we had to tell them to leave their shoes at the door, and every Halloween, we found ourselves describing why Canadian costumes were often funny, creative, or completely random rather than actually scary.

Some moments made us realize how much we ourselves had changed. My sister once brought empty plastic bottles home from a trip because she could not find anywhere to recycle them, something that genuinely stressed her out after growing up in Canada. Visiting family in Mexico also meant readjusting to customs that had started to feel unfamiliar to us too (like greeting near-strangers with kisses on the cheek). But the changes went far beyond small habits or cultural misunderstandings. Growing up between those two worlds shaped my identity in ways I only fully understood later. Over time, I learned to carry the best pieces of both with me: valuing the warmth, closeness, and family-centred nature of my Mexican upbringing, while also embracing the independence, diversity, and strong sense of social responsibility I associated with Canada.

That sense of social responsibility, coupled with the example of public service I saw from my parents, shaped many of my own aspirations. I also saw firsthand how strong public institutions in Canada could meaningfully shape people’s lives. Once we immigrated, I attended public schools throughout my education, just as most children in Canada do. Years later, Canada’s public healthcare system would also quite literally save my life through emergency brain aneurysm surgery covered entirely by the healthcare system. Those are things many Canadians understandably take for granted, but I understood how much they mattered.

Having experienced two very different countries and systems gave me a deep appreciation for public service and for the role governments can play when institutions function well and people genuinely feel supported by them. It made me proud to pursue public service in a country where I had experienced those systems working firsthand.

Over time, my interest in navigating between cultures evolved into a broader curiosity about how people, economies, and societies connect. In many ways, I had already spent much of my life navigating between different worlds, and I found myself increasingly drawn to international affairs and public service.

Years later, I followed in my dad’s footsteps and eventually attended the University of British Columbia myself (my sister later followed too), where I studied Economics, Political Science, and French. During university, I joined Global Affairs Canada’s (GAC) Trade Commissioner Service (TCS) as a co-op student, an experience that made a career in the Foreign Service suddenly feel tangible and possible.

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My sister and I in traditional dresses during a cultural celebration while growing up in Mexico .

Through those internships and my first roles at GAC, I saw firsthand that diplomacy was not only the traditional image of negotiations at the United Nations or managing geopolitical crises. Much of the work was deeply human: building trust, creating opportunity, and helping people connect across borders.

I became especially interested in inclusive trade because I could see that access to opportunity was not always equal. As a racialized woman, I had often found myself in spaces where people like me were underrepresented, which made me think a lot about who gets access to certain opportunities, who feels included in those spaces, and how public policy can help open more doors for more people.

I was also fortunate to have mentors, particularly Christian Hansen and Élise Racicot, who encouraged me and helped me see a real path into the Foreign Service. Eventually, after years of student terms, applications, and competitions, I became a Foreign Service Officer myself.

Even now, there are moments when I still feel humbled by the privilege of representing Canada abroad.

Now, as a Vice-Consul and Trade Commissioner at the Consulate General of Canada in São Paulo, I have come full circle. This is my first posting, the beginning of a career I once could only dream of, and a chance to be part of a new generation of Foreign Service Officers shaping Canada’s presence abroad.

Among my responsibilities, I lead on international education — helping strengthen the same kinds of connections that once changed my own family’s trajectory.

One of the most meaningful initiatives I’ve worked on has been supporting the Prontos pro Mundo program, a partnership with the State of São Paulo that sends 400 public-school students each year to Canada for a fully funded language and cultural exchange program. Many of the students come from diverse socioeconomic backgrounds and had never even left their state or thought about studying abroad.

I still remember standing at the airport alongside students and their families before departure, watching the mixture of excitement, nervousness, and possibility on their faces as many prepared to leave the country for the first time. I knew that moment would change not only their lives, but also those of their families and communities, rippling across generations.

Experiences like these remind me that international education is never only about statistics or policy frameworks. It is about people, opportunity, and the kinds of experiences that continue shaping lives long after an exchange or degree itself ends.

And that is the heart of our work in the Foreign Service. The relationships and opportunities we build often outlast our postings in ways we cannot always measure.

But these connections do not only shape the lives of the people who cross borders – they also shape Canada itself. Families like mine become part of the country’s evolving story, helping redefine what Canada looks like, sounds like, and becomes over time.

I am also part of a new generation of Foreign Service Officers who reflect the evolving face of Canada – one that is diverse, inclusive, and globally connected. When I walk into a room, I know I do not necessarily fit the image many people still have of what a Canadian diplomat looks like. But I do represent Canada just as much as anyone else. And I am proud to stand as proof that diplomacy is not just about policies and trade deals, but about people.

My journey (one that started with my father’s studies all those years ago) has led me to this moment, representing Canada in ways my parents never could have imagined.

I stand here because someone, decades ago, opened a door that changed my family’s future. Now, I have the privilegæe of opening doors for others. And perhaps, years from now, one of those Brazilian students will find themselves standing where I am.

That is the quiet, immeasurable impact of the work we do. And that is why it matters.

Avril Espinosa-Malpica is a Canadian diplomat with experience advancing Canadian priorities related to inclusive trade, international education, G20 engagement, and the global energy transition in Southern Africa, Brazil, and across multiple roles within Global Affairs Canada, including at headquarters in Ottawa and the Vancouver Regional Office.

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Taking ice skating lessons in Mexico as a child while trying to hold onto my Canadian identity from afar.

Teamwork takes flight

by Tammy Ames

In mid-March 2020, the world changed. Countries began to close borders; airlines began to cancel flights; within days, many of my colleagues and their families were being repatriated to Canada. Then, we encountered a snag. Managua, Nicaragua, had only two Canada-Based staff, and both were required to return to Canada. After a discussion with my Ambassador in San José, Costa Rica, we decided that I would go to Managua and cover off until the Head of the Office could return. Twenty-four hours later, I was in-flight to Managua via Miami. We assumed that I would be back home in four to six weeks. Certainly, COVID-19 would blow over by then!

OH, HOW MISTAKEN WE WERE. One hundred and eighteen days later, I returned home.

I’m a Trade Commissioner and have worked my entire career in Trade. While aware of the work my colleagues did in other sections, it was an entirely new experience to be the only Canadian on the ground. From my first day in Managua, everyone was patient with me and walked me through the myriad of things I needed to know and do. Things were going as well as could be expected, but airlines continued to cancel flights, and borders remained closed. Canadians in Nicaragua were becoming more and more anxious as the Prime Minister encouraged everyone to return home. Within weeks of my arrival in Managua, all commercial flights were cancelled. We were well and truly stuck, and I knew that my six-week plan was no longer even slightly reasonable.

In April, the Canadian Honey Council (CHC) contacted us. Canadian farmers needed workers to harvest honey over the summer. Traditionally, those workers are flown in from Nicaragua. The CHC had decided to send a plane to pick up these much-needed workers.

That’s when work got complicated.

It seemed simple: hire a plane in Canada to fetch the people you need. But during a pandemic, there is a phenomenal amount of work that must be done with various governments to obtain permissions and authority. Canada had closed its borders to non-citizens. Exemptions were needed for these workers. The workers’ visas and passports were in Mexico City, with no direct flights to get them back to Nicaragua. This was another layer of complexity in an already difficult situation. When we discovered that there would be empty seats on this plane, we quickly offered them to Canadians who wanted to return home.

Like a mostly well-oiled machine, we swung into action.

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The author (right) with two locally engaged staff: driver Pablo Robles (centre) and Consular Officer Juan Gazol.

We needed COVID-19 loans for Canadians without means. The Consular team in San José, along with headquarters in Ottawa, worked frantically to approve the loans in record time. The Mission Consular Officer and his team in San José developed MOUs/agreements to get the payments to the Honey Producers, who needed to be reimbursed. The Political section wrote and got approval for diplomatic notes at all hours of the day and night, and forwarded documents to the Nicaraguan government, while also overseeing a social media campaign about the flight.

Our Immigration section in the Canadian embassy in Mexico City found a solution to get the workers’ passports back to Nicaragua in the nick of time. Meanwhile, the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) made sure that the airport in Calgary, where the flight would touch down, was ready to receive the workers and Canadians, many of whom would continue to other destinations in Canada. We sent a team to the Managua airport and crossed our fingers.

The night of the flight, the team on the ground at the airport met the Canadians and processed payments on the spot. When the flight departed at 2 am, 35 Canadians were on their way home. Our Bee Flight was a success, and we could relax.

Until it was time for the next one.

Since we’d done it successfully once, the second experience was certainly less stressful. However, nothing is ever easy. Because the local government changed their requirements for COVID-19 testing of flight crews, the flight had to be delayed. Finally, everything worked out; paperwork was submitted, and again we found ourselves at the airport at 10 pm on a Saturday night to ensure that another 27 Canadians could go home.

Nature loves a little joke; a little hitch is always needed to add some excitement. That night at the airport, a Nicaraguan worker approached me; he had not received the documentation which would allow him to board the flight.

We were well and truly stuck,
and I knew that my six-week plan was no longer even slightly reasonable.

At 11:00 on a Saturday night, I sent a message to my CBSA and Immigration colleagues without much hope that I would hear back, since I didn’t expect them to be monitoring their cell phones. To my happy surprise, I had a response within minutes. The information was being forwarded to Calgary, and the happy traveller would be able to enter Canada when he arrived. The worker and I both nearly fell to our knees to give thanks to that CBSA officer who came through at a nearly impossible hour on the weekend.

That was our last Bee Flight. We weren’t able to get every Canadian on those flights. But shortly afterwards, some charter flights to the US began, and Canadians were able to leave Nicaragua. Without the collaboration and support of my colleagues from three different Canadian missions and three departments in Canada, the Bee Flights would not have happened.

It was one of the most stressful and rewarding experiences of my career. I met many fascinating Canadians along the way, while helping them get home or get their family members’ home. This type of work was definitely different from my usual Trade work, and I certainly learned a great deal about Consular Services and the sheer amount of paperwork that has to be managed for such an event. I will be forever grateful to the teams in Managua, San Jose, Mexico and, of course, Canada for keeping me sane. Although I was the sole Canadian Embassy staff member in Managua at that time, I was never truly alone, and I knew that I had the full support of my colleagues and friends. When serving Canada abroad, teamwork is essential, and I’m proud of all who helped pull off our Bee Flights. They are examples of the best that Canada offers the world. *buzz* *buzz*

At the time of publication, Tammy Ames was the Senior Trade Commissioner in San José, Costa Rica, also covering Nicaragua and Honduras.

Trans-Mission

by Holly Jacobs

Transitioning at the age of 59 has unexpected benefits. You have the chance to do everything all over again for the first time.

Washington, DC, 2024

One more check in the mirror. I can’t believe I cut myself shaving – halfway between the bottom of my nose and my upper lip. A tiny nick that sprouted a little bloody Charlie Chaplin moustache. Multiple layers of foundation and powder, and I think I can still see it. That said, I can still see my beard shadow when everyone else insists that they can’t. One last check: make sure my skirt isn’t tucked into my underwear, that the wig is straight. Triple-check the purse for my phone and the room key.

And ... go.

I step into the hallway and head to the elevator. I am starting to feel that confidence. I step in and see the girl in the mirror, the one who has shadowed me since I was four years old. The doors open and I stride into the lobby. The girl passes through the looking glass, living in that world she only dreamt of for so long. Out of the lobby and into the street. I am in Chinatown, on H Street (I didn’t even know Washington had a Chinatown). The heat has already started, but I am lucky that my route is mostly in the shade. As I walk down 6th towards Pennsylvania Avenue, I repeat Olivier’s advice in my head. “Be confident. Own the space. Eye contact.” My posture is better in spite of or maybe because of the low heels I am wearing, and I realize that I am confident, I am owning the space.

The simple reality that feminine me is self-assuredly walking downtown in a foreign city is a source of joy and wonder to me. Other pedestrians pass by, and no one seems to “clock” me. I am early and feeling good, so I stop to pick up an Americano (when in America…). The barista asks for my name for the order – “Holly” – and a smile spreads across my face because it’s still new saying this and because it still feels so good.

I continue and turn left on Pennsylvania Avenue, and suddenly the iconic Dome of the Capitol appears in the distance. Just a block or two and then I am at the Embassy.

Rosemere, Quebec, 1968

A toddler and a four-year-old are watching cartoons on the black-and-white television in the walnut console that dominates the living room. Mom and Dad are trying to enjoy a quiet moment before the day’s activity begins. It is not to be. The door is being slowly pushed open and suddenly the four-year-old, their son, is standing beside the bed. He looks at them solemnly and says, “I’m a girl.”

Suddenly, the four-year-old, their son, is standing beside the bed. He looks at them solemnly and says, “I’m a girl.”

Washington, DC, 2024

I have been to many embassies and consulates before, and high commissions and permanent missions too. But never this one, the biggest and arguably the most important one we have. And never, ever before as the person I have always known myself to be.

I climb the steps and go to the receptionist under the watchful eye of security and tell them I am with IRCC, that I am here to visit S.

Later that afternoon, we are watching guests arrive for tonight’s reception. The DHOM (Deputy Head of Mission), who will be the first speaker, has let us know she will come down in about 10 minutes. The room is filling up nicely. It’s World Refugee Day, and it’s Pride Month, and the reception marks the launch of the Annual Report of Rainbow Railroad, a non-governmental organization dedicated to protecting the rights of LGBTQI+ refugees around the world and a key partner for our refugee program.

This is why I am here in Washington. I was asked to emcee this event and, since I was coming, managed to add a few more meetings to round out the day. It’s been intense but good.

I check my phone and look over at the podium. Five more minutes. Earlier today, we had scoped out the room, and I had stood up there, imagining myself addressing 50 to 80 people, tonight’s estimated attendance.

Public speaking of any kind used to be a massive anxiety trigger for me. Back in undergrad, a presentation to a seminar of a dozen classmates would paralyze me with fear. Sometimes I would take an Ativan, which would take the jagged edge off, but at the cost of leaving me feeling vaguely lobotomized and unsure of how it went after. Or during for that matter.

Somehow, I overcame that and gradually came to enjoy public speaking and storytelling and especially how the two were interwoven. I learned that I could speak to a large crowd and establish rapport. Even one that was initially hostile or suspicious. It’s 50 per cent preparation, thinking through the script and the messaging and 50 per cent reading the room. This is a friendly room.

Burlington, Ontario, 1978

Mrs. Wilson surveys the 9th-grade English class and sighs, thinking about the many years that remain between her and retirement. This job does not seem to be getting any easier. Burlington has just been anointed as one of the wealthiest communities in Canada by annual income and also has the dubious honour of one of the highest vandalism rates. Bored rich suburban kids. “White Punks on Dope”. This class is no exception. Even the kid who transferred in from the gifted program is worse than useless. Often reeking of marijuana smoke with bloodshot eyes, or bleeding and bruised from another fight out at “smokers’ corner.” She is skeptical about his regular absences on Wednesday afternoons to see a “specialist.” One day, in exasperation she tells him “You’ll be in jail or dead before you’re 20.” If she thought this would scare him straight, she is disappointed. Behind dead eyes, the once promising kid says nothing. But he is thinking, thinking that jail doesn’t sound fun, but death might not be so bad. Better than the ritualized sexual abuse of conversion therapy every Wednesday or the intolerable pressure of gender dysphoria. There was no question of telling her or any other grown-up about what was happening. What would he say with no vocabulary, and who could he trust with these terrible, shameful secrets?

Washington, DC, 2024

The DHOM has arrived and S gives me a nod. It’s time.

I take a deep breath and remind myself that I have gotten good at this. I have done it a million times.

I have never done it in a dress.

At least this is my favourite dress. With brilliant blues (match my eyes I am told) and a good length and silhouette. I feel confident. I’ve felt confident all day.

I am also wearing a special talisman. A heavy silvery metal pendant on a fine silver chain. It’s a little cast sculpture in the form of an Inuk woman standing legs slightly apart. She is wearing a parka and peeking out of the hood of the parka, cheek to cheek with her, is an infant. My father had travelled to Baffin Island for business back in the mid-1970s and bought it as a gift for my Mom. Wearing it now, I feel like mom – who passed eleven months ago – is with me. I feel her protection.

Ottawa, Ontario, 2023

After the pandemic, after losing people dear to me, I feel intense distress at the thought of letting any more time slip away. I am terrified at the thought of dying without having ever been me. I am also aware that the world has changed. Trans people exist and enjoy human rights protections. I return to work after two years Leave Without Pay and make a small addition to my email signature – “she/they”. Those two words became a conversation starter: “I’m trans, trans people exist, and I am a trans person. The bald guy you’ve known for 25 years as Oscar is actually a redhead named Holly.” Hold my breath and wait to see how people will react. I have lived in terror of this moment my entire life and now I am orchestrating it myself. The reactions are beautiful and welcoming and this thing I have feared and hated forever, seen as a liability, has suddenly become a source of power. Dysphoria is displaced by euphoria.

Washington, DC, 2024

I take the podium and lean into the microphone, “Good evening, everyone! Bon soir!” I say to the anglophone audience, Ottawa habits following me wherever I go. After a few more attempts and some helpful glass tapping from the floor the room finally goes quiet and all eyes are on me.

“Good evening. Bon soir.” I repeat now with everyone’s attention. “Welcome to the Embassy of Canada. We are very pleased to welcome you to tonight’s reception to celebrate the vital work of one of our important partners, Rainbow Railroad. My name is Holly Jacobs. I am a trans woman. I’ve waited 55 years to say this.”

I pause and savour the moment.

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My dad bought this pendant as a gift for my mom during a business trip to Baffin in the 1970s. Mom passed away last summer, but wearing it, I feel her love and protection.

“Tonight, we will be hearing from distinguished speakers from the Embassy, from the United States Government, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, and from Rainbow Railroad themselves.” Take a breath, quick room check. “Before we launch into the program, I would like to share something. My journey yesterday was quite stressful. I only received my passport at the very last minute the night before my flight. It was my first time flying post transition, as feminine me. Going through security. Crossing a border. First hotel check in. Feminine me is only seven months old. This felt scary.” Brief pause. “And then I thought to myself, really? I am feeling stressed? I am travelling legally. I am documented. I have trusted friends at both my start and endpoint. I speak the local language throughout my journey. I have cash and cards and a hotel reservation. If I am feeling stressed with all of these privileges and advantages and predictability, what must an LGBTQI+ refugee feel? Undocumented, uncomprehending, destitute after paying their passage, forced to trust shady facilitators and destination unknown. How powerful must their motivation be and how awful their fear?” Audience scan. A sea of attentive faces, many nodding. That landed well.

I make some technical announcements, including the location of the washrooms (not inclusive) and that there is a themed cocktail available, the “Rainbow Rum Sidecar”, the product of the research and creative dedication of S. And then I introduce the DHOM and step down.

Ottawa, Ontario, 2024

Sometimes the stars align. Two months after coming out, I am approved for a six-month micro mission with the Public Service Pride Network Secretariat. I learn that I am one of only two trans executives (out of 9,000) we are aware of and, to the best of my knowledge, the only trans Foreign Service Officer. If there are others out there- we do not seem to be numerous- we won’t need a big clubhouse. The work is absorbing and impactful, and after the experience of addressing 75 Deputy Ministers on the issue of trans inclusion and acting as emcee on the first Canada–UK Pride Network Summit, I officially retract the letter of intent to retire I’d submitted just a few months ago. I have rediscovered inspiration. There is a trail to break.

Washington, DC, 2024

The remaining introductions and interstitial bits between speakers go smoothly. The final speaker is a refugee from Central America, a gay man, who brings down the house, communicating his joy and relief at finding a place where he can be himself, and his commitment to helping other newcomers. I call for another round of applause for him, and then I am wrapping things up, thanking everyone for coming and urging them to stay and network and enjoy the hospitality.

I am on a cloud. My entire life, I could not have imagined doing this, even eight months ago, I was terrified of stepping out my front door and braving public spaces as authentic me. I feel invincible and euphoric. I reach back through the years to all of those versions of me, embrace them, and tell them it will all be ok.

Holly Jacobs has been in public service for over 25 years and completed postings in London, Delhi (twice), Tehran, Beirut, and Ankara. Her posting as Migration Program Manager in Ho Chi Minh City in autumn 2024 marked the first time in her diplomatic career that she was able to live and work as her authentic self.

Home is Where the Kitchen Is

by Lisa Bitto

When I was asked to write for the bout de papier book, it took some thought to decide on a topic. I decided to answer a question I’ve been asked many times: why do I like food so much? It’s a long answer. Or an answer with many parts. And it began before I could even drive.

I came home from school one day craving something sweet. With plaintive eyes, I asked my mom if she would make some chocolate chip cookies. With what my twelve-year-old self saw as a heart of stone, she declined. So I did what any dedicated cookie monster would do and made them myself. And you know what? Not rocket science after all. They came out the same as my mom’s.

Ghirardelli’s Chocolate Chip Cookies

Pulled from the Ghirardelli chocolate chip bag many years ago, it is improved further by a technique from a New York Times article on the best chocolate chip cookies in the city. It has raised over $5,000 for charity over the years, so you can trust it’s a good one.

1 cup butter, at room temperature

1/2 cup white sugar

1 ½ cups dark brown sugar (light brown sugar works, but you’ll lose the caramel note)

2 eggs

1 Tbls vanilla

2 ½ cups all-purpose flour

¾ tsp salt

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

As much or as little chocolate as you like (milk, dark or any other flavour of baking chips). Tradition is one bag (270 grams or so), but I chop equal measures of milk and dark chocolate without weighing them. Add nuts if you like, such as walnuts or pecans; they are nicer if you toast them at 350F for 10 minutes before adding to the recipe. Your call.

In a stand mixer (or with a handheld mixer), cream butter until light and creamy. Add both sugars and cream again, scraping down the bowl.

Add eggs one at a time, beating one in completely before adding the next. Add vanilla and mix in.

Blend remaining ingredients in a small bowl with a spoon. Add to the batter and mix until it’s just incorporated. Then add the chocolate(s) and optionally, nuts.

Here’s the twist: cover the mixing bowl and refrigerate. This really improves the flavour of the cookie. I usually leave it in the fridge for two days before baking. This means you can control when you bake and you can prep the dough in advance.

You could also freeze, splitting the dough into two even portions and rolling it into a log on parchment paper, then placing it in a plastic freezer bag to prevent freezer burn.

I’m a December baby from the Maritimes, so I graduated high school and started university at 17. I traded small-town New Brunswick for small-town Nova Scotia, in a university town whose population doubled for the school year. For the first time, I was on my own with not a lot of money in the bank and a truly heinous meal hall. While my residence floor had a highly coveted oven and stove (part of a “sample” upgraded kitchen offered by a renovation company), I didn’t have much in the way of equipment. But I did have the cast iron frying pan that my dad bought for me as a going-away present.

You can actually do an awful lot with a cast iron pan. Once it’s properly heated, the cooking surface produces fantastic browning, making for perfect grilled cheese sandwiches. Add soup, and you’ve made an easy comfort meal.

Grilled Cheese Sandwich

Two slices of thinly-sliced buttered bread (I like light rye)

Cheese (I use sliced cheddar and grated parmesan, but use whatever you like/have)

A sprinkling of garlic powder + salt or garlic salt

Preheat a heavy frying pan, preferably cast iron. It’s ready when your hand can feel the heat radiating, but it’s not smoking. If it smokes, pull it off the heat and let it cool down a bit so it doesn’t burn your sandwich.

Add one slice of bread to the pan, butter side down. Add the cheese, garlic powder or garlic salt and the remaining bread slice, butter side up. Let it sit for about thirty seconds, then check the colour. When it’s golden brown, turn it over and repeat.

That’s it, you’re done. (Do turn off the heat now, though.) Cut it in half and eat with soup, chilli or anything else you are craving. One of the most comforting things you can make in your kitchen, in my opinion. Even helps with homesickness.

As my undergrad drew to a close, I worried about what came next. My International Affairs prof had instilled the idea that the Foreign Service was the career, so I wrote the recruitment exam. While filling out the application, I saw I could also apply for Citizenship and Immigration Canada. Why not? It was a single extra click. And CIC hired me. From a small town in Nova Scotia to the wilds of Toronto to work at Pearson Airport.

In a little house in an Italian neighbourhood, I rented a room from a Jamaican mother; her adult son lived in the basement apartment. They were complete opposites: she was very stern and pragmatic, he was laid-back and cool. Both could cook like you cannot imagine. And there was always something cooking. I was lucky enough to be invited for chicken curry one evening, and I watched closely. While it will never match Kemel’s, this is how I make it now. It’s so good.

Kemel’s Jamaican Chicken Curry

1 3-lb roasting chicken, cut up. Remove the skin but leave the bones.

1 potato, cubed

4-6 cloves garlic, minced (you can add more or less)

1” piece of peeled fresh ginger, grated (you can add more or less)

Yellow curry powder to taste (start with 2 Tbls and adjust next time)

Thyme to taste (start with 1 tsp for dried thyme or 1 Tbls for fresh and adjust next time)

Salt to taste (start with 1½ tsp and adjust at the end)

1-2 cups chicken stock

1 scotch bonnet pepper (*hot!*) or ¼ tsp of cayenne

2 green onions, chopped

Heat a large pot on medium and add a generous glug of vegetable oil. Add chicken pieces, meat-side down and let brown. Turn them over. Add potato, garlic and ginger, then stir and let fry for a minute. Add curry powder and thyme, stir again and let it fry for a minute to release the flavour. Add salt and stock to barely cover the contents.

Cover and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to a simmer and partially remove the lid so the steam can escape. Let the liquid reduce. Simmer 45 minutes, stirring every 15. The potato should be tender and the meat cooked through. Stir in the green onion at the end, which gives a nice pop of freshness. Serve over rice or with paratha.

I didn’t get into the Foreign Service on my first try. And once I did, it was a whirlwind. You quickly learn the impact of having a good manager (or not), networking, slaying that briefing note, and getting noticed. That was when Damascus was considered the secret awesome posting, and the Middle East Peace Process seemed just out of reach.

When I got to BNATO, I wanted to try all the local fare. Carbonnade, Belgium’s answer to boeuf bourgignon, was high on the list (with fries, obviously). Turns out I wasn’t such a fan of the Belgian preferences for minimal salt, spice and garlic. So I went back to making my own favourite boeuf bourgignon from my faded copy of Julia Child’s cookbook. With boiled or mashed potatoes, this is top-level comfort food.

Julia Child’s Boeuf Bourguignon

This is Julia Child’s recipe from Mastering the Art of French Cooking, but I changed a few things to align with what I typically have in my kitchen.

4 slices of smoked bacon or equivalent amount of lardons

2 lbs beef stew meat, cut into 2” cubes and dried with paper towel to help browning

4-5 white or brown button mushrooms, sliced

1 large onion, peeled and sliced

1 bottle of wine (1 cup decanted into a wine glass, for the chef)

3 cloves garlic, chopped

1 bay leaf

1 tsp thyme

1 tomato

1 Tbls tomato paste

2 cups chicken stock

Over medium heat, fry the bacon in a fry pan, retaining the fat. Remove to a large plate and then brown the beef cubes, adding olive oil to the pan if needed. Move the beef to the plate and then add onions to the pan to cook. Salt them immediately to help release the water. You can cook the onions a little or a lot (caramelizing over low heat in a bit of butter adds great flavour, if you have the time). Remove onions, placing them with the waiting beef.

Add a bit more oil, then add bacon and let it cook. Add sliced mushrooms and let them shrink and brown a bit. Add the garlic and herbs, stirring for about a minute, until you can smell them. Then add the tomato and paste. Add half a cup of wine, which will help deglaze the pan, pulling up all the colour and bits that have accumulated at the bottom. Add the beef-onion mixture, stock, up to two cups of wine and the deglazing wine into a pot; you want the meat to just barely be covered by liquid; add more stock or wine if needed.

Bring to a boil, then reduce heat so that the stew just simmers when covered with a lid. Let it simmer for an hour and a half, then check on the tenderness of the meat and the level of the liquid. Give it a stir and keep cooking, checking every half hour, until the beef is tender. Remove the beef.

Combine 3 Tbls flour with 2.5 Tbls butter to form a paste. Add to the remaining sauce. Bring it to a boil, then reduce the heat to keep it simmering while you stir occasionally; the longer you cook, the thicker it will get, so it’s up to you when it’s ready. Place on a bed of mashed potato (or whatever you prefer).

Don’t be intimidated; it’s really just a bunch of stirring. You’re layering lots of nice flavours and textures on top of each other. When you’ve made it a few times, it won’t feel intimidating anymore. It is terrific after you come in from skating or skiing, and makes the most amazing office lunch to make your colleagues jealous.

I’m back in Ottawa now. I don’t know about you, but by the time Friday rolls around, I am done. And when I get home from work, I want something easy and delicious to celebrate the arrival of the weekend. Having pizza dough ready in the fridge is perfect.

Master Baker Richard Bertinet has a BBC Maestro bread-making course that will knock your socks off. One of his recipes is pizza. It is perfect. You too can make a perfect pizza with almost no time or effort. Seriously. You’ll put more time into choosing what to put on top. But start it on Wednesday. And buy a scale.

Eric Bertinet’s Exquisite Low-Effort Pizza

(makes 2 that each serve 2 people)

On Day 1, as you’re making breakfast, stir into a jar or cup: 1 gram of yeast, 32 grams of water and 32 grams of bread flour.

Cover lightly with a lid (don’t screw the lid on) and put in the fridge.

Set your phone to remind you after work that evening to take the jar out of the fridge and let it sit on the counter. Before you head to bed, add to a stand mixer bowl:

163 grams of water

250 grams of flour

5 grams of semolina (available in the flour section)

The jar of starter from this morning

2 grams yeast (instant or traditional)

8 grams of olive oil

6 grams of salt

Using the dough hook attachment, mix on low for 5-10 minutes; it will be smooth and supple. If you do this by hand, use a bowl scraper to control the stickiness.

Roll the ball in an oiled bowl to coat it, then cover. Refrigerate and forget it until Day 3. Seriously. Time is an ingredient here, and it makes an enormous difference to the flavour, the lightness of the dough, and how easily it stretches.

After work on Day 3, leave the bowl on the countertop to warm up and rise for a few hours. During the last hour, preheat the oven to 450F; heat a pizza stone on the bottom rack if you have it and move any additional racks out of the way. Prep toppings.

My topping recommendations are:

Red sauce. Simmer in a small pot for an hour: sauteed onion and garlic, a can of tomatoes, a teaspoon of salt, and a bit of rosemary, thyme, oregano and basil.

(And either) bacon and caramelized onion.

(Or) meatballs. Combine with your hands a pound of ground beef, a bit of grated onion, a few tablespoons of breadcrumbs, a glug of olive oil, ½ tsp each of rosemary, thyme, oregano and basil, minced or grated garlic to taste, and a teaspoon of salt. Form into 16 meatballs and let rest in the refrigerator, if you have time. Bake at 350F for 25-35 minutes, or until cooked through but not browned. Sautéed sliced peppers and caramelized onions are a nice addition.

(And) cheese. Stretchy mozza or provolone; flavourful gruyère, graviera or cheddar; and salty parmesan or peccorino. Not authentic, but really good.

Spread semolina or flour on a pizza peel or a wooden cutting board. Roll half the dough in the semolina/flour. Now you are ready to shape the dough. Yes, you are. Don’t be scared. I promise it’s not hard; you just need some practice.

Press gently on the centre with your fingertip pads to deflate, then work slowly from the middle, leaving the edges untouched. Find YouTube clips by Chris Bianco or Ooni to help. You don’t need to toss it in the air. Don’t fear the dough; it’s a learning experience, not a test. Make sure there is enough semolina or flour to keep the dough from sticking. Don’t skip this step.

Add toppings (see below for ideas). I usually layer: sauce, half the cheese, toppings, the other half of the cheese. You do you.

Give the pizza board a few shakes to make sure the dough isn’t sticking. Open the oven door and screw up your courage. With one or two good, confident shakes, move the pizza from the board to the pizza stone. Close the door and bake for ten minutes, then check for doneness. Bake a few more minutes if it needs it. Rotating it at the seven-minute mark makes sure everything bakes nicely.

Instead of a pizza stone, you can oil a large cast iron frying pan for a thicker, deep-dish pizza or use an oiled round pizza pan, placing it on the bottom rack. Consider dropping the cash for a thick cordite baking stone, which makes amazing pizza and bread. It needs no maintenance other than brushing it off after it cools. Never wash and always let it cool before moving, so it doesn’t crack. I’ve had mine for nearly twenty years.

So that’s it. Some of my favourite recipes and some memories that go along with them. I bet you have some recipe memories and stories of your own too. Those are the best recipes to share, since they share a bit of yourself, too. Try some of these in your kitchen, wherever you are calling home right now. May they bring you comfort, happiness or just a full tummy – whatever you need.

Lisa Bitto is a former Foreign Service Officer now learning about satellites and asteroids at the Canadian Space Agency. Her love for cooking and baking is surpassed only by her love of eating. She is currently doing extensive research to find the best ice cream, croissant and burger in the National Capital Region.

Annex

An Interview With
Charles Ritchie

Since his retirement from the Foreign Service in 1971, Charles Ritchie has written a series of books which looks at the lighter side of life as a Canadian diplomat. Purposely eschewing the historical memoir or a study of the role of Canada in international affairs, Ritchie’s volumes are rather undiplomatic diaries of his life and times. The first, The Siren Years (1974), recorded his experiences as a young foreign service officer in London. It won the Governor-General’s Award for Non-Fiction. An Appetite for Life (1977) introduced the young Charles Ritchie. Diplomatic Passport (1981) followed his rise in the Service. Storm Signals (1983) takes the author from the United Nations in New York to the Canadian Embassy in Washington to Paris as Canadian Ambassador to NATO and finally to 12 Upper Brook Street, London as High Commissioner to Great Britain. bout de papier spoke to Mr. Ritchie in his flat in the Duncannon Arms about his life in the Service. Mr. Ritchie is currently working on another book — a series of sketches of individuals from various walks of life whom he encountered during his travels.

bout de papier: One of the things that struck me when I read your books was that life always was tremendously exciting and sounded like great fun, but there must have been some frustrations or a downside to life in the foreign service?

C. RITCHIE: Of course there were, and they were all internal personnel problems. The frustrations were not, however, the kind that made you feel that I’d chosen the wrong profession. I think that the London post, in the end, was the least interesting politically. But it was the most delightful. There wasn’t very much of importance to work on after Washington. But, over a long period of nearly 40 years, there were so many different phases. When I first joined, which was the really early time in 1934, there wasn’t so much frustration, but it was so different from anything which exists. There was no training of any kind. The pay was $1,800 a year, and even in those days that was not very much. But then to have any kind of job was rather good. It was an education but not an education deliberately. One day you would be decoding, the next day you would be doing press clippings, then you would be answering letters from some crank about whether the Union Jack should fly or something of that kind. We kept a very low image, right on the level of the floor perhaps. I think I could say that there was no administration virtually. Dr. Skelton paid no attention to administration. He was really an academic: He was a close advisor to the Prime Minister not only on external affairs, on everything. So he was a power in the land, and administration was something he left.

Norman Robertson, who succeeded him, was exactly the same. And everything to do with administration was left to Miss McCloskey. She had two female assistants. And if you were being posted abroad and wanted to know what your allowances would be or anything to do with administration, you just went to see Miss McCloskey, if she had time to see you. And if she said you would go abroad, away you went. Dr. Skelton might or might not sign the papers. It was really a very peculiar world in a way. I didn’t find it at all frustrating because I didn’t know anything else. I was not completely inclined towards administration myself, and I never felt very sad about it.

bout de papier: How did the Department entertain foreign diplomats in the early years?

RITCHIE: Well, there was no entertainment. There was no question of entertaining. There were no allowances; it came from your salary, and you simply had friends around for a drink or something like that.

bout de papier: Posting procedure. Today we have this fairly elaborate system set out. What was it like in 1934?

RITCHIE: It was such a small service, almost everyone knew what everyone else was like. Vincent Massey would be asked if he liked X, and he would discuss with Dr. Skelton and say he would rather have Y. So it was all rather personal. All personnel arrangements above a certain level, that is to say the foreign service officer category, were built around a basis of knowing each other, what the traffic would bear, and how you got along. You would see how the wife would get on and all that sort of thing.

I don’t think I ever said that I would like to go anywhere particular. I wasn’t really concerned about that. And, of course, there were very few posts from which to choose. It is hard to describe the past practices of the Department because in the course of my life in the Department it has changed several times. It changed most dramatically when Arnold Heeney took over as undersecretary from Norman Robertson. Heeney had been dealing with the Prime Minister’s office, and he had a sense of administration. He wanted to relate External Affairs to other departments and make it part of the whole civil service, which it had never thought of itself as being. That was really the beginning of the sort of “grown up” administrative relationship with other departments. Before that, during the long period when the Prime Minister was Secretary of State for External Affairs, we were almost part of the Prime Minister’s enclave, and no other department or Civil Service Commissioner or anybody else put their nose too far into our affairs.

bout de papier: When you were going off to posts, did you have any idea of what you were going to meet when you did arrive? Discussions on simple things, the allowances, the type of accommodation that you were going to receive?

RITCHIE: Well, you went to see Miss McCloskey, and she told you about the allowances you were going to get. As for the work, it was very similar to academic matters. Apart from myself and one or two others, all had been teaching at university at one time or another. Pearson, Wrong, Skelton and the others were all academics, and they had very much that approach. The atmosphere was more like a college. As well, they were quite young men. They talked to you a great deal about all the current problems. Suppose you were going to Washington to help Norman Robertson negotiate tariff matters. You would go out to the cafeteria at the Château Laurier, accompanied by two or three officers, and talk. You had to educate yourself. You heard all about it, not through any programs in actual instructions, but by talking with others.

bout de papier: You mention the Chateau. Was the Chateau the foreign service officers’ club or the lunch spot?

RITCHIE: The cafeteria was the cheapest place to eat. It was also close to the Department.

bout de papier: You were then in the East Block or Langevin?

RITCHIE: East Block. I never was anywhere else. The Château was the nearest place, and it was also sort of a gathering place for other civil servants. And, of course, the senior civil servants received very small salaries. On top of that, they had a point of view that any ostentatious expenditure was undesirable. Dr. Clark, who was the deputy minister of Finance, was a great civil servant. I’m sure he never took a taxi in his life. There was one place where we could get a free cup of coffee. We used to go there. It was all conducted on a rather reduced scale, sort of self-consciously so. That’s the way that we were supposed to behave.

bout de papier: What was a usual day back in those days?

RITCHIE: We started rather late. I was always rather late. Then, you just bowed your head and set about the task of the day. I’m talking of the very early days before the divisions were properly set up. Naturally, later on there was a structure. I started with the Royal Commission on Price Spreads and Mass Buying in 1934. Mike Pearson was the secretary, and I was just sent along to help. But this had nothing to do with foreign affairs at all, and I was there for months.

Mike Pearson was such an odd person to work with because he appeared to be so casual. This was all a double-take because he was a tremendously industrious and conscientious person. I got the notion that if he could be so casual, I could be equally casual. So I would go on coffee breaks and carry on. Then, one day, I came back to find somebody else was sitting in my place. I spoke to Pearson, fearing a very unpleasant confrontation, but not a word was said. Then, fortunately for me, the other person proved more deficient, and he disappeared. This interregnum lasted a few weeks. And then I was called back, and I returned to my desk in the East Block.

bout de papier: What about your sources of information in the early days?

RITCHIE: We relied a lot on what we got from the British Foreign Office. That was the chief source. It was still the age of long dispatches, which went on and on. I don’t know if it’s entirely extinct now. The missions then did long dispatches. The third secretary spent weeks writing a dispatch, polishing and cleaning it up. The Counsellor then looked at it for questions of style and verbosity and expression. They were very educational from the point of view of the person who handled the job. You had to do a very thorough job. I wonder if anyone looks at these now. The USSEA looked at them, but I know Mr. King only looked at short pieces of paper.

After the war, things began to get organized with the proliferation of missions and the organization by Heeney. It is rather irritating that civil servants are often blamed for the proliferation of either jobs or missions, but it was always the politicians who set up these missions. They would come up with ideas and the public servant would be asked to produce. The rather unfair thing was that the public got the idea it was self-generated.

bout de papier: One of the things that comes through in your book is the tremendous relevancy of what you did, either as Third Secretary or as Ambassador; you were very much part of the process.

RITCHIE: That is very true. This is what made life worthwhile. For example, after I’d been in the foreign service for some years, there was a discussion about the post-war plans. We had very much a sense of participating in the formulation of policy at a time when you were just formulating positions and reaching out to see what the Canadian stance would be on major issues. That was fascinating. The human contact was also most interesting.

bout de papier: Did this hold true throughout your career? Did you feel that there was a change towards the end? There is some talk now that diplomats are less relevant. You remember the most often quoted remark by Trudeau: “I can read what I want in the New York Times”.

RITCHIE: Yes. Well, I think it is perfectly true. I suppose those long dispatches that were written really weren’t justified. They were an education for the person, but they couldn’t really serve much of a purpose. As to the irrelevancy of Ambassadors, yes, this is somewhat true. There is much more incessant travel by ministers. One of the other difficulties was, and still is, that, curiously, those people who have served abroad — when they came home they suddenly became different animals. You were a different animal when you were abroad. It was very easy to drift out of touch, not only with the ministers, but with the Department itself. Your only hope was that as people came on a delegation, you could get your pals around and find out what was happening. Sometimes you learned the brilliant dispatch you had sent was creating a most unpleasant smell. Nobody ever gave us an idea of what was happening. That was rather frustrating. I don’t know if it is like that now, but you found it very easy to get out of touch. The great thing, as it was such a personal thing, was to have friends in the Department. The differences inside the Department were very often based, not so much upon how many employees you had, or rank, or any of that, but on views that you held. For instance, I would have one point of view about the objective of NATO. The undersecretary would perhaps have another. There would be controversy, and sometimes quite sharp controversy on your estimate of what the traffic would bear and the Canadian position should be.

People wrote dispatches, letters, telegrams from the missions to the missions. Of course, when we were at home we would have discussions. Somebody from the division, for instance, would send the usual papers up and then we would have to discuss it. The structure was simple then — you had a minister, an undersecretary, the deputy undersecretary. It was just linear down. It was not perpendicular, and there were very few deputies. In our dealings with other departments, the evolution that I saw depended rather on the clout and knowledge of the undersecretary himself — especially his knowledge of administration and above all economic realities. If you had an undersecretary like Norman Robertson, who was no good at administration but who knew every tariff by heart and the exact prices for the last few years and could recite them by heart — if he went to a department, they paid attention to him because he had, as they say for a ship, an awful lot of displacement. He knew a lot about economics and politics in Canada. But I think that later on, somehow, perhaps we didn’t always have undersecretaries who had quite this wide knowledge or who impressed in the same way the people with whom they worked. Then, of course, there was the difference between those who spent most of their lives, or a lot of their lives, serving abroad. When they came back, they didn’t really know the game plan.

bout de papier: In your books you suggest that, while serving abroad was fun, your career was made in Ottawa.

RITCHIE: Oh yes, certainly. Of course your relations with your own government were far more important than your relations with any other government.

bout de papier: In your book you describe a number of people, the undersecretaries and the ministers. How would you paint a picture of the ideal undersecretary?

RITCHIE: I doubt I’ve ever met somebody who combined everything in that position. From the point of view of long-term policy, Norman Robertson was by far the most remarkable undersecretary. Arnold Heeney knew how to run the show and was very competent but was not the same sort of thinker.

Relations with ministers were close — they were just down the corridor — you saw them every time you went for a walk. Our foreign service was small. Ottawa was small, and all these people lived cheek by jowl with each other, and all the ministers lived next door to each other in Rockcliffe, with their civil servants and their wives. They played tennis together, and they went to parties together, and their wives knew each other well and knew all about their families and their affairs. It was a very closely knit little world. But, of course, basically, it was a closely knit Liberal world. I think, however, most foreign service officers felt they could devotedly serve either party. And I think they could. But still, I quite understood that people like Mr. Diefenbaker, or any incoming Conservative government who hadn’t been part of this little circle, wondered about these people. The whole thing had grown up under King.

bout de papier: A bit of a parallel with today?

RITCHIE: Yes, very much . . . I came in under a Conservative administration with Bennett. Now there was a Prime Minister for you! He never slid down a bannister in his life or did a pirouette. A massive man with a winged collar. I remember when I came for my oral interview, he said: “Young man, it is a great privilege to serve.” He said: “Many are called, but few are chosen.” So we walked off with this great admonition in our ears.

Things have changed since then . . . The exams were different from what they are now. There were these long essays which included reviews. Of course, the other thing about the Foreign Service was that it had no effective French element inside the Department. There was Mr. Beaudry, who was an associate undersecretary. A charming and distinguished man. But it was always quite clear that he and the French element were not part of the process. The Paris Embassy was a different world. It had always been French from the days of M. Roy, before we had an Embassy. It was a French enclave. Many of the French-speaking foreign service officers, as we expanded, much preferred serving abroad, in Brazil, and Rome. One reason why they preferred it was that the whole method of working was so unadjusted to their way of working. That has all changed. Of course, then there was no question of French being made a qualification for joining the Department of External Affairs. I was fortunate because I happened to speak French. It was very peculiar because French was a requirement for almost all foreign services elsewhere. I remember taking it up in those days with one senior officer. I asked, “Why can’t we have classes where people can learn French?”, and he said, “Oh no, that would be quite wrong and unconstitutional because that would be like teaching French as a foreign language, and we wouldn’t do that — that would be very much resented.” That was part of the reason it didn’t play any part in the formulation of policy.

The breakthrough came when Mike Pearson appointed Jules Léger as undersecretary. Jules Léger was much younger and junior to other foreign service officers, but he had such a great deal of integrity and modesty, and he was such a good man that his appointment was not at all resented. But I am quite sure that for the first time one element that entered into it, apart from his own abilities, was the fact that he was French. And then of course the whole thing changed.

bout de papier: What about other languages?

RITCHIE: There were no language requirements. But you could have training, if you were going to Japan or some place like that.

bout de papier: Why did you write the diaries?

RITCHIE: The diaries were an escape. I had no interest in writing down all my appointments during the day, who I dealt with, the staff problems. That wasn’t the object of the operation. There was nothing more boring than sitting down and writing everything that you had just done in the office. I had lots of notes scattered about, lists of personnel, all sorts of things like that.

bout de papier: What was the greatest achievement of your career?

RITCHIE: Well, I don’t know that I achieved anything. I sort of took on the attitude towards the Department of a lawyer with a client. I thought my job was to work as plausibly and actively as I could and keep in close touch with the Prime Minister or the Foreign Minister.

I was very interested in the early days at the United Nations. I loved that very much. It was very fascinating. From the point of view of a diplomatic job, it was most interesting work — negotiating with every country under the sun and with all their representatives. I handled a lot of disarmament work. When I look back on it, nothing was achieved for all those endless disarmament resolutions at the United Nations. There is, of course, another side which may not be an achievement but, keeping your people out of trouble and keeping them from doing or saying something which would get the lads in a mess with Canadians or people abroad is no small thing. You had to keep on the watch, especially if you were in Washington.

bout de papier: Would you join today’s foreign service?

RITCHIE: I think that if I had never known the structure and the way of working that I was accustomed to, I would take a shot at it. Because after all, the relations between states are what it is all about, and that is the basis of the whole career. I have never known a time in the Department of External Affairs when people didn’t say: “oh, the frustration”, that was as true in 1934 as it is now. I have hardly ever known a time when they didn’t say “morale isn’t what it used to be”. I’ve heard that one for 40 years, although I do think from what I hear of how the Department is set up now, my morale would be very bad. I don’t understand the rules of the game that is being played at present. The endless meetings and committee meetings, which I never liked and thought were rather a waste of time and could be very trying. And the structure is confusing — this sort of lateral structure and authority. I think I would find it very difficult to disentangle myself. The rules of the game are different and, of course, the great emphasis on administration I find unattractive.

bout de papier: What about the attempts to fertilize the Department from without, to bring in people who didn’t come up through the ranks, and place them on single assignment.

RITCHIE: Well, just after the war, when the expansion came, quite a lot of people were brought in from universities. They were teachers in their forties. There was a need to expand and to expand in a hurry, so they wanted men over forty with experience. It worked out not badly as far as we were concerned. They identified themselves quite readily, although they were never quite like the people who served as juniors.

bout de papier: What happens to old diplomats? Are they like old soldiers? Do they just fade away?

RITCHIE: We keep on. You must keep on in the habit of keeping up. We are certainly never used in an advisory capacity. After I retired, I started writing and collecting. I keep in touch with some who have retired. Some I see really only accidentally. We often talk about foreign policy.

[picture]

Robertson with Ritchie.

Behind Enemy Lines: A Practical Guide for Diplomats

by Nicholas Coghlan

Venturing into national territory not fully under the control of the government to which one is accredited as a diplomat is usually a matter to be undertaken with careful forethought, not to say hesitancy, but it can considerably enhance your value on the cocktail circuit, provide colourful material for your memoirs post-retirement and, as long as you couch your reports for Ottawa in a sufficiently studious and non-alarming manner, can actually be of assistance in the development of Canadian foreign policy. The only snag is that you have to survive to tell the tale.

MY FIRST EXPERIENCES OF SLEEPING WITH THE ENEMY (well, not literally...) were in Chiapas, Mexico, immediately before and after the dramatic indigenous revolt, led by a mysterious blue-eyed white man in a black balaclava, that galvanised the world on the very eve of the entry into force of the North American Free Trade Agreement in 1994.

Over the 18 months prior to the revolt, I had travelled repeatedly to Chiapas, which was the most impoverished of Mexico’s states and in most ways little changed since Graham Greene wrote about it in The Lawless Roads, in the 1930s. I met with feisty Bishop Samuel Ruiz, later nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, with human rights defenders, with leaders of self-help groups whom we were assisting through our Canada Fund for Local Initiatives and, of course, with all the usual local dignitaries: the Governor, the chief of Police, mayors and so on. While no one in our mission in Mexico City predicted the rebellion, it was thus with some smugness that, when Ottawa spluttered its bewilderment at the January 1, 1994, uprising, we were able to list page upon page of detailed and distressing previous posts reporting on the plight of Chiapas peasants.

Mexican military police guard the site of peace talks with Zapatista rebels; Chiapas, Mexico

“Where do you think I got this?”

But a few months later I was summoned peremptorily to a meeting with a senior officer attached to one of Mexico’s then numerous and mysterious intelligence agencies. After we had exchanged the usual niceties (I had thought it prudent to meet in a very public place: a central table at VIPS, Mexico City’s answer to Tim Horton’s), he produced with a flourish a dog-eared visiting card bearing my name and slapped it down onto the table, demanding:

“Where do you think I got this?”

Lesson Number One was thus learned: be rather careful to whom you hand out your card in such lands, especially if your contact is a person who has good reason to be very disgruntled with the government to which you are accredited. In this case my card had been taken from the dead body of a Zapatista rebel killed in a shootout.

MANY MORE SIMILAR LESSONS were learned when, for three years, I covered Colombia’s brutal civil war. One interesting moment was when most of the Western diplomatic corps flew by light aircraft into rebel-held territory to witness the first substantive face-to-face meeting between the FARC and the government in years. As we taxied to a halt on the bumpy strip of San Vicente del Caguán, the remote jungle capital of the rebels, to our collective dismay we saw out of the portholes that a huge reception committee had been formed, with an honour guard of a hundred or so fearsome-looking men and women in fatigues, all laden down with heavy weapons. There was an equally intimidating brigade of the media.

Behind rebel SPLA lines, South Sudan

As I found myself being pushed, blinking, down the stairway by my colleagues as a kind of sacrificial offering, I remembered the old adage that diplomats should at all costs avoid being photographed with a drink in hand, lest they reinforce the public’s existing perception of them as dipsomaniacs. Adapting that fine rule to these circumstances, I decided on the spot that when meeting armed men responsible for multiple massacres and other atrocities, and in front of the media, it may be wise not to be seen embracing them, kissing them or slapping them on the back Latin-style. Instead, nod politely and noncommittally, smile (but only faintly), avoid any effusive remarks, and above all keep one’s hands firmly behind one’s back, in the style made famous by Prince Philip. After all, you never know at what war crimes tribunal your photograph might later turn up as evidence.

Yesterday’s terrorist is of course tomorrow’s freedom fighter and the day after’s President, so by all means keep any photographs that do commemorate events such as these, but do be alert to shifting moods and circumstances — as was my good friend at the Sudanese MFA’s protocol department who was quick, after 9/11, to remove from his desk a photo of himself sharing coffee, as a then junior officer, with one Osama bin Laden.

It goes without saying that when meeting with disgruntled rebel leaders it is not wise strenuously to adopt the positions of one’s host government. Nor should one demonstrate great enthusiasm for photographing or even discussing interesting-looking military equipment one may inadvertently come across when being shepherded around by the leadership; in SPLA-held South Sudan, where modern telecommunications technology is a late-comer, even getting out one’s handheld satellite phone to call home can prove most rash, as I learned to my cost. Only if you can persuade your guides to pose macho fashion and brandishing their AKs before the tank in question may you actually be able to snap that old T-64.

ONE OF THE PARTICULAR PROBLEMS of travelling in South Sudan, which I also covered for three years, was that — unusually — even some positions of our own government were not popular. Thus I well recall being deposited alone on the red-dirt strip at Yambio, deep in the Equatorial forest. The tiny white UN Cessna Caravan was lining up to leave again, and towards me I could see a welcoming posse, armed FARC-style, approaching. They reached me just as the UN plane was lifting off, and eyed me in silence.

“So you represent the government whose oil company is responsible for the genocide of our people?” was how the conversation began.

There is no easy response to such an opening pleasantry. In my experience, it was advisable to let oneself be steamrollered for a while, nodding, accepting without committing, taking notes (above all, take notes — it doesn’t matter what about...). When the momentum starts to slow, then you may be able to move almost imperceptibly onto the offensive, for example:

“Send us Stinger missiles, so that we can shoot down more government planes.”

“Very well. It’s a difficult situation. What, specifically, would you like us to do?”

Be prepared for disconcerting responses. In this case, a straight-faced:

“Send us Stinger missiles, so that we can shoot down more government planes.”

Whether by skill or sheer good luck, I was able to turn this particular exchange into a discussion on the extent of Western responsibility for Africa’s woes, that then meandered into one on aid politics and which ended in a rewarding two-way dialogue on political accountability, successfully capped with a couple of beers. If all else fails — but this is a last resort — you can always try: “I don’t necessarily agree with my government’s position; but in our system of government, I’m paid to put across the positions of my elected employers... .”

“It’s so that if they use a SAM against us, it will go through one door and out of the other!”

Rebel FARC commanders at San Vicente, Colombia

IF VISITING WITH HOSTS WHO HAVE a penchant for kidnapping, such as the ELN and FARC in Colombia, it is as well to make known early on that your government has a policy of not paying ransom, that you carry no ransom insurance and (perhaps an embroidery on the truth, this) that your relatives have all been instructed not to pay up, should one be kidnapped — in a word, demonstrate that you are worthless. Once this distasteful matter is out of the way, then you can usually proceed to have a serious discussion.

But it may be diplomatic to acquiesce with minor extortion. One late afternoon on the Putumayo River in Southern Colombia, our dugout was intercepted by a high-speed launch full of the usual cut-throats (FARC, I recall, but it could just as well have been the ELN or the equally illegal and more violent right-wing Paras). They silently went through all the papers of the dozen or so cowering civilians on board, leaving me — quite evidently and conspicuously a gringo, albeit unshaven — until last. To my great relief, my nervously proffered red passport elicited not the slightest interest.

But then their chief silently stabbed his finger at three of us, including me.

“Tú, tú y tú,” he said rather superfluously.

I thought the game was up

“500 pesos cada uno.”

Refugees at Acumcum, SPLA-held south Sudan

Mystified, I paid up readily. Then there was a gruff explanation; the FARC was fining us for not wearing lifejackets.

YOU LEARN ALL SORTS OF UNUSUAL SKILLS behind rebel lines, and you never know when they will come in useful. I can now recognize from about ten miles away the differing engine sounds of an Antonov 12, a de Havilland Buffalo and a C-130 Hercules: an important skill in South Sudan, as at that time the Antonov invariably came with bombs, while the other two brought food supplies.

And one cold dawn high over the Andes, clattering along at the old Huey’s maximum altitude limit and observing opium-spraying over rebel-held territory while the young Colombian gunners fingered their misnamed Mini-guns nervously, I had the temerity to ask the pilot over the intercom whether we could close the doors at least halfway, as it was freezing cold.

Angrily, he turned around and yelled over the clatter:

“Idiota! It’s so that if they use a SAM against us, it will go through one door and out of the other!”

Humbled and shocked, I slumped back. A few seconds later he turned around again, this time with a broad smile.

“Just kidding! Actually, it’s in case we crash; that way the rescuers have a better chance of getting you out. . . .”

Nick Coghlan is a former editor of bout de papier (the magazine of the Canadian Foreign Service) and was twice PAFSO’s Foreign Service Officer of the Year. He and his wife Jenny were awarded the Meritorious Service Cross (MSC) for their role in evacuating Canadians from Juba when civil war broke out in South Sudan in 2013.

Canada in the New World Disorder

by J.H. (Si) Taylor

While my subject is a bit less difficult than the examination question that asked candidates to describe the universe and give three examples, it has its problems. I shall try to be highly selective, but not, I hope, incoherent. I want to concentrate on two aspects of the new international disorder: the risk of war, and the tension between the growth of the number of sovereign states on one hand and the growth in the limitations on sovereignty on the other. Then I shall suggest that some of the implications of these two aspects may be for Canada.

First, the risk of war. We survived 40 years of Cold War. What has happened now that the Cold War is over? Go back to the beginning. A lesson of the thirties was that aggression must be stopped early; otherwise little, far-off wars of no apparent relationship to our interests would become big wars involving us directly which we were obliged to fight in unfavourable circumstances. If only we had faced down Japan over Manchuria in 1931, or Italy over Abyssinia in 1936, or Germany over the Rhineland, or the Anschluss or Munich, we would have spared ourselves going to war over Poland, a country we could do nothing to help. It seemed clear from this that little wars could not be ignored, nor the importance of securing an alliance with the United States before a dangerous situation deteriorated into war.

To this lesson of the thirties was added a lesson of the forties: that violence grows once force is used, so that more and more powerful conventional weapons are employed, and finally the atomic bomb is used. In short, to the idea of horizontal escalation was added that of vertical escalation: not only did little wars spread around the world as they became big wars, but conventional violence grew until it reached nuclear dimensions. Hence the conclusion that “peace is indivisible” — that violence anywhere carried an ultimate risk of the nuclear holocaust.

These were some of the ideas that underlay the Cold War at the outset. But as the Cold War progressed, they became attenuated. The wars in Korea and Vietnam showed that local violence could grow to very high levels and could involve one or more of the nuclear powers, yet show great resistance either to spreading geographically or “going nuclear”.

Even in Europe — where it was evident that even minor incidents carried grave risks of escalation — it became increasingly clear with time that nuclear weapons were difficult to use either for military purposes or to support diplomacy. In a sense, the whole history of NATO during the Cold War was a struggle to find effective means within an alliance to share the political control of nuclear weapons. This was true during the earlier years of crisis over Berlin and the abortive Multilateral Force; it was true 20 years on, during the Euromissile crisis of the 1980s. By the time that — had we known it — the Cold War was shortly to end, the NATO Council, at the direction of ministers, was conducting exercises designed to play through the whole scenario of the initial and subsequent use of nuclear weapons in response to a major Soviet attack. Such exercises tended to show how difficult it would be, on any realistic assumptions, to threaten to use nuclear weapons and then actually to use them. The lesson seemed to be that the only sensible reason to have nuclear weapons was to deter their use by the other side.

The whole history of NATO during the Cold War was a struggle to find effective means within an alliance to share the political control of nuclear weapons.

This mutual deterrence could be accomplished expensively, at high levels of armament, or more cheaply, at lower levels. The negotiations of the last decade, which began before the Cold War ended, are designed to reduce the level of nuclear weapons held by the United States and Russia dramatically. Theoretical discussion has passed from considering concepts like “minimum deterrence” (the lowest level of weapons capable of deterring effectively) to “virtual deterrence” (the possibility that, while the knowledge of how to make nuclear weapons cannot be eliminated, deterrence would still be effective even if no weapons, but only the unassembled components of weapons, actually existed).

To sum up this part of the argument, then:

We began the Cold War with the idea that peace was indivisible, that little wars tended to become big wars and that conventional wars tended to become nuclear wars.

We ended, even before the Cold War was actually over, believing that peace was highly divisible, that little wars didn’t necessarily become big wars, that wars far away didn’t necessarily come any nearer, and that conventional wars didn’t necessarily become nuclear wars. Then the Cold War ended. One of the Alliances disappeared. The nature of the problem radically altered, and our anxieties about the risk of nuclear war sharply diminished. I shall return to this point to consider some of the implications for Canada later.

The second striking aspect of the new international order is the odd contradiction between the growing number of sovereignties and the growing limits on sovereignty.

Take the limits first. We see on every hand the evidence that national sovereignty means less and less in practice — that for many purposes, the world is better understood by the measure of cultures or economic regions or simply as one world than it is by the measure of national sovereignty. There is the CNN world of instantaneous transmission of TV images of events around the world as they occur; there is the Internet, providing floods of information directly to users across the world instantaneously, in ways that escape the control of governments, flattening all hierarchies and ignoring their pretensions; there are world financial markets, mustering far greater resources swiftly than governments can assemble, and backing their own judgements against governments through massive, instantaneous transfers of funds; there are modern industrial processes, which rely on an increasingly complex exchange of ideas, technology, raw materials and components, so that clearly identifiable national industrial products are less and less characteristic of the world economy; there is the creation of regional trading blocs, bringing rules-based trading systems to vast areas covering many countries; and finally, there is the World Trade Organization, bringing a rules-based system, and thereby constraining sovereignty, all across the world.

All these powerful developments make nonsense of the pretensions of national sovereignty — so much so that you would expect people to be prepared to scrap the very notion of the sovereign state. Yet they aren’t. The opposite is happening. The number of states claiming to be sovereign and recognized as such has risen from 55 to 185 in forty years. Why? Basically, because this was the age of the end of empires and of decolonization. The process began with the First World War, which brought down the German, Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman and Russian empires, and was completed with the aftermath of the Second World War, which saw the disappearance of the British, French, Dutch, Portuguese, Italian, remaining Spanish, and at last, with the end of the Cold War, the Soviet Empire.

Most of the new states in the world are the result of this process. This suggests an important conclusion: while obviously there are links between the trebling of sovereignty and the limitations on sovereignty, they are not causal links; the simultaneous existence of these two contradictory trends is largely a coincidence.

Not only the number of states, but their range and variety has increased: from very small to very large; from authoritarian to free; from institutionally sound and economically viable to institutionally chaotic and economically marginal; from highly centralized to loosely federated. Think, for example, of the difference between the Stalinist carbon copies of the Soviet state imposed on Central and Eastern Europe by the Russians in the late 1940s, and the variety of states now existing in the same area, even where in many instances there have been no changes of frontier.

We have at the back of our minds some notion of an ideal nation-state: it would have clearly defined and recognized frontiers, based on geography and easily defensible; it would have a viable economy; its people would be ethnically uniform rather than diverse, sharing a common history, culture and language. Few states in the past ever approached this ideal. Many strong and successful states departed widely from it. Indeed, it is hard to think of states that ever came close to meeting all the qualifications of the ideal: Iceland, maybe. All this is even truer today. Because of artificial frontiers, or weak economies, or ethnic tensions, or constitutional incoherence or administrative incompetence or civic irresponsibility or some combination, departures from the ideal are more marked today than in the past.

So much could be said against the concept of the nation-state. And much could be said against particular states. Yet nation-states are plainly not headed to the garbage can of history; on the contrary. Why? Presumably because, for all their defects, peoples are not yet prepared — even in Europe — to transfer their loyalties to some international structure. In particular, the notion that economic union leads swiftly and inevitably to political union needs to be examined skeptically.

We are in danger of losing our perspective on how far we still have to go before we become the strong, independent exporting nation we sometimes imagine ourselves to be.

What do these two aspects of international life — the diminished threat of nuclear war and the contradictory tendencies towards greater world economic unity and greater world political diversity mean for Canada? How does our country fit into this kind of world?

On the security point: although many Canadians during the Cold War found it hard to accept, Canada was then, and is even more now, one of the most secure countries in the world. We were, and are, defended by the United States in the act of defending itself, whether we choose to defend ourselves or not. With the end of the Cold War especially, we no longer feel threatened by fears of little wars becoming big wars or conventional wars becoming nuclear wars. Canadians can enjoy an immense sense of security compared to many people in the world. They will not feel that their security interests are inevitably threatened by small, far-off crises.

If nevertheless Canadians decide to involve themselves in small, far-off crises, it will not be because of national security, but for other reasons — disinterested humanitarian reasons, the defence of human rights, the relief of human suffering, or objections of principle to aggression. Canadians have shown they are capable of supporting involvement of this kind. The limits have not been tested. But that there are limits shows up from time to time, for example in the sense of shame and disgust over the action of a few servicemen in Somalia; the increasing impatience that led to withdrawal from Cyprus; the insistence on improving the UN’s security machinery; the frustration when others won’t pay their peace-keeping bills; and so on. The limits would show even more clearly if Canadian involvement were ever to lead to heavy casualties. A debate unresolved at the time of the Gulf War, and which continues over Bosnia, divides those who believe that substantial risks, including risk of casualties, must be run to preserve peace, and those who believe peace-keeping Canadian style must be largely risk free. It is by no means clear what Canadians mean when they say they support peace-keeping. At what risk? How far up the scale of enforcement? At the moment we are participating in IFOR, which goes beyond what many would see as the limits of classic peace-keeping. This raises not only issues of principle but practical questions. What kind of forces do we want? How should they be organized, trained and equipped? How much are we prepared to spend on them and on the organizations, the UN and NATO, under which they operate?

What also about Canada’s place in the emerging world of the single money market and falling trade barriers across regions and across the world?

On the whole, Canadians are either in favour of falling trade barriers, or at least acquiescent: this seems to sum up attitudes on the transition from GATT to the WTO and the expansion of the Canada-US Free Trade Agreement into NAFTA. These developments have coincided with a period in which Canadian exports have performed better than any other economic indicator. We have had record exports and trade surpluses when consumer confidence and sectors like housing have been weak, interest rates high and the domestic economy sluggish.

Yet there is still a sense of vulnerability underlying our strong export performance. The idea of reducing our vulnerability by reducing our relative dependence on the US market is a recurring theme in trade policy debates. In Mr. Diefenbaker’s day, there was the 15% trade switch objective; in Mr Trudeau’s there was the “Third Option”. Yet we are no closer than we ever were to reducing our relative dependence on one overwhelmingly important market — the United States; and we have made only modest progress towards moving the balance of our exports up the scale from raw and semi-finished products to the high value-added, knowledge-based exports where Canada’s trading future is said to lie.

And at the same time, despite a recent levelling-off in foreign borrowing, we have continued for a generation to increase our vulnerability through increasing our debt to foreign lenders, so that 40% of Canada’s long-term debt is now held by foreigners and we have learned to twitch at every sign of displeasure from Standard and Poor or Moody’s.

These are manifestations of deep structural features of the Canadian economy, not easy to change quickly. The problem with the Team Canada approach to dealing with such difficulties is not the objective; it is with the risk that all the related publicity may cause us to mistake objectives for accomplishments. We are in danger of losing our perspective on just how far we still have to go before we become the strong, independent exporting nation we sometimes imagine ourselves to be. As a form of reality check, then, let some of the basic facts of our situation be restated:

The United States remains overwhelmingly our most important single export market. In our lifetime, it has gone from absorbing two-thirds to three-quarters to four-fifths of our exports (although here also, as with foreign borrowing, there has been a recent levelling-off). Nothing any government has done, nor any turn of the business cycle, has altered the apparently inexorable trend.

The United States supplies two-thirds of our imports. More of our trade passes within the Canada-USA auto sector alone than with the entire European Union.

In 1994, two-way trade between Canada and the United States was 15 times the value of two-way trade with Canada’s second largest trading partner, which is Japan. And yet Japan, in trade terms, is more important to us than our four largest European trading partners (Germany, Britain, France and Italy) together; and we trade more with Japan than with all the rest of Asia combined. These comparisons shed an interesting light on much that is said and written these days about Asian markets.

As to the matter of high-tech, high value-added exports, it is interesting to note that Canada’s most important export to Japan is coal; that its most important export to Japan in the food and agriculture sector is oil seeds; and that about 60% of Canadian exports to Japan are resource products while only 40% could be classified as value-added — and even that includes many goods that are far from being technically sophisticated industrial products.

Thus, when we hear yet more talk about Team Canada successfully selling high-tech Canadian goods in fast-growing Asian markets, we should keep two things in mind:

it’s all true, and we should rejoice in our export successes and build on them;

but relatively, Canada is still, as a trading nation, heavily dependent on exports of resource materials and, for good or ill, overwhelmingly dependent on the US market.

Finally, what about ethnic nationalism and Canada’s relationship to it?

The connection with the national unity debate is obvious; I won’t belabour it. But three points can be made:

a) International comparisons of states can be illuminating. But nation states come in all shapes and sizes. No two are identical. Each is unique. The range of solutions that have been found in constitutions across the world to the problems of multi-ethnic states is enormous. Both federalists and separatists could find justification for their theses about what is best for Canada by judicious selection of foreign examples. All such example-seeking is tendentious and should be treated with skepticism. The hard truth for both ardent federalists and ardent separatists is that the world offers no particular solution to Canada’s problems of national unity; we have to find our own.

b) It is evident that ethnic nationalism has often been perverted and that it can degenerate into violence. Whatever the outcome of our national debate, we have so far avoided violence almost entirely. The civilized course would be to bear this in mind and continue to do so. Respect for the rule of law should be our guide.

c) Finally, whatever advantages might be advanced as justification for breaking the existing Canada into two states, an inevitable disadvantage would be that two smaller, economically divided states will carry less weight individually in the international system and have to exert themselves even harder than the existing federation to protect their interests and make themselves heard.

This text is slightly modified from an address delivered to the Rideau Club, Ottawa, in 1996.

J.H. (Si) Taylor’s first posting was Hanoi; his last two appointments were Undersecretary of State for External Affairs and Canadian Ambassador to Japan. He served as the Chancellor of McMaster University and as a member of the senior editorial board of bout de papier.

Canadians Abroad Bringing Change to Consular Services

by Gar Pardy

The call came into the Operations Centre at Foreign Affairs late in the evening.

The voice was hesitant and faint. It was a young Canadian, touring South America by motorbike, saying that he was lying in a ditch along an isolated road in northern Bolivia following a close encounter with a truck. It was raining, and he was injured. Within minutes the Operations Officer was in touch with the consul at the Canadian embassy in La Paz, provided the available information and instructed that assistance be sought from the Bolivian authorities. The caller was assured that help was on the way and before long he was receiving medical attention.

The call was one of thousands that come into Foreign Affairs’ 24-hour Operations Centre each week from the four corners of the world. The system, based on the world’s best communications and computer equipment and software, is the envy of most foreign ministries. The software backing the system, called COSMOS, was developed in Canada for Canadians. The British and Dutch governments recently purchased it for their own consular services. A first for Canadian government-developed software.

It was not always this way. Consular service has been the handmaiden of the Department of Foreign Affairs’ work since its inception. Those who visited the prisons and scenes of accidents, found missing children or negotiated the release of kidnapped Canadians were constantly reminded of the lack of personnel, money and training. John Hilliker, in his book on the Department, The Early Years, 1909–1946, reflects on the efforts of early Canadian governments to avoid financial or direct responsibility for Canadians in foreign lands. Regrettably, that policy continued for more years than was understandable.

Also, consular work has never played an important role in the culture of departmental life, either in Ottawa or abroad. Similar attitudes can be found in the foreign ministries of other countries. For most, life in the foreign service was not intended as one providing services to Canadians who were affected and afflicted by acts of others, God, or their own egos. Rather, for most, foreign service was for the “loftier” pursuit of peace and commerce.

Nowhere is this better illustrated than in the chequered history of the bureaucratic location and the identification of officers for consular services. Since the mid 1980s, the management of consular services has floated, independent of outside influence, from a stand-alone bureau, to integration with immigration and passport, to inclusion in legal and environmental matters, and then on to trade and communications. Today, consular is part of a GOB (group of bureaux) that includes financial services, protocol, physical property, information management and technology, inspection services and passports. A common thread is hard to find.

These bureaucratic peregrinations were also accompanied by changes in the departmental officers designated for consular work. Historically, consular work was the responsibility of political officers; that changed in 1988 when immigration officers were assigned the responsibility. That changed again in 1992 when immigration officers were de-integrated (in the aftermath of the al-Mashat affair) from the Department. At the time, little thought was given to the fact that the removal of immigration officers from the Department also meant serious disruption of consular services for Canadians.

This lack of thought was evidenced by confusion as to the future home of the consular function among departmental employees. It was departmental employees themselves, in the management group, who recognized the problem and made a proposal to have the consular function become part of their responsibilities. It was not a perfect solution, given their already heavy responsibilities, but in the absence of other options it was accepted.

This change, in 1992, provided the stability on which wide-ranging and far-reaching changes could be made to the delivery of consular services. Nevertheless, there are suggestions today that these arrangements are no longer acceptable. As happens far too often in the Department, personal and bureaucratic interests could once again take precedence over the interests of Canadians in difficulty overseas.

Canadians have been well served by the 1992 arrangements. But, as recent events have demonstrated, assistance to Canadians in difficulty overseas is no static matter nor one that can await bureaucratic perfection. The advent of the jet engine and chickens in the pots of many has made foreign travel as common as a trip downtown. Younger and older Canadians are travelling; they are travelling to more distant places; and adventure tourism brings its own special dangers. Wars, civil and not-so-civil ones, terrorism, crime, earthquakes, volcanoes and storms have added immeasurably to the traveller’s traditional problems of upset stomachs and sand fleas. In the Caribbean basin sun, sea, sex and Seagrams are part of the background litany of afflicted Canadians.

Not so many years ago, governments and the travel industry worked to replace the archaic patchwork of rules and procedures that continued to dog the international traveller. In 1963, the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations was negotiated and represented a codification of historical international practise on the treatment of foreigners by nation-states. It remains the world’s pre-eminent and, to a large extent, only international agreement that provides the basis for assistance to citizens in other countries.

Further to the Vienna Convention were efforts, largely through ICAO and IATA, for facilitation initiatives to ease the movement of the international traveller and to remove the barriers, many the legacy of the pre-aircraft era, that continued to make international travel an obstacle course. These efforts mirrored, in part, the efforts to facilitate the movement of goods and services, which continue to make progress even in a troubled world. Unfortunately, the efforts to facilitate and support the international movement of people have largely disappeared and, in the absence of world comity, the future of such efforts looks bleak.

In the early 1990s, once the bureaucratic decisions were made, serious attention was given to improving consular services for Canadians. At the same time, it was recognized that the future of consular services was dependent on creating a recognized and respectable place for the service in the daily life of Foreign Affairs.

A daunting task. Bureaucratic changes had decimated the group of trained Canadian consular officials and it was largely due to the professionalism and dedication of locally engaged consular officers around the world that Canadians abroad continued to be assisted. Program reviews and other government-wide expenditure reduction exercises added to the bleak landscape. Resources for consular services, just as for other essential programs, were going south and there were no expectations that this would change in the coming years.

In all of this, the objective was to maintain existing service levels and, as well, to improve and add to them. In this we were rebuilding the boat while at the same time sailing it to the far corners of the world. During this period, the demand for consular services was constantly outstripping the ability of the system to meet it. More Canadians than ever were travelling; dual nationality problems were emerging as a serious impediment to providing assistance; parental child abductions were increasing; and there was a dramatic increase in the arrest of Canadians in other countries. In 1993, a preliminary inventory of Canadians in foreign prisons listed fewer than seven hundred. Today, there are times when the number exceeds three thousand.

Typical of the period were the calls to parents on Mondays to inform them that their teenage daughter had been arrested the night before in Jamaica and to be told that was impossible. She was staying with friends down the road!

In bringing change to consular services, it was assumed from the beginning that change would have to come from inside. There were no expectations that others would be willing or able to help. At the same time, it was also assumed that there was a need to break with the hoary, historical traditions that so long encased and circumscribed consular services.

An early initiative was to broaden the travel information program. A limited program had been in place for a number of years and was largely centred on the publication Bon Voyage, but... Country travel reports were created and, despite misgivings from lawyers on liability, these have blossomed into a central feature informing Canadians of the problems that will be encountered and what can be done to avoid them. Today there are country travel reports for over 225 destinations. At the same time, country and subject publications were created, and today there is a rich mixture covering topics ranging from dual nationality to working overseas, retirement abroad and the woman traveller.

Early activities also included initiatives to improve the legal environment in which consular services are conducted. A League of Nations treaty which obligated Canada not to provide assistance to Canadians when they were in the country of a second citizenship was denounced, a first for Canada. Negotiations were begun for bilateral treaties with Egypt and Lebanon to assist in resolving parental child abductions. Treaty arrangements for prisoner transfers were concluded with a number of countries. In the United States, where there had been a treaty arrangement with Washington since the late 1970s, efforts were concentrated to improve its working and to increase the number of states active in the treaty. Today there is only one state — Rhode Island — that is not active in these treaty arrangements.

Throughout the period, an overriding issue was to provide assured resources for the consular services. The aim was to remove the large element of uncertainty associated with the “lottery-based” allocation system that was and remains characteristic of the governmental process. This was achieved in 1996 when, as part of the budget for that year, a consular service fee of $25.00 was approved. The fee is collected at the time a Canadian applies for a passport, and today, along with other fees, it provides in excess of $50 million in revenue that is dedicated to consular activities.

The assured funding direct from Canadians and tied to the demand for passport services provided the foundation for the expansion in the recruitment of new people and expansion of services, including new offices overseas. Resources for consular work have always been a small part of the Department’s budget, averaging in the single numbers, and the number of people directly involved worldwide was fewer than three hundred. These cost recovery initiatives provided a significant increase in personnel resources overseas and in the directing group in Ottawa. One example of this was the growth in honorary consuls, whose numbers have grown from the low forties in 1993 to over one hundred today. These offices in places such as Puerto Vallarta, Luanda and Chang Mai are a low-cost and effective way to provide consular help to travelling Canadians.

The assured funding also permitted the development and deployment of COSMOS software. COSMOS is tied to the Department’s own computer and communications system, and provides Canada with the world’s only dedicated consular software. It was developed in cooperation with WorldReach Software, an Ottawa-based development firm. Since its first deployment in 1993, it has provided consular officials overseas and in Ottawa with a thoroughly modern tool to support their work. In addition to improved case management, COSMOS provided the foundation on which the Consular Operations Centre was expanded so that services could be provided 24 hours a day in all corners of the world. Also, there are software modules for the delivery of passport services overseas, registration of Canadians living abroad and contingency planning.

Today the tragic problems of Ms. Kazemi, Mr. Sampson and Mr. Arar demonstrate that consular assistance for Canadians in difficulty overseas will continue to occupy a significant place in public debate. Earlier, the debate concerned assistance for Canadians such as Raoul Léger, Stanley Faulder, Sean Kelly, Christine Lamont, David Spencer, Nguyen Thi Hiep and countless others.

Unfortunately, for some there was no satisfactory conclusion to the earlier debates, and as the new cases demonstrate, the current debate is as much characterized by wishful and confused thinking as it is by an understanding of what Canadians can expect when they venture beyond the borders of Canada. “Respect” for the Canadian passport or the “rights” of Canadians overseas have become the demands of many and “soft diplomacy” has become an all-encompassing accusation against the government.

Canadians overseas, like foreigners in Canada, do not have any special rights, nor can they expect to obtain preferential treatment from foreign governments. The best they can expect is that they are treated no worse than the citizens of the country concerned and in many cases that is cold comfort. Canadian laws and rights end at the Canadian border, and the laws and rights of another country begin when a Canadian crosses its frontier. For the vast majority of Canadian travellers this is not a problem. But for the few who encounter difficulty, this basic rule is lumpy gruel.

Canadians overseas, like foreigners in Canada, do not have any special rights, nor can they expect to obtain preferential treatment from foreign governments. The best they can expect is that they are treated no worse than the citizens of the country concerned, and in many cases that is cold comfort.

Contrary to popular belief, there are few international rules, and certainly no effective “laws,” that control the actions of states in their treatment of foreigners within their boundaries. The Vienna Convention on Consular Relations has more to do with the conduct of consular relations between governments than it has to do with the establishment of standards of conduct in the treatment of foreigners. In the Convention’s fifty-seven articles, only two establish standards of conduct. These provide limited requirements for notification in the event of arrest and death of a foreign national. The Convention provides no support for the popular view that the Canadian government can “legally” demand standards of conduct on the part of other governments in their treatment of arrested or detained Canadians. The Convention provides no right of private communications with arrested persons, or unlimited access or guarantees of medical or other services or even a safe environment.

Equally troubling is that other international conventions on such matters as torture, the rights of the child, equality or human rights offer little direct benefit to Canadians arrested in foreign countries. There is a wide gap between the largely hortative objectives of such conventions and the need to assist individuals in trouble in foreign countries. In most instances, there are no specific mechanisms through which breaches can be determined and remedies enforced. When feet are being beaten and fingernails shortened, threats of disruptions to the bilateral relationship or public embarrassment do nothing to improve the lot of victims. There is more than a risk that their lot would be made worse by such entreaties. When torture, coercion or mistreatment is used in connection with national security or large national interests, as was the case in some of the recent cases involving Canadians, then there is little scope for redress based on national laws, international instruments or the quality of bilateral relations.

Persons and organizations who perpetuate the myth that there is redress through such mechanisms do an enormous disservice. The disservice becomes more disturbing when the ensuing public clamour results in foreign governments refusing to cooperate and puts on hold any expectation of positive action. Christine Lamont and David Spencer probably spent several years more in a Brazilian prison than was necessary as a result of the efforts of their supporters to portray them as victims or to demonstrate the unjustness of the Brazilian justice system. Foreign governments rarely read the Globe and Mail or listen to the CBC, and should they do so, rarely heed their advice.

Canadians in difficulty in foreign lands do have a right to the full support and assistance of their government. In most of the troubles — deaths, accidents, kidnapping, illness and missing persons — most foreign governments are ready to assist. However, it is also common in such matters that the expectations of victims and friends and family are not always met. Persons naturally have high expectations and react badly when they perceive inattention or dismissal of concerns. In foreign lands, such expectations are affected by language, practice, and culture. Unfortunately, wrongful convictions, poor medical treatment, unfounded missing persons and parental abductions are as much a part of the Canadian scene as they are of foreign countries, and despite the best will in the world there will always be disappointments.

In the area of detentions and arrests, the problems are more acute and the demand for action by those jailed or by family and friends in Canada more intense. The unfortunate reality is that some Canadians in foreign countries do pretty much what they do in Canada — they murder, they assault, they traffic in drugs, they organize and carry out large-scale frauds, and they rob. In some instances, Canadian law enforcement officials provide information to foreign governments that could result in the arrest of Canadians overseas. Also, Canada is one of a few countries that will extradite its citizens to foreign countries to face charges. Generally, Canadian law enforcement or justice officials admit to no obligation to assist in the defence of such persons, although there have been instances when they have cooperated with Foreign Affairs in doing so.

For the most part, Canadians in such predicaments abroad are treated much the same as the citizens of the country in question. However, unfamiliar legal processes, lack of bail, barriers of language and custom, prison conditions and lack of direct support from family and friends all contribute to make the life of a Canadian imprisoned abroad one of high anxiety, dangers and illness. Many of the same conditions apply in Canada as well, but this does not lessen the obligation for action by Canadian officials.

In this fevered ferment it would be wrong to assume that Canadians have suddenly become the favoured victims of unsavoury regimes or friendly governments that have placed national security ahead of respect for human rights. The citizens of other countries encounter similar problems, some even in Canada. In this new world, the vast majority of travellers will continue to move, and while the movement is slower than we would want, only a very few fall victim to the misplaced or idiosyncratic vigilance of governments.

Gar Pardy joined Foreign Affairs in 1967 and served as Director General of Consular Affairs and Ambassador to Costa Rica, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama.

A 21st Century Foreign Service Career

by David Malone

Ups and Downs

My career in the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT) has been unusual. I joined in 1975 at age 21, having achieved grades so pitiful during my undergraduate years that no scholarships were in reach for further studies (even in those golden days of educational largesse). My first stint away from “External” was a year of Arabic language training in the decorative setting of the American University in Cairo. It proved a happy time, with the Department underwriting extensive travel to allow exposure to various Arabic accents. This instilled in me a sense of confidence that I would never be cut off anywhere Arabic was spoken.

After a subsequent posting in Cairo, with responsibility for the aid program in Sudan and the consular program in Libya thrown in, and then a year on the human rights desk, a stimulating assignment that taught me to be careful about the selection of congenial supervisors, I took my second academic break, enrolling in the mid-career Masters in Public Administration Program at the Kennedy School of Government (KSG) of Harvard University. Its offerings were not everything the KSG hype had made them out to be — the KSG operation turned out in the main to be a vast PR exercise — but there was plenty on offer beyond the KSG within Harvard and at other Boston area universities. One of my best experiences was a negotiations class at Northeastern University in which all other students were ambitious, mostly very impressive local cops. Fatefully, an awakening of hitherto slumbering scholarly instincts seemed to occur as I produced several (for me) in-depth term papers.

During the ensuing years, I worked closely with Sylvia Ostry, then Canada’s chief international economic and multilateral trade negotiator. Sylvia, a tremendous intellect, if a demanding one, generously introduced me over time to her international network of colleagues and admirers, opening my eyes to worlds well beyond those of classic diplomacy. I absorbed with admiration her capacity to sell many of her ideas in Ottawa by arranging for the Prime Minister and others to read all about them in the Financial Times and Wall Street Journal, both devoted to her incisive analysis and advocacy. As with all great supervisors, some of her “can do” temperament and self-confidence rubbed off on me. In the trenches, I was anchored for eight years on and off within the Economic Policy Bureau, then experiencing a golden age under the likes of Derek Burney, John Paynter, George Haynal and David Wright. In 1988, at my request, I was appointed a foreign service visitor to the University of Toronto, on the understanding that I would spend much of my time in the economic studies program at the Brookings Institution in Washington, something Derek, by then the PM’s Chief of Staff, had made possible.

Two important things occurred that year. First, having at the last minute stepped into the teaching shoes at the University of Toronto of the recently deceased and greatly mourned John Holmes, I discovered a penchant for teaching that has not left me since and that I have been able to indulge even during foreign assignments. Second, I undertook my first serious effort at academic research at Brookings, on economic integration in South-East Asia. It yielded my first published work, of distinctly dubious quality. Never mind. Working within Brookings, among accomplished actors on the Washington stage, developed in me a healthy respect for top-flight policy research and the impact it can have, particularly when spun expertly through the media.

My first experience of the complex interdependencies of media and research communities was also tantalizing.

An assignment to the UN in the final days of Canada’s 1989–90 term on the Security Council proved fateful. It allowed me to observe Yves Fortier, our tremendously popular and effective Permanent Representative, at work. Fortier, who was a master of the big picture and possessed acute political antennae — as well as a direct line to his good friend, the Prime Minister — drew heavily on the remarkable skills of his deputy, Philippe Kirsch, a master of detail and tactics (as well as broader strategy, later demonstrated in chairing negotiations on the International Criminal Court). This brief experience shaped my subsequent academic interests.

After a stint in Ottawa working on the 1994–95 foreign policy review, a dismal exercise about which I wrote candidly in a recent issue of the scholarly International Journal, I spent two years at Oxford “reading and writing”, as my MacArthur Foundation grant grandly described it. The product was a doctoral thesis on decision-making in the Security Council focused on Haiti’s crisis of democracy, 1990–97, later published as a book. My academic supervisor, a titan on the laws of war and much else, Sir Adam Roberts, proved both rigorous and vastly sympathetic. Working on a doctorate so late in life proved a signal luxury, one that honed my research skills and also provided sobering perspective on the fog of negotiations in the Security Council, which often leads to bad decisions.

An Unexpected Development

Returning to Ottawa in 1997, I had expected to remain at Fort Pearson for some years. However, the Chair of the International Peace Academy (IPA), a small but high-powered research institution in New York independent of, but closely linked to, the UN, asked me to consider the IPA’s presidency, recently vacated by Olara Otunnu, a charismatic Ugandan politician, scholar and diplomat who had moved on to work with Kofi Annan on humanitarian issues. I was intrigued, and after some months of reflection and consultation, Don Campbell, then Deputy Minister, agreed to grant me leave for an extended term at IPA. Because I had so recently returned to government, this can hardly have been an easy decision for him, so I am doubly grateful for it. DFAIT colleagues were mostly perplexed but supportive. They would not have adopted this course themselves, but they were prepared to give the adventure the benefit of the doubt.

How different is life in the NGO and research worlds from working in DFAIT? Plenty.

One factor that helped shape my decision had to do with personalities already in place at the UN. I had known well Kofi Annan and his chef de Cabinet, Iqbal Riza, when I chaired the negotiations of the UN Peacekeeping Committee and when they were running the UN’s new peacekeeping department, 1992–94. We had remained in touch ever since. Louise Fréchette, my impressive Permanent Representative in New York, 1992–94, had recently become the UN’s first Deputy Secretary-General. I knew that, to the extent they could, they would be helpful to me (as they have been, over and over again). Other friends in the diplomatic and academic worlds also offered words of encouragement. Being well connected within the UN has indeed helped hugely.

Life in the Non-Profit World

IPA today has a staff of 32 (the majority women), drawn from 22 nationalities, including eight outstanding Africans. Because of the quality of our scholarly work, we receive many applications for vacancies, and can pick and choose among the cream of the crop. I have never worked with a more talented or dedicated team. It produces exceptional value for money, one reason why our funders like us.

How different is life in the NGO and research worlds from working in DFAIT? Plenty.

First, we raise all of our own money. Specifically, I raise it. My predecessors prized IPA’s independence from the UN and worked hard to maintain it. I have sought to do likewise, in part by diversifying our sources of income, adding to our list of foundation and government funders. In the latter category, we have focused particularly on large European countries (UK, Germany, France) that hitherto had not supported IPA financially but now do, the UK more generously so than any other government. Our budget now oscillates between US $4 and 5 million. We work hard to keep our fixed costs low, so that we can clear as much cash as possible for interesting academic and operational projects and partnerships we want to lead. I have allowed our own modest endowment to grow without drawing on its interest income, contrary to general practice in the US, as one never knows when a rainy day may occur.

To my surprise, I enjoy fund-raising. Success validates our work. Indeed, I have concluded that good work attracts money rather than the other way around. Friends who run universities, other think tanks and foundations confirm this perception.

Second, I report to a Board. It is chaired by Rita Hauser. An accomplished corporate lawyer, she and her husband (a communications magnate) established some time ago a very well-endowed foundation benefiting higher education (huge grants to the Harvard and NYU law schools), the arts (Lincoln Center and its component organizations, such as the New York Philharmonic) and research and policy development on international security (Rand Corporation, International Institute of Strategic Studies and ourselves). A committed Republican, and serious funder of the party, but one of the few progressives still remaining in it, she works closely with Brent Scowcroft, widely considered the voice of George Bush the First in today’s Washington. She sits on the President’s Foreign Intelligence Board. She has provided me with tremendous support and with immediate, undivided attention whenever I have needed it. She carries with her not only her considerable personal authority, but also the influence derived from running a significant Foundation.

One benefit of working with an excellent board (of which Paul Heinbecker is a dynamic member) has been evolving a view on how non-profit boards — on a few of which I now sit — can work best. Key is avoiding the temptation to micro-manage. Much harder, but vital, is to help shape the strategic direction of the institution. I have developed enormous respect for the US non-profit world (9% of the total economy — more than Canada’s total GDP) and how it is managed overall. Coming from Canada, where many non-profit activities do not seem widely prized, I find it striking in what high regard private sector and government leaders hold those leading significant non-profit institutions. We Canadians still have much to learn about philanthropy.

Third, the nature of our work is diverse and complex. On the one hand, we engage in policy research, publishing frequently under our own house imprint and with leading university presses. Many of us teach, in my own case at the New York University School of Law and at Sciences Po in Paris, where my students keep me on my toes. We also aim to work in depth on multi-year policy-development projects. One of them, started in 1998 as a joint project of DFAIT and the UK’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office under Michael Small’s energetic lead out of Ottawa, addressed economic factors in contemporary civil wars. The project subsequently devolved to IPA, from whence a strong partnership was forged with the World Bank’s development economics research group under Paul Collier, whose work was producing fascinating and controversial findings on this topic. We have built in significant corporate as well as academic and NGO participation. It has influenced policy perceptions broadly, including in the Security Council and the UN secretariat.

Similar projects have been developed to address security (and civil society’s participation therein) in Africa, conflict prevention, terrorism, transitional international administrations, sanctions, and the tangled relationship between the UN and European security organizations. On the latter, it was touching to see my splendid Indian, Iranian and Singaporean colleagues during a recent conference in Paris crowding around George Robertson of NATO, whom they had gotten to know in the course of our association with his institution, the European Union, and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. I wonder how often George is lionized by a group of young Asians.

I have been tempted every now and then, but as the time for my return to public service in Ottawa approaches, I find I am looking forward to it.

Fourth, my colleagues are different in outlook from many in DFAIT, although the two groups share a commitment to high professional standards. Other than a small management team and an excellent military adviser on loan from the Finnish government, it is a very young group drawn from some of the world’s foremost universities at doctoral and (more rarely) master’s level. The mix of nationalities and backgrounds is extraordinarily stimulating. We practice variable architecture within our projects, working in flexible teams to achieve immediate and long-term objectives. We partner extensively with other academic and research institutions, a steep learning curve for all concerned much of the time. When they leave us, generally after 2–5 years, my colleagues move up quite distinctly in their chosen academic or policy fields. Such are the rewards of outstanding work on the international employment market.

Fifth, as I learned at Brookings, research institutions (as opposed to academic ones preoccupied with theory) live and die to a certain degree on the strength of their media profile. IPA is fortunate to have a large press corps available nearby at the UN. However, most correspondents on the UN beat take a fairly limited view of their responsibilities, so achieving coverage requires flair and work. For us, it results over time from: a) having something to say; b) saying it clearly (especially on TV or radio); and c) being perceived as media players ourselves. Largely for this reason, I publish every three weeks or so in the Globe and Mail and in the International Herald Tribune, often writing with a partner. Beyond the buzz of seeing one’s name in lights, media exposure yields real pay-offs at fundraising time.

Sixth, while IPA’s influence is hard to pin down, what our funders like best about us is our ability to create human interaction on a range of research dilemmas and policy challenges. Generating frank discussion is doubly valuable given that few of us have time to read all we should. Even the busiest individuals need a break for lunch, and if a free sandwich (sometimes something better) and some stimulating talk is on offer, they will often come. Conferences, as one learns in DFAIT, also require foolproof logistics, comfort and an interesting agenda. We organize a lot of them, in New York and elsewhere, mostly with great success. I have forced myself to develop an impresario persona, which I can now access on automatic pilot, much as any diplomat would need to at times.

What are some of the rewards of my time here? One is being able to participate, when invited, in UN Under-Secretary-General-level task forces without any actual responsibilities at the UN. Working at the UN is tough: it’s hierarchical (much more than DFAIT), quite inflexible administratively, poor at personnel management, and no good at all at setting priorities in relation to resource allocation. It demands micro-accountability without being able to delegate much responsibility. Louise Fréchette is trying to convince member states to inject modern management principles into the workings of the organization. This is a long-haul undertaking. Meanwhile, a heroic minority among the staff keep the institution afloat through sheer force of personality and intellect.

Another bonus is our close relationship with most Security Council delegations, including the P-5. The Council works exceptionally hard, often in improvisational mode. It is not particularly introspective or self-critical. Nevertheless, there is agreement that widely recognized mistakes should not be repeated and that new approaches need to be explored. Because they trust us, Council delegations occasionally turn to IPA to help them think through nagging problems or to convene informal, discreet discussions of Council members away from the UN on sensitive topics. As a result, and not for the first time, I found myself chairing an informal but brutally frank retreat of Council ambassadors in early December on problems ranging from the Congo and Ivory Coast to subpar UN field appointees. The Council’s excessively process-oriented approach to terrorism also came up. In these relaxed settings with no formal standing, new ideas are welcomed and occasionally result in change.

Our independence from the UN means that I do not fit into any particular hierarchy. This makes dealing in a rather egalitarian way with ministers, diplomats and other members of the UN community at all levels a relaxed experience. We can readily tell politicians things that officials might be reluctant to articulate, and officials generally encourage us to do so. I am struck when visiting Washington every now and then that its hierarchy is (at least in its own mind, and often in reality) based more on perceived personal merit than on job descriptions, rank and administrative grades. I have occasionally been included in closed-door discussions there with surprisingly senior people simply in the hope that I might have something substantive to contribute. Being a Canadian is a key asset: no other nationality opens doors quite the same way with Americans, the superiority (in both senses of the word) of many Europeans, including the Brits, often rubbing Washington types the wrong way.

What of the future? In this line of work, one occasionally gets job offers, usually at quite the wrong time, generally from the academic world. Deans and senior professors can make princely salaries in the US, exciting both ego and greed. I have been tempted every now and then, but as the time for my return to the public service in Ottawa approaches, I find I am looking forward to it. It remains to be seen whether the public service, its protestations of interest in managers of diverse backgrounds notwithstanding, will feel sufficiently comfortable with an unconventional career profile to trust me with serious responsibilities when I return in 2004. There are grounds for greater optimism on this score than would have been the case 20 years ago, although, from the outside looking in, the Canadian public service continues to seem hide-bound and hermetic. After a number of years back in government, possibly including an assignment abroad, I would like to retire early to engage in some years of full-time teaching, which several colleagues have found possible.

Some Reflections on DFAIT

How does DFAIT look from here? First and foremost, it remains (in spite of its chronically despondent morale) a well-trained and sophisticated corps, with a high concentration of brain power and entrepreneurial drive relative to most foreign services. That said, exceptional talent stands out exceptionally, as David Angell’s much-admired performance in the Security Council, 1999–2000, alongside Bob Fowler and Paul Heinbecker, demonstrates. Because Canada does not matter particularly in a UN where the Permanent Five dominate, it needs to work hard to accomplish anything. Here, ideas are critical, as well as the energy to pursue them and overcome the resistance to the new that characterizes the UN even more than most large bureaucracies. On this front, Canada does very well, as Paul demonstrated with Canada’s compromise proposal on Iraq in February. Diplomats at the UN enjoy tremendous autonomy and a high degree of delegation of authority from headquarters, so it is a very good testing ground for initiative and resourcefulness, but not every colleague seizes the opportunity.

How does DFAIT look from here? First and foremost, it remains ... a well-trained and sophisticated corps, with a high concentration of brain power and entrepreneurial drive relative to most foreign services.

DFAIT officers individually are highly regarded by those Canadian media types who encounter them abroad, but our Department as a whole continues to enjoy a poor media image. We need to ponder this, rather than whining. Likewise, many Canadian academics admire the work of DFAIT units with which they interact, including the academic relations and historical units, while thinking poorly of us overall. Clearly, we are failing in our efforts to interact well with the academic world. We pay a very high price for this as our poor relations with the Canadian academic community are refracted through the media back to our more powerful government sister departments and to political elites. The Foreign Service Visitor program that I so greatly benefited from fifteen years ago needs a hard look. Can we leave it as mainly a personnel management tool allowing DFAIT to place some of its more senior officers in a holding pattern, often leading straight to retirement, or should we use it as an opportunity for those at the peaks of their careers to impress the academic community?

DFAIT’s most positive contributions are nearly always seen by outsiders to derive from the field, where we provide consular, trade and other services to Canadians and where we can demonstrate our policy expertise and our fleetness of foot. And yet, in recent years, we have been concentrating resources at headquarters, largely to save money. Penny-wise, pound foolish? The United Nations Development Programme has, over the past two years, decisively reversed a similar trend, forcing (often reluctant) staff back into the field and cutting back massively on headquarters. This is undoubtedly a good decision, although it would be an expensive one for us.

As a funder of research and NGO activity, DFAIT is quick off the mark and flexible, which goes some way towards making up for its very limited “walking around” money. In particular, the Global Issues Bureau’s Human Security Fund has been managed with agility and skill. Overall, we do best when we leverage our resources with larger contributions from CIDA and IDRC. (DND, sadly, is simply not a factor in international research and policy work, unlike the Pentagon and leading European Defence Ministries.) This makes turf fights with these Ottawa actors highly counterproductive for DFAIT, although differences of view are inevitable.

Pearson Building types often inadvertently present an unfortunate public face of DFAIT. A culture of entitlement (as if the Foreign Service exam were a highly reliable measure of talent) and of victimization (however objectively true it is that remuneration and other more professional rewards for FSOs have declined in real terms over the years relative to other professional groups) is highly unattractive to outsiders. Now that some of our professional grievances are being addressed, it would seem wise to welcome meritorious lateral transfers and to reinvent ourselves as a confident cadre willing and able to compete both within DFAIT and elsewhere in our society. The strongest DFAIT bureau in which I served in recent years, Global Issues, was then staffed mainly by “outsiders” from government, the academic world and NGOs. This suggests advantages to opening up other DFAIT policy bureaus radically and, meanwhile, to developing ourselves professionally through career diversification elsewhere in the government and beyond.

DFAIT professionals should systematically consider assignments in the NGO and research worlds. Our young colleague Ben Rowswell, much admired at PCO for his current work there on Canada-US relations, at his own initiative will take up a Pritzker International Fellowship this summer in Washington’s highly regarded Center for Strategic and International Studies, during which time he will doubtless learn more about what makes Washington tick than he could in any alternative assignment over a similar period of time. Other postings of a non-traditional sort will also become increasingly important for DFAIT and rewarding personally. One example: Patrick Wittmann, a young member of the leadership team of the UN’s successful mission in Mozambique in the mid-1990s, who expertly anchored in Ottawa Canada’s Security Council term, 1999–2000, has been nominated to take up the job of Canadian political advisor to the commanders of NORAD in Colorado Springs.

My experience here has been exhilarating. I am confident it will make me a more acute, results-oriented and entrepreneurial public servant on my return to Ottawa. I look forward to it.

David Malone, a former Ambassador and Deputy Permanent Representative at the UN and former Director General of the Policy, International Organizations and Global Issues Bureau. At the time of publication, he was on leave from the Public Service until late 2004.

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Rita Hauser, Chair of the Board of IPA, with David Malone, February 2000.

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IPA hosts a meeting of defence ministers on rapid deployment. From L to R: Malone, Polish Defence Minister Janusz Onyszkiewicz, Annan and Danish Defence Minister Haekkamp. Then-Canadian Defence Minister Eggleton also attended.

Difficult Dinners

by Mary Taylor

Diplomats eat a lot of dinners. So of course do we all, but diplomatic dinners are a little different. On these occasions, formally dressed people are usually served elaborate food, often in the company of those they barely know and with whom they may even share no common language. Some such events are wonderful. You enjoy gourmet food in beautiful surroundings with fellow guests who make one feel witty and attractive. But many such evenings are not so good and, as Tolstoy so famously observed, it is the unhappy times that are memorable.

Early in our time in Moscow we gave the dinner, which was expected of us, for our ambassador, Robert Ford, and his formidable wife Thereza. As was his custom, Robert sat at the head of our table, both his right as our ambassador and a convenience for his disability. Unfortunately, I had failed to warn our Russian helper of this change in the arrangements, and so she followed her normal procedure serving those at the ends of the table last. In an attempt to correct this, I whispered to her, “Serve Mrs. Ford first.” She looked at me skeptically, but I nodded firmly, trusting that the situation would be corrected by the second course. Imagine my horror, a few seconds later, to see Vyera appearing with a silver salver on which stood a bottle of beer. Unfortunately, I must have pronounced the word for first, “pervaya,” so badly that it sounded like “piva.” There was worse to come. Later, as was the custom, the guests were served drinks, including orange juice. What was available locally was very poor, and with my fourth child only a few months old, I had not had the time to squeeze sufficient oranges, so made the mistake of mixing the two kinds. The result was no doubt lamentable — as half measures so often are. Thereza took one sip and enquired in her usual drawly voice, “What is this darling, Chanel no 5?” At least the government sofa did not collapse beneath her, something which was to happen, though with a different guest, during our successors’ stay in that Kutusovksky apartment.

The menu at these Moscow dinners was not a big issue. What was available locally was limited. Perishable food could only be obtained by air, and was therefore very expensive. Good filet mignon was available to the diplomats and caviar was still relatively cheap, so we ate a lot of boeuf Wellington and blinis. In the winter, some of us would arrange our dinners in the same week, order flowers from Helsinki by air and rush them from one apartment to the other swathed in plastic. The French were blessed in that Air France provided their ambassador with a weekly shipment of cheese, something he generously shared with his staff. At a later dinner for the Fords, a French friend nobly lent me her cheese assignment to add lustre to the occasion. There again disaster was narrowly averted when I discovered at the last moment that my Russian treasure was, reasonably enough, preparing to serve this at the beginning of the meal as Zakuski instead of before the dessert.

If no one expected you to produce a gourmet meal in Moscow, the same was certainly not true in Belgium, where the standard was exceptionally high not only in restaurants but in private homes. But it was not trouble with the food but a slow eater which caused me alarm at the first dinner party I gave in Brussels. Struggling to converse with an Italian general — my Italian was non-existent, his English very limited — I longed for the second course to provide a distraction. It never came, and as time passed I began to wonder whether something awful had happened in the kitchen and how long I should wait before excusing myself and going to investigate. I remembered the tale of a colleague’s wife who, in a similar dilemma, had finally gone behind the scenes to find her cook chasing the waiter with a knife. Could something like that possibly be happening here? Just as I was about to give up hope, the plates were removed and the second course duly appeared. The problem, I later found out, had been a guest at the far end of the table who ate so slowly that the whole procedure had been held up until he finished.

The diplomatic protocol for those who feel they have been misplaced at a table is to turn over one’s plate, sit through the first course, and then leave without giving any explanation. I never actually witnessed this diplomatic myth — I also never saw a maid serve suckling pig holding the apple in her own mouth, though difficulty with the declensions of Russian pronouns made this conceivable — but I had two friends who swore they had seen a plate turned over. One occasion, many years earlier, had been in Moscow where great importance was attached to one’s place in the hierarchy and where the to and fro of ambassadors often made it difficult to know who was a chargé d’affaires. My friend reported that most of the other guests simply assumed the Latin American in question was having a nervous breakdown. I did attend one meal, however, where a guest ate absolutely nothing, though not for reasons of protocol. This was a small dinner given by the Austrian cultural attaché in Moscow for a formerly renowned architect, Melnikov. The regime tolerated him but presumably kept him under surveillance. He himself was charm personified and obviously enjoyed the outing, but not so his wife. Whatever the reason, perhaps fear of what this might lead to, she ate nothing throughout the whole meal.

Because they represent their country, diplomats, especially junior ones, may find themselves seated beside people who are much more prominent than they are. Sometimes the great are charming, sometimes not. I once sat beside a French foreign minister — one who, rather to my satisfaction, was later taken to court — who obviously found me unutterably boring and barely spoke. Long before, in Delhi, my husband had attended a dinner where Krishna Menon had clearly indicated that he did not expect to dine in the company of anyone as junior. Others, Maureen Forrester was an example, could be delightful and treated everyone alike. Sometimes one didn’t take on board just how prominent one’s fellow guest might be. A young friend seeing “Ionesco” on the place card beside her assumed it was a common Romanian name and asked her companion what he did. “I write plays,” was the laconic reply. The first time I met Henryk Szering, at a dinner given by Giles Lefebvre, the founder of the Jeunesses Musicales, I was not sure who he was. I was left in no doubt, however, as to his importance when the young woman next to me sank to her knees and murmured “Maître.”

Another problem at these dinners is what to wear, and often the simpler and more remote the post, the grander the attire. One of the most pleasant events I ever attended was given by the president of Dior to celebrate the company’s long association with Holt Renfrew. It was in July, and I had bought myself a summer evening dress which, even on sale, strained my budget. I was very pleased with it despite the fact that my teenage daughters had murmured something about mutton dressed as lamb, but the minute I entered our host’s elegant apartment I knew that I was the worst dressed person in the room. Everyone else was sporting Dior, apart from one whose obvious loyalty to another couturier later gave rise to some malicious remarks. There were also the jewels from the bank. But despite the dress, it was a wonderful evening. Not only had the jewels come from the bank but so had the plates, a marvellous set of Creil, edged in coral, which proved an ideal subject of conversation with my host.

Many years later, at the time of the French Bicentenary, I accompanied Maureen McTeer to an outdoor performance of opera at Versailles. The invitation had stated that we should dress warmly, which we had interpreted as wearing rather simple dresses under our raincoats. Not so le tout Paris by whom we were surrounded. For them it meant a full-length couturier coat well cut so as to show off the jewels. Our attire did not go unnoticed. When we approached the VIP tent at the intermission, the official took one look at us and demanded haughtily, “Where did you find these tickets?” Fortunately, a friend of Maureen’s was standing near the door and waved us in.

Diplomatic dinners are sometimes marked by speeches, only too often recitals of banalities about goodwill and friendship, since no one wishes to offend either the guest or the host. Occasionally, however, things go wrong, and one comes to with a start. It was a French foreign minister, at a time when relations with Quebec were still pretty tense, who remarked at a dinner on the 9th floor of the Pearson Building how glad he was to be in Montreal. The slip almost passed unnoticed, but not so the comment of a Chinese visitor, who remarked, presumably due to a faulty translation, that he looked forward to a third world war.

It is usually the host and hostess who suffer most on these occasions, particularly if they are living in very different cultures and are dependent on staff for whom their ways are a mystery. But the guests can have a hard time too. They may be served food which is at best unappetizing: live seafood, fried grasshoppers, sheep’s eyes. They may be expected to eat far more than they want and to sit or kneel uneasily, embarrassed by the still grace of their hosts. So how to cope with these difficult dinners? Do one’s best and then let things roll. Remember that this too will pass and that even the worst disaster at table is insignificant compared to what is happening in the outside world.

Mary Taylor is the author of If Only I Had Known and A Black Mark.

The Fourth UN World Conference on Women: Beijing, 1995

by Adele Dion

The Fourth UN World Conference on Women took place in Beijing from September 4 to 15, 1995. UN Conference planners saw it as the finale of a series of four such gatherings, spanning 30 years, from 1965 in Mexico City, Copenhagen in 1975 and Nairobi in 1985.

Also, Beijing would be the fourth in a series of recent United Nations meetings aimed at addressing key economic and social issues: the World Conference on Human Rights, Vienna, 1993; the International Conference on Population and Development, Cairo, 1994 and the World Summit on Social Development, Copenhagen, 1995.

Each conference resulted in consensus final documents containing strong reaffirmation of the equal status and rights of women, and in some instances, such as Cairo, made significant progress in the definition of women’s sexual and reproductive health rights.

The Setting: Why Beijing?

The question was asked many times. The UN answer is straightforward. The Asian region had not yet hosted a women’s conference and therefore had first right of offer. China, as the sole volunteer, was awarded the honour. What China had perhaps not counted on was the obligation to host a parallel non-governmental forum.

Although China had initially sought to host the conference in order to enhance its international status, the Chinese Delegation did not play an active role in the negotiations surrounding either the Beijing Declaration or the Platform for Action. After repeated international assurances that “China will be a good host” to the conference, the Chinese appeared to assume an anxious “father of the bride” role, primarily concerned that the main event conclude without major incident.

The Conference

The 42 members of the official Canadian Delegation were led by The Hon. Sheila Finestone, Secretary of State (Status of Women).

As usual, the delegation had its own unique dynamic. Sharon Hayes, MP (Reform) left early because she was gagged in Beijing (the title of her op-ed piece in the September 15th Globe & Mail). At an informal press briefing, she stated that, once in Beijing, she learned ‘only six negotiators’ actually had the opportunity to present the positions of the Canadian delegation.

Hedi Fry, MP (Liberal) also created a stir when she attacked actress and fitness guru Jane Fonda during a discussion of the media’s role in educating women about health issues: “I asked her if she also believed the media should be accountable for perpetuating stereotypes that affect women. I said when women see only thin, beautiful women in the media, it leads to more cases of anorexia nervosa and bulimia.” Ms. Fry enjoyed a standing ovation.

Beyond trying to hold the line on previous agreements, did Beijing result in any meaningful advances for women? Yes. The Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action was agreed to by consensus by the more than 180 participating governments.

The Platform makes clear in every chapter that women have a right to equality, that sustainable development demands equality and that no woman should have to live her life in fear of violence, coercion or discrimination. Bella Abzug, well-known American feminist: “The Beijing Platform for Action is the strongest statement of consensus on women’s equality, empowerment and justice ever produced by governments.”

Some major achievements include: Affirmation that all governments have an obligation to promote and protect the human rights of women and girls regardless of cultural or religious traditions. Reaffirmation that violence against women is not a private issue and that states cannot invoke customs, traditions or religion to avoid their obligation to eliminate violence against women. Reaffirmation that rape in armed conflict constitutes a war crime, a crime against humanity, and introducing a new concept of rape as genocide under certain circumstances. First-time recognition in a UN document of sexual violence and gender-related persecution as grounds for refugee status. Recognition of the right, not just ability, of all women to control all aspects of their health, in particular their fertility, as basic to their own empowerment. This builds on consensus language, strongly supported by Canada, achieved at the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo. Affirmation that women include the right to have control over their own sexuality, free of coercion, discrimination and violence.

The NGO Forum

The Forum took place in Huairou from August 30 to September 8, 1995. The Forum, involving approximately 30,000 non-governmental women, was a massive undertaking. Forum organizers and facilitators were challenged by structural, logistical, and weather problems in scheduling plenary and working sessions.

The organizers’ attempts to accommodate more than 800 workshops and events, ranging from “International Goodwill Sunflower Cultural Exchange”, “Women Healing Oceans”, “Natural Family Planning and the Reluctant Husband” to “Senior Judges and their Instruments” quickly became an organizational nightmare. In spite of all obstacles, the NGO Forum produced some thoughtful, innovative proposals concerning issues of importance to women, as well as a Declaration which was presented in the final session of the government conference on September 15.

What does it all add up to?

After ten years of work (1985-95), UN member countries now have an increasingly well-defined, progressive (and, perhaps, intrusive) framework governing the rights of women — a framework which allows women everywhere to measure their quality of life against internationally agreed standards.

Beijing was a fitting birthday present to the UN on its fiftieth anniversary.

“Words, and the meaning of words, and the translation of words, become very important. Because all of these people have to go back to their own countries and try to implement this platform. So it’s got to be as acceptable to as wide a range of people as possible.”

(R. Archibald to CNN reporter May Lee)

At the time of publication, Adele Dion was Deputy Director, Human Rights and International Women’s Equality at DFAIT. She was one of the six negotiators on the Canadian delegation in Beijing.

[picture]

The Hon. Sheila Finestone (left), leader of the Canadian delegation at Beijing.

Refugee Movements and Canadian Response

by Carol Turner-Trusca

Introduction

One of the basic policy objectives of Canada’s present Immigration Act is “to fulfil Canada’s legal obligations with respect to refugees and to uphold its humanitarian tradition with respect to the displaced and the persecuted”.

This objective was not stated so clearly until the proclamation of this Act in 1976. Yet the humanitarian response to the displaced and the persecuted had, indeed, become a tradition long before the introduction of the legislative means to recognize officially special humanitarian programs that fall outside the definition of a Convention Refugee.

The “Political Prisoners and Oppressed Persons (PPOP)” Program, which facilitated the resettlement of those fighting oppressive regimes from within their homelands, and consequently suffering for it at the hands of those they opposed — such as the Chileans of the early 1970s who opposed the Pinochet Regime, and Poles of the early 1980s who, as ‘Solidarity’ activists, were imprisoned or detained following the introduction of martial law in 1981 — was one program which continues in certain countries to this day. The affected countries change from time to time, but not the commitment to extend such humanitarian assistance.

This tradition had its roots in the Cold War. The Iron Curtain had just been hung between East and West, forcibly enclosing East Europeans within the Soviet sphere of influence determined by the Allies at Yalta in 1945. It took a decade for East Europeans to recover sufficiently from the ravages wrought by the war to demonstrate dissent with the communist regimes — and another 35 years before the yoke was cast off completely — and in between, those who could flee west did. Canada took thousands during this period, beginning with the Hungarians in 1956, continuing with the Czechs and Slovaks following the Prague Spring of 1968, and extending throughout the 1980s with the Self-Exiled Program.

Canada extended assistance to Ugandan-Asians in 1972 when they were expelled by then-dictator Idi Amin Dada. It was described as the first mass resettlement of non-Europeans to Canada following the introduction of the universal, non-discriminatory selection criteria in 1967. Barely half a dozen years later, Canadians responded to the plight of thousands of Vietnamese fleeing that country following the defeat of the South in April 1975. By then, the new Immigration Act and Regulations had been proclaimed and there now existed a legal process for rapid response to such a massive displacement of people.

The articles which follow are based on the experiences of officers of the Immigration Foreign Service who were (and in one case still are) actually involved with the special groups we profile here — the Hungarians of 1956, the Ugandan Asians of 1972, the Vietnamese of 1978-80 and the Yugoslavs of 1995. Memories of these special programs remain forever clear for those who were actively involved with them — the bold headlines and sombre voices of newscasters describing scenes of human upheaval akin to Dante’s Inferno, the speed and urgency with which the programs were established, the chaos and confusion greeting the first wave of staff arriving to respond to the crisis and the subsequent camaraderie among colleagues while getting the job done. And finally, for the faces, if not the names, of the people sitting on the other side of the table, desk, or whatever flat surface served as the working space for the immigration interview, seeking a new life of peace and security in Canada.

The Hungarians

by Carol Turner-Trusca

The Hungarian Uprising of late October and early November of 1956 was the culmination of a tumultuous year in the Communist world. The denunciation of Josef Stalin’s policies and personality in a vitriolic speech by his successor, Nikita Khrushchev, at the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union sent shock waves rippling through the communist satellites. The effects and disparate resolutions in Poland and Hungary were most dramatic.

Encouraged by what appeared to be a relaxation of totalitarian control from Moscow, the Poznan (Poland) Riots of September 1956 began initially over a shortage of bread. They later spread to those who were generally discontented with their standard of living. The crisis was resolved without the direct intervention of Soviet forces through negotiation and an acknowledgement by Moscow that Warsaw would be permitted to respond to Polish problems in a uniquely Polish way.

Less than a month later, the Hungarians, taking encouragement from the Polish outcome, began demonstrating in the streets of Budapest against the political system which had been imposed upon them. Students and young workers were later joined by members of the military who had been ordered out to subdue the demonstrators. On November 4, 1956, Soviet troops marched through the streets of Budapest and by November 7, 1956, visible dissent had been quelled. Then came the Stalinist-style retribution, for leaders such as Imre Nagy, who was toppled from power and later executed, and for the students, workers and soldiers who had demonstrated. The exodus began. Two hundred thousand persons fled Hungary for Western Europe over the next few weeks. Almost 40,000 found new homes in Canada (the entire Forestry Faculty of Sopron University resettled at the University of British Columbia where students continued their studies under Sopron auspices until the last class graduated in 1961) in an ad hoc program which forever changed Canadian immigration.

Under the guidance of the then Minister, J. W. Pickersgill, who personally oversaw many of the arrangements both in Europe and in Canada (including the placement of the Sopron faculty), disputes, obstacles and uncertainty which have been the lot of these people in the last few weeks.”

This admonition likely proved unnecessary. Historians have noted that all involved in the processing of the Hungarians, from the Minister right down to the most junior clerk, displayed an extraordinary degree of professional commitment during this period, particularly those officials posted in Europe.

At the outset of this movement, immigration staff in European centres processing Hungarians were reminded that “field officers are to exhibit a sympathetic and patient approach bearing in mind the stress and uncertainty which has been the lot of these people in the last few weeks.”

To facilitate the rapid movement of the Hungarian refugees to Canada, Cabinet approval was granted in late November permitting Minister Pickersgill to modify the usual security and medical procedures, and within days the Immigration Attaché in Vienna had received his instructions, including relaxed selection requirements. Most Hungarians underwent medical examinations on their arrival in settlement centres in Canada, and the only reason for politics was set aside to permit an administrative approach that processed and resettled virtually the entire movement in less than three months. For the first time, Canada took an active role in resettling refugees, including the chartering of aircraft dedicated to bringing Hungarians from refugee camps all over Europe to Dorval, Malton, Winnipeg and Vancouver in addition to those who travelled by sea to Halifax, Quebec and Saint John.

Scattered Pearls — the Ugandan Asian Exodus to Canada

by Leslie Toope

In early August 1972, world headlines proclaimed “IDI AMIN TO EXPEL UGANDAN ASIANS”. Given 90 days to leave the country they had called home for generations, some 80,000 people found themselves stateless.

The Asian community in East Africa, which traced its roots back to the mid-1800s, had been the mainstay of the Ugandan economy and civil service, and a link between the former British colonial power and the African nationals. There had been threats of “Ugandanization” since the country’s independence from Britain in 1962, but few believed it would happen. However, threats, beatings and robberies showed that Amin meant business this time.

Amin declared that all Ugandan passports had to be “verified”, a pretext for stripping people of their documents. Over half of the Asian community held British citizenship, and queues soon formed at the British Commissioner’s office. However, speedy acceptance was uncertain, as a wave of “Britain for the British” nationalism was sweeping that country at the time. India, the “mother country” for most Ugandan Asians, was not keen on taking them either.

At that particular moment, Canada was in the midst of a federal election campaign. As always, immigration was a controversial subject. Up to this time, Canada had never been involved in resettling thousands of refugees from anywhere other than Eastern Europe. The plight of the Ugandan Asians was one of the first challenges to Canada’s relatively new non-discriminatory immigration policy. The Minister of Manpower and Immigration, the Hon. Bryce Mackasey, convinced his cabinet colleagues that Canada had a moral obligation to respond.

On August 24, 1972, then Prime Minister Trudeau announced that Canada would accept all “expellees” with nowhere to go. The only trouble was, Canada had no diplomatic mission in the Ugandan capital at the time. The Foreign Branch at immigration headquarters in the old Bourque building in Ottawa called on the immigration program manager in Beirut, Roger St. Vincent, to head up the team.

Mike Molloy was one of that team of 30 visa officers, clerks, typists, doctors, and medical technicians who flew into Kampala. “Canada got there first with the most,” says Molloy, now Director General of Citizenship and Immigration for Ontario. Under St. Vincent’s leadership, Molloy and his colleagues set up an office from scratch that was capable of assessing over a hundred refugees daily. “We only had the point system to work with,” Molloy adds. The United Nations definition of a Convention Refugee was added to the Immigration Act in 1976.

Since most Ugandan Asians spoke English and had business and professional skills, they easily qualified for the minimum 50 points. However, visa officers had to be very careful that their very efforts to assist the Asians did not in fact put them at risk of reprisals from Amin’s government, since the selection process was taking place within the country of persecution. To protect applicants, each was given a number and told to watch for it in the local newspaper, alerting them when to come for an interview. By Amin’s November deadline, Canada’s team had facilitated the departure of 6,175 refugees. Canada admitted more Ugandan Asians than any other country except Britain.

The Indo-Chinese Movement: Bangkok — The Early Days

by Robert J. Shalka

Communist victories in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia in April 1975 displaced thousands of persons associated with the defeated governments. While most were resettled in the United States and France, the two countries most directly linked to Indo-China, Canada accepted over 5,000 persons over the next two years either as refugees or under Family Reunification Categories.

By mid-1977, increasing numbers of “Boat People” from Vietnam began appearing on the less-than-welcoming beaches of neighbouring countries, chiefly Malaysia and Thailand, which resulted in pressure on Western countries to resettle more. At the same time, a trickle of refugees escaping Cambodia brought at least some of the horrors of Pol Pot’s “Democratic Kampuchea” to the attention of the wider world. Laotians, facing conditions somewhat akin to those in Vietnam, also started to cross the border into northeast Thailand in large numbers.

In mid-1978, Canada officially committed itself to an Indo-Chinese resettlement program through the “Indo-Chinese Designated Class” — a concept incorporated into the then new 1976 Immigration Act. The initial limited commitment was quickly overtaken by events, primarily that of world attention focusing on the problem through media coverage of the plight of the “Boat People”.

The principal share of the workload in the early stages fell on the two-person office at our High Commission in Singapore. It quickly became obvious that the Singapore-based staff could not handle the situation alone. It was decided to open a small operation in Bangkok, with responsibility for Thailand and Burma (Myanmar) when a “land” component for the Indo-Chinese movement was established — the “Thailand Overland Refugee (TOR)” and the “Small Boat Escapees (SBE)”. We would also process refugee camps on the border and coast. The Thais had markedly different attitudes to the three nationalities: because of the close ethnic links between Thais and Laotians, the authorities took a relaxed approach to security in the Laotian camps. Residents were free to travel outside the camps, including back to Laos. Cambodians were offered an uncertain welcome in a series of austere camps on the border between Thailand and Cambodia.

Against this background, the Bangkok operation became operational very quickly, with Murray Oppertshauser and myself making trips to various “transit centres” or refugee camps within a month of our arrival. We also arranged the week-long visit of the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Ottawa, the Right Reverend Plourde, whose efforts were instrumental in developing the Church’s refugee sponsorship program. Ottawa and elsewhere were to become particularly active in the resettlement of Indo-Chinese in what became known as “Project 4000”.

Ever greater numbers of refugees arrived in Thailand throughout 1979. Particularly difficult was the situation of Cambodians who began arriving in great numbers along Thailand’s eastern border from April onwards. The “Boat People” also began arriving in Hong Kong, the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia. Canada, among other resettlement countries, was under increasing pressure to accept more Indo-Chinese. By the end of 1979, Canada was committed to receiving some 60,000.

I believe all members of the Immigration Foreign Service who were involved in the Indo-Chinese Refugee program found the experience to be one of the most rewarding and worthwhile of their careers. At one level, we were directly responsible for getting people out of an impossible situation and where, in most cases, resettlement was the only viable solution. The work gave a rare opportunity to follow through on the immigration process from beginning to end. I have encountered people whom I processed between 1978-80 in the Thai camps after their successful establishment in Canada.

Refugee and Humanitarian Programs for Former Yugoslavia

by Brian Casey and Martina Stvan

In the span of just three years, our mission in Belgrade has become the largest refugee office overseas. The number of refugees has increased from under 200 persons in 1992 to a 1994 record of 3096 arrivals. Under the Yugoslav special measures program, which allows Canadians to bring over their relatives affected by the conflict, our mission in Belgrade has admitted an additional 4000 persons to Canada.

These figures only hint at the strain and workload pressures confronting our immigration staff, from the program manager and Canada-based officers to the locally-engaged staff and countless temporary duty officers and emergency LES. Every day the staff hears difficult stories from people who have lost their homes and their livelihoods, whose neighbours have turned against them and who have been forced to flee in the face of an ethnic conflict which shows no sign of abating. With each interview comes the realization that these people have found an advocate. Someone whom they had helped — they were seen by a Canadian officer and little more than two months later they were in Canada under the care of a Mennonite church group. Things have not been easy for the children required further counselling and adjustment to school. However, a year later Mrs. T. has learned English, is working part-time and is helping other refugees adjust to life in Canada.

Sadly, the need for refugee and humanitarian immigration from Former Yugoslavia shows no sign of abating. Continuing efforts and resources will be required to respond to the plight of at least some of the victims.

Ripples in the Pond: Reflections of a Diplobrat

by Jade Puddington

Well, you seem to have turned out pretty normal. That’s good.

I HAVE HEARD THAT SENTIMENT expressed more than a few times during my life. It is usually expressed when people find out I grew up in a diplomatic family. As part of that family, my parents, brother and I shifted around the world multiple times while I was growing up: once to Barbados for three years and twice to Turkey for a total of six years, with moves back to Canada in between. A situation many outside our departments would consider an unconventional upbringing.

Moving with children is something that weighs heavily on the minds of numerous people at Global Affairs and Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada. When is the right time to move? Is it better to stay in one location longer? How will the school systems match up? Key amongst those questions seems to be: how will all of this moving affect my child? While some parents feel that living abroad will broaden their child’s horizons, others worry that the instability of many moves may take its toll, especially as their children age. The thought of inconsistency in school, both in terms of steady friends as well as teachers and curricula, is sometimes enough for parents to delay postings.

Below I try to summarize some of the pros and cons of moving your children abroad based on my personal experiences. I should caveat that I cannot speak for all children who have grown up moving around, but for one side of two typical extremes. Children who grow up with this nomadic lifestyle often fall into either of two categories upon reaching adulthood: they develop a love of this modus vivendi and keep it all their lives, or they move to one location never to move again. As you can surmise, I consider myself part of the former grouping. Given the number of people working within Global Affairs who themselves are the product of such a childhood, it is safe to say I am not an exception.

1. Your children will not have lifelong friends in the same way other children will

When I began university, I would occasionally meet people who had grown up in the same city all their lives and would talk about friends they had known since they were two. I did not have that. Looking back at my network of friends, I think the earliest friendships I have come from high school. You will notice I used the word “network” – that is not only because Global Affairs has appropriately influenced me to love the word, but it is a true reflection of what I have: a network of friends. Instead of a single friend I’ve known since kindergarten with whom I have shared all the same experiences, I have a multitude of friends spread around the world with a plethora of backgrounds, views and thoughts. Attending international schools abroad, diplomatic children will meet others going through similar experiences and will bond because of it.

2. Your children will have a completely different sense of risk

Returning to Canada after being abroad, school trips were hard to compare. While posted in Turkey, the big school trip for grades 4 to 6 was an eight-hour bus ride with the teachers to the coast for a week to explore the beaches, visit the ruins of an ancient castle on a small island, and truly live history. How better to learn about water cisterns than stare down into one carved in the sun-bleached rocks beside a crumbling castle wall? What better way to learn about evaporation than explaining a dried puddle of salt on a rock by the crashing ocean waves? Were there mishaps on our trips? Yes (a healthy respect for sea urchins can quickly develop after seeing a classmate step on one), but they were adventures... ones that allowed children to grow and push their limits from a young age, to learn problem-solving skills, and to develop their independence.

3. Some memories only come from living abroad

In Turkey, during thunderstorms we would sit and watch lightning strikes hit the top of an unfinished hotel perched atop the hill near our apartment, while torrential rains rushed down the streets carrying woven door mats with them. Moving back to Canada at the end of a posting, a week after a massive earthquake hit south of Istanbul, my brother and I were in charge of guarding a pile of suitcases for our family and those of four other passengers as our flight had been so delayed leaving Ankara that we had all missed our onward connection. We sat, watched and played around the suitcases piled high in front of the empty check-in counter while the adults attempted to determine the next legs of their onward journeys. Sitting on a bus transferring between terminals, we saw the Canadian military DART (Disaster Assistance Response Team) driving in the opposite direction, heading to the hardest hit areas to provide assistance. I remember looking out the window and seeing the Canadian flag patch stand out against the green of the uniform on their shoulders. Living abroad, your child will have experiences that would never occur in Canada. Some will be good, some will be bad; but these types of memories are ones that help shape who children become, how they will view challenges and how they will choose to tackle them.

4. Your children will have no strong ties to any one country

Being in an international school, surrounded by other children who themselves had also lived abroad, we would sometimes ask each other what country felt most like home. For me, no one country would come to mind – my answer would be that home was where my family was. Home became more about the people than the place. In truth, before the age of 18, I had spent more than half of my life living abroad. Moving back to Canada for the first time when I was eight felt like I was moving to a new country rather than moving home. Growing up, I found I would often feel more patriotic about the other country when I was not living there; I would jump to Canada’s defence if someone made a comment while in Turkey, and I would feel proud about Turkey while living in Canada. In adulthood, they have all come to feel like home for different reasons.

In addition, if your children are part of the group which grows to love this nomadic lifestyle, they will be more open to try new adventures themselves. They will know they are able to adapt to whatever life throws at them because they have already done it. Power or water cuts? No problem. Can’t speak the local language? We’ll figure out a way. How to celebrate Christmas in a country that doesn’t recognize that holiday or have pine trees? Say hello to a Christmas palm tree or cactus. During orientation week of my first year at university, I tracked down the school’s exchange office as I was determined to go to Australia. They looked a little surprised when I walked in, asked if I was lost and then told me to come back in a year, which I gladly did. I still remember how ecstatic I was to be granted an exchange to Melbourne for my third year of studies. A friend who had always grown up in the same city couldn’t understand why I would want to go. He argued everything they had in Australia was already available in Canada, to which my response was “maybe so... but I can try it over there!”

5. Your children will mix cultural traits from different countries

I went to a British school for a large portion of my schooling, and when I wasn’t at a British school, it was an international institution with teachers coming from across Europe, the US and Canada. By the time my family returned from posting, I had a mishmash of expressions and colloquialisms that my Canadian friends have simply come to accept as unique quirks. I speak of “flat-mates”, not “room-mates”; I know exactly what someone is looking for, whether they ask for the washroom, bathroom, toilet, lavatory, WC, dunny or water closet, and I will always say “no worries” instead of “you’re welcome”.

Spending large parts of their childhood abroad, your children will sometimes miss cultural references when they return to Canada. I still have friends who speak about television shows or bands from their youth which I know nothing about. I did not grow up with “Mr. Dressup,” for example, but instead with BBC’s “Blue Peter” and “Art Attack.” That said, when diplomatic children find someone who knows a cultural reference from their childhood, it is an instant bond.

Similarly, growing up abroad, your children’s comfort foods may vary slightly from those of their Canadian peers. While I would say that peanut butter and honey are a staple go-to, my favourite snack food is actually dried figs – something most Canadian children likely wouldn’t even recognize. I have heard similar stories about children who love kimchi or others whose dinner favourites at restaurants are classic Italian pasta dishes rather than the more typical chicken nuggets and fries.

6. Your children will miss family events

Living in other countries, some on the other side of the globe, it is inevitable that family events will be missed. Grandparents won’t be there for birthdays, and cousins won’t necessarily grow up knowing each other. Grandparents may not know their grandchildren as well simply because they are not able to play the same role they might otherwise have living in the same city. In the event of family emergencies, they may not be able to help. Looking back, for my family, I would say that this served to reinforce the strength of the smaller family unit – siblings and parents become closer by necessity. Growing up, whenever my family moved to a new place, my brother was the first person I knew and my first friend, something I would like to think made us grow closer as a result.

7. They will have to start over in each new place

Whether it is a new country or a new city, your kids will have to get used to new schools, meet new friends, find new activities and discover new places to hang out. It will be difficult and will take time – but given the time and the support needed, children adapt. In fact, they will likely adapt faster than their parents. Being in an international school, they will not be the odd ones out – they will be amongst numerous other children who have either lived abroad themselves or have had friends who have. Starting high school, my closest friends were a Brit, a Spaniard and a Turk. In my classes, about 40 percent were expat children and the remainder were national children with international experiences themselves. I also like to think that it is because of these friends that I grew up to be open-minded and willing to try new things. Attending international schools, children grow up constantly exposed to different ideas and learning that just because something is different from what they know doesn’t make it wrong – it’s just someone else’s way of tackling an issue.

I know there are many facets that I have not touched upon. Not all children adapt to their different environment. Not all children will be in international schools. The security environment of a country – and thus the freedom a child is afforded – also impacts their experiences living overseas. There are pros and cons, and parents will make their decisions based on what they feel is best for their child, as they should.

Just know that moving with your children will give them experiences that would never even be an option in Canada, allow them to meet people from around the world, form friendships that will last and memories that will mould them into who they will become. It will be difficult, and there will be tears, but the adventures and laughter will eventually replace them. They will lose some friendships, but with today’s technology, they will also keep the ones they want. Your children will be challenged, pushed, and grow. They will have opportunities like no other.

As I have mentioned, many in our departments have experienced this lifestyle as children – feel free to talk to them about it; they won’t bite. Although I cannot speak for everyone, I feel I was lucky and privileged to live in the countries that I did, as I did. I would not trade my experiences for anything, and, as others have pointed out, I seem to have turned out alright.

Jade Puddington grew up a child of a Foreign Service family. After university, she worked for DND before joining Foreign Affairs in 2010. Since then, she has worked in the International Crime and Terrorism Division, acted as a Media Liaison Officer at the G20, covered communications in the Emergency Management Bureau, as well as covering political relations with Cambodia, Myanmar and Laos in the Southeast Asia and Oceania Relations Division. At the time of writing, she was in Mandarin language training and was scheduled to head to Beijing that summer.

Amis d’Haïti et amigos de l’Amérique latine / Friends of Haiti and Amigos of Latin America

Le sous-ministre adjoint par intérim aperçoit à travers la fenêtre de son étroit bureau une autre tour du complexe Lester B. Pearson, vue peu inspirante s’il en est. Le sous-ministre adjoint est en mission à Washington et New York; il participe à des entretiens avec le président Aristide et les cinq «Amis d’Haïti» où seront examinées les prochaines étapes que pourraient adopter pour Haïti les pays les plus concernés et ceci, à la lumière des sanctions économiques décrétées par l’ONU et de la menace d’une invasion imminente qui aurait pour but de rétablir le président d’Haïti, Aristide.

Les priorités politiques et commerciales pour le Canada dans la région sont :

la mise en place, dans les relations bilatérales et dans le cadre de l’OEA, d’un partenariat actif avec les états de la région

la défense de la démocratie

le renforcement des institutions démocratiques en Amérique centrale et dans les Antilles

la promotion des relations commerciales avec l’Amérique latine et les Antilles

June 2 unfolds...

... The Press Office organizes a meeting on the Secretary of State (Latin America)’s proposed visit to Cuba. The Minister’s office tries to get through to Bogota to talk to her but the connection is not made. “CNN Latin America wants an interview with her from Ottawa prior to departure, as well as after the visit while she is in transit in Miami airport.”

... At Place du Portage, a meeting starts. “The purpose of this meeting is to begin preparations of the next round of meetings with Mexico and the US on the regulations governing the admission of temporary workers under NAFTA. We might want to look at some new professions for eligibility.”

... Le cabinet du ministre Ouellet demande une mise à jour des réunions des «Amis d’Haïti» à New York. Ottawa contacte l’ONU pour s’assurer qu’un rapport des consultations avec les Français soit produit.

... The Honorary Consul in La Paz reports a missing plane carrying a Canadian environmental worker and four colleagues has not been found. A search plane is missing as well. Lima contacts the head of the Peruvian Air Force to arrange for the loan of a helicopter for searching the higher reaches of the Andes.

... Port-au-Prince files its reports on the impact of economic sanctions and needs for humanitarian assistance. The Ambassador calls. “There is increasing tension in the air. The military leaders are starting to panic.”

... Selon notre ambassade en Colombie, la visite de la secrétaire d’État Mme Stewart s’est bien déroulée.

... There is a meeting in the Office of Protocol with the Argentina Ambassador on the upcoming visit of President Menem.

... A funeral home in Costa Rica details their work in forwarding the ashes of a recently deceased Canadian. They regret that the ashes had not been received in good condition, but the transportation company is to blame.

... Le bureau de la presse rapporte que «nous recevons de nombreuses demandes des médias au sujet des sanctions financières à l’égard des partisans du régime illégitime de Haïti, en particulier ceux de nationalité canadienne ou possédant le statut d’immigrant reçu.»

... “The Deputy’s office calls back the urgent memo again. They say we don’t have the margins correctly set.”

... A Montreal travel agency inquires about the return of the personal effects that had been stolen from 40 Canadian tourists in Venezuela in a daring middle-of-the-night robbery.

... Discussions are finalized on the sale of helicopters to Colombia, and a memorandum is prepared for ministerial consideration.

... The families and lawyer of two Canadians imprisoned in Colombia, in a conference call, go over the problems they are having and ask for help to transfer them to a Canadian prison.

... Jamaica reports that the Jamaican judicial system has promptly dealt with yet another of the five to ten Canadians arrested each week on drug charges.

... The Mission to the United Nations sends on the latest draft communique for the UN Five Friends of Haiti. It calls for tough new measures if the military regime does not hand over power soon.

... La Barbade nous envoie un rapport sur leurs entretiens avec le Commissaire de police portant sur l’assistance aux investisseurs canadiens qui croient avoir été fraudés et qui estiment ne pas avoir reçu l’appui des autorités locales.

Fin d’un premier voyage en Libye

par Caroline Guimond, Ambassade du Canada, Tunisie

DÉCORS : Hôtel El Mehari, Tripoli. Hôtel moderne à la «Intourist» des années soviétiques ou le personnel a certainement été formé par un des Comités révolutionnaires du peuple. Chambre spacieuse où les traces du dernier occupant sont omniprésentes mais où, heureusement cette fois, l’air climatisé fonctionne car les vents du Sahara ont amené sur la ville une chaleur accablante de plus de 40 Celsius.

Il est sept heures. Je paresse un peu au lit, profitant de ce moment de paix pour repenser à tout ce que j’ai fait au cours des six derniers jours passés en Libye. Moi qui craignais un peu cette visite au pays de Kadhafi, me voici conquise par le charme de ce grand peuple du désert. Tandis que je rêvasse, mes collègues de Tunis entament leur journée à l’ambassade. Leur matinée se passera probablement avec le train-train habituel.

Dernier coup d’œil par la fenêtre de ma chambre sur cette belle ville baignée par des eaux turquoise de la Méditerranée. Depuis le port, une des principales voies d’accès depuis l’embonpoint au centre pétrolier, cargos et traversiers continuent leur va-et-vient. Pour un instant j’oublie les tas d’ordures au coin des rues, les édifices décrépits et les portraits décolorés du «Grand Chef» de la «Grande Jamahiriya arabe libyenne du Peuple Socialiste», et imagine l’arrivée en rade des navires phéniciens, grecs, romains, égyptiens, turcs et, plus tard, les pirates barbaresques.

Dès l’antiquité, l’ancienne Oea et ses villes-sœurs de Sabrata et Leipsus Magnus étaient de grands centres de commerce méditerranéens d’où partaient des bateaux pleins des intérêts canadiens en Libye.

Le Chargé d’affaires et le Consul des Pays-Bas viennent également nous saluer. Je m’amuse intérieurement à comparer mes impressions du pays avec les leurs: encore sous le charme de la découverte, ma vision est naturellement plus rose que celle un peu désabusée des habitués.

DÉCORS : Un petit salon dans les bureaux du Service protocolaire du ministère des Affaires étrangères avec quelques sofas confortables et l’éternel café de bienvenue. Ce qui retient surtout mon attention, c’est une grande carte de la Libye sur le mur. Moi qui en ai cherché une en vain, je peux enfin mieux saisir l’immensité du pays.

Il est midi. Nous sommes cinq qui attendons ma carte d’accréditation diplomatique, deux jeunes hommes et une dame qui semblent simplement attendre que le temps passe. Après quelques instants, nous lions conversation avec cette dame qui s’avère être une diplomate libyenne en poste au Rwanda. Rapatriée depuis un mois, elle attend impatiemment son retour dans ce pays qu’elle décrit avec chaleur et attachement.

Après à peine vingt minutes d’attente, le Directeur du service des immunités diplomatiques m’apporte ma carte diplo. Après un bref déjeuner frugal au salon, Fatima et moi qui attendons ma carte d’accréditation diplomatique.

Caroline Guimond a servi comme Ambassadrice du Canada en Tunisie.

The Vote from Here to Timbuktu: Observing Mali’s 2013 Legislative Elections

by Alex Johnston

It’s likely that I learned parliamentary elections would be held in Mali the same way most Malians did, through a text message inviting me to find out what my polling station was. The first message came a week or two before the vote, and a year and a half since a coup d’état brought to an end one of Africa’s most enduring democracies. In 2012, a group of army officers had removed the previous President, Amadou Toumani Touré, on the grounds that he was failing to prevent the rapid takeover of much of the country by Tuareg rebels and Islamic militants. It didn’t take long for Mali’s erstwhile colonial rulers, the French, to appear and put an end to both the coup and the southward movement of the militants. President Touré, who was himself associated with an earlier coup in 1991 that eventually led to democracy in Mali, did not return to power and new elections were called. In July of 2013, the presidential elections brought Mali back into the democratic fold. The Legislative Assembly vote that I observed in November of the same year was meant to close the unwelcome chapter of the country’s political history as quickly as possible, even as concerns lingered over the validity of any results that came from wide swaths of northern Mali that remained in militant hands.

A few months earlier I had just wrapped up my first posting as an immigration officer in Hong Kong, on the other side of the planet in all respects. I was now an accompanying spouse on my partner’s first posting, and experiencing the shock of suddenly having a lot of spare time. So when the call went out for election observers about a week before the vote, I quickly raised my hand.

A couple of days prior to the vote, knowing that I would be taking part, I started asking the odd Malians their opinions on the election. A friendly taxi driver seemed to sum up the sentiment of the capital, which in the end had about 30% voter turnout – “the parliamentary elections don’t matter, because all the power is with the president”. On the day of the vote, at around 7 a.m., we set out to the first of a half-dozen schools that were doubling as voter centres we would visit that day. The first centre was empty. Once we tracked down the man in charge, who spent a few minutes digging up the bibs for the polling officers before he would talk to us, he explained that it was simply too early to see many voters. An hour later, when we arrived at the second centre, things weren’t much different.

A friendly taxi driver seemed to sum up the sentiment of the capital, which in the end had about 30% voter turnout – “the parliamentary elections don’t matter, because all the power is with the president”.

One of the things we had been told to look out for was voter manipulation. It was a challenging task in those first few hours as voters trickled in at a rate of about two per hour. Party representatives, on the other hand, lounged outside of stations in greater numbers than voters for most of the morning, slung across their motos in the shade of trees and school houses with no apparent interest in what was going on. The highlight of the morning came when I observed one of the party reps nonchalantly putting X’s over the names of registered voters that hung on the walls outside each station. I asked my colleague to enquire about what she was doing. “Just marking who has already voted,” she responded. A good follow-up question probably would have been “why?” but following the first question she decided to stop the practice.

Even as I started to feel a little down at the low voter turnout, and the inexplicable peculiarities of the process, there were moments of real enjoyment in observing the election unfold. Posters at one station declared Femme du Mali votons massivement. Their presence wasn’t quite ‘massive’, but women were present as election officials, party officials, observers, and voters at every station we visited. Shortly after taking a photo of one of these posters, I was approached by a young Malian woman who eagerly told me about the campaign she volunteered for to encourage turnout among female voters. She explained the purpose of the campaign, the importance of participation in a democracy, and universal voter rights better than I ever could.

It was abundantly clear that the international community wanted this vote to work out. That poster extolling women to vote had the flags and logos of 17 countries and organizations on it. In the span of about thirty minutes observing one particular polling station, which was one out of about twenty at a particular school, observers from the EU, two Malian NGOs, and the United States all made appearances. It was hard to reconcile the apparent apathy of the local population with the enthusiasm of foreign powers. Where is the definitive indicator of self-determination in this sort of circumstance, and where does the will to see legitimate election results outweigh the ability to actually realize them, especially in the face of significant voter apathy?

I was reminded of this again at the end of the day, when we arrived at our final polling station to observe the vote count. The rules in Mali stated that once the ballot box was opened, no one could enter or leave the poll, which in this case was a classroom that entered into a central courtyard of a secondary school. At this single polling station, at least a third of the twenty or so people present were international observers. The rest were party representatives. The polling officer read the rules diligently as the sun slowly set and the room grew darker. About a quarter of the way into the counting, a single fluorescent bulb was flicked on to give the room its only light. We all squinted to see the ballots as they were held up at the front of the room, counted and marked on a chalkboard. Once or twice the power failed altogether, and the officers pulled out flashlights and headlamps until a generator kicked in. The door remained open to prevent the oppressive heat from the bodies of twenty or so people trapped in the tiny room from suffocating us all. We sat on rickety school benches on uneven packed-earth floors. Every once in a while over the course of the count, one of the benches would make a creaking sound as if it were about to break under the weight of the many adult bodies it wasn’t designed to hold.

For many of the inconsistencies I observed, plausible explanations that did not involve fraud or voter manipulation were present given the context of the elections that did, after all, take place shortly after a coup d’état, in the midst of ongoing instability in large areas of the north, and in one of the poorest countries on the planet.

While everything about the process was imperfect, it appeared functional. The light coming from that single fluorescent bulb was just enough for everyone to fit. The occasional departure or arrival at the open door was observed by the vote counters, and concerns were raised and addressed if it seemed suspicious. Anyone present had the right to protest the inclusion of a ballot if the validity was in question, a right party representatives happily took advantage of but never pushed too hard on. There were no fights, and at the end no one seemed particularly surprised by the results. The party of the president won a majority and other parties not insignificant portions of the vote. After counting was completed, the ballot box was resealed and carried off. The national results largely reflected that single polling station.

As a Canadian, and as someone who had never observed our own elections in the same level of detail, there were aspects of what I observed that I could clearly define as specific to Mali, others that I could just as easily see happening in Canada, and still others that seemed bizarre (read suspicious) no matter the context. Polling officers not being entirely sure of all the rules and having to go find the instructions book would not surprise me in Canada or Mali. Voters not being able to find their polls, or the single laptop that held the registry having a poor internet connection, while concerns for the integrity of the process, didn’t seem surprising given the context. On the other hand, in a country where corruption and graft are rampant, a police officer appearing before the polls had closed with cash in hand to pay the polling officers, as happened at one station we visited, set off a few alarms in my head. Whether this is the sort of thing that is sufficient to question the results of an entire election was hard to tell. Whether the return to democracy outweighs certain issues popping up here and there is also a hard call. As an observer, I didn’t have to make those calls; I just asked questions, took notes and reported back.

…in a country where corruption and graft are rampant, a police officer appearing before the polls had closed with cash in hand to pay the polling officers, as happened at one station we visited, set off a few alarms in my head. Whether this is the sort of thing that is sufficient to question the results of an entire election was hard to tell.

As an immigration officer, I am trained in fraud detection. Part of this involves knowing when inconsistencies, uncertainties, and unknowns are material to the decisions I have to make. Whether a potential issue could lead to material information being found fraudulent determines whether or not you choose to pursue it further. As an election observer, I didn’t have to make any decisions, but the same principles held true. For many of the inconsistencies I observed, plausible explanations that did not involve fraud or voter manipulation were present, given the context of the elections that did, after all, take place shortly after a coup d’état, in the midst of ongoing instability in large areas of the north, and in one of the poorest countries on the planet. While my knowledge of Mali was limited, I was nonetheless constantly reminded of these simple structural factors that made it almost impossible for the process to be perfectly transparent to an outsider, or even many Malians. I also knew that these structural limitations meant that fraud could be more easily committed and hidden completely.

A second text message a couple of weeks later marked the beginning of the second and final round of voting in the legislative elections. In short order, the victory of the president’s party was confirmed, and the international community declared a definitive return to democracy. The voter turnout for the election was about 40% nationwide, giving President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita 78% of the Legislative Assembly’s seats. In the restive north, the voter turnout was higher than anywhere else in the country, even as a bomb killed two UN peacekeepers in the same week of the final vote. In the three years since the election, and two and a half years since I left Bamako, the capital has experienced a number of deadly terrorist attacks. Instability in the north remains while the international community has continued to try to solidify a lengthy and uncertain peace process.

The ultimate unsettling convenience of my role both as an election observer and a member of the international community present in Mali in 2013 was that I could, and eventually did, leave the country. Observing elections and declaring democracy functional or dysfunctional on that basis is a facile approach to assessing the validity of a political process that is at constant risk of collapse, as was shown in Mali in 2012. No matter the party or president elected, what I observed and recorded on the ground, or how much the international community wanted the elections to be valid, Malians were ultimately the ones left to hold their new government to account.

Alex Johnston was an FS immigration officer at IRCC. After finishing his first posting in Hong Kong in 2013, he experienced the Foreign Service life from the other side, accompanying his spouse on a posting to Bamako. Alex also completed temporary duty assignments in Lagos, Pretoria, Riyadh, and, most recently, Beirut, assisting with Canada’s efforts to resettle Syrian refugees. At the time of writing, he was finishing an MA in Political Science at the University of Ottawa and occasionally, with varying degrees of success, attempted to build things out of wood.

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Poll workers wait for voters outside of their station at a School in Bamako.

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Voter lists outside of a polling station in Bamako.

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The flags and emblems of 17 countries and ogranizations adorn a poster supporting women voting in the 2013 legislative elections in Mali.

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Party representatives lounge outside of polling stations.

Third Culture Kids

by Robin Pascoe

Nothing adds veracity to writing like first-hand experience. Robin Pascoe’s second book on family life in the foreign service proves that she is writing about a subject she knows intimately. Culture Shock — Successful Living Abroad: A Parent’s Guide (Times Editions Pte Ltd., 1993, 271 pp., $15.00) is an in-depth, step-by-step look at the trite and the traumatic situations parents face when they and their children move from a familiar culture to a foreign one. Full of astute observations and practical advice, the book is written in ordinary language but delivers a professional punch. Although aimed at parents, the author’s insight into the impact of culture shock applies to everyone. This excerpt from the chapter “Third Culture Kids” (TCKs), looks at the long-term influence of rotationality on foreign service children and explores some of the characteristics these children share.

My daughter finds it almost bewildering when our conversations turn to comparisons between my own childhood and hers as a foreign service child. One particular point never ceases to amaze her: the fact that I actually grew up living in only one house, in one neighborhood, in one country — indeed in one culture — until I was 16 years old.

“You never moved, not even once?” she always asks, even though she knows the answer.

“No, not even once.”

“And you actually could play on the street in front of your house? With the same neighborhood kids, year after year?”

“That’s right.”

“And you really went to the same school all those years?”

“I did switch after eighth grade to a high school.”

“And grandpa’s job truly never forced him to move?”

“Honey, when you’re a dentist, like your grandfather, the drills don’t move around too well. And if you think I haven’t budged,” I couldn’t resist adding, “Grandpa has been drilling people’s teeth on the same Toronto street for almost 50 years!”

Too mind-boggling — and if she could express it politely, too provincial — for her to absorb. After all, she is the product of an international upbringing. Born in one foreign country, she experienced four different cultures before the age of 9. My daughter is a classic example of a Third Culture Kid (TCK).

Sociologists, psychologists, educators, and experts from other related disciplines have been investigating the common experience of internationally mobile children. That research, into the lives of children labelled Third Culture Kids, is gaining recognition and popularity through workshops and conferences held by the authorities on this subject. Chances are you have heard the phrase but have never known exactly what it meant.

What is a TCK?

A Third Culture Kid — or a ‘trans-cultural kid’ as the term is now also being defined — is a child who spends a significant part of his life in a country or countries which are not the same as the one stamped on his passport. The child is not, as the term might lead you to believe, the product of parents of mixed cultures.

TCKs are the children of parents who often share the same cultural background and are now mobile professionals such as diplomats, military types, businessmen, teachers, or missionaries, among others, who move in and out of other cultures for several years at a time. TCKs are also the prototype, according to some experts, for the world citizen of the next century. Generally speaking, they are adaptable, globally oriented, multi-cultural in outlook, and in many cases, multilingual. They are also good observers, less judgmental and less prejudicial than their non-mobile counterparts.

What is the ‘third culture’? I’ll use my own daughter Lilly as an example to explain the concept. Her first culture is Canadian. Her parents are Canadian, and she carries a Canadian passport. That’s her ‘home’ or ‘birth’ culture — even though she was born in Bangkok.

The second culture, in Lilly’s case, is a blend of the cultures of Thailand, Taiwan, and China, where we have lived. From these places, she has gained things which have contributed to the development of her values. These may be intangibles, even just cultural images, but she will nonetheless carry them with her for the rest of her life.

It is from the combination of these first two cultures that the third culture — the universal, global identity — surfaces. It is a unique third culture which she shares only with children who have also international, mobile experiences as she does. I often think of it as the jumbo-jet culture, where pint-sized travellers flash their passports in exotic airports, or smoothly exit in chauffeur-driven airport limousines or embassy cars. It is overnight, or week-long stays at five-star hotels or international resorts while on vacation from international schools and diplomatic housing compounds. It is life in a rustic village, with one well for water and no indoor plumbing, or a South American mining village where natives and foreigners share local produce and customs. It might even be some Arabian oil outpost.

Regardless, it is a ‘global nomadic’ existence which even at my daughter’s relatively young age, has already affected her learning experiences, her friendships, her ability to understand and relate to other cultures and the world at large, and of course, her interest in travel. Eventually, say the experts, it will even affect her choice of career, her relationships, and probably her choice of a spouse.

The Third ‘Expat’ Culture

With its isolated foreign communities, jet-set travel to exotic places for Christmas vacation, duty-free shopping, international schools, expatriate health clubs and so on, the expatriate style of life provides not only the reference points for everyday life overseas which many TCKs share, but also greatly affects the child’s system of values, in good and bad ways. A child whose parents treat local people, and especially servants, badly, for instance, will also likely grow up not respecting indigenous cultures. By the same token, a child who watches his parents enjoy and respect a foreign culture will be influenced in a positive way. An expatriate lifestyle which provides overseas benefits in the form of money, cars, or lavish housing will likewise lead a child to believe his family is rich. That may be true compared to the host culture, but the true family fiscal reality may be quite different.

Moreover, I can’t help but think that by our isolation in foreign ghettos and an expatriate lifestyle abroad, my daughter has in some ways been cheated out of a greater appreciation for the cultures we have lived in. (I take full responsibility; my husband at least speaks local languages.) While it is certainly true that living in China or Thailand has heightened her sense of the poverty and despair in parts of the developing world, it is equally true that living an expatriate lifestyle in those same countries has exposed her to the Westerner’s code of values and style of living in developing countries.

Often, unfortunately, chances to learn about the local culture are missed because of the parents’ reluctance to investigate and participate. Festivals are an easy way for children to jump in and enjoy their new culture. Older children may participate on their own, but younger ones will need their parents to take them or to explain the significance of the celebrations. When parents can’t get into the swing of things, they often spoil what could be a lot of fun for their children.

Where is Home?

What is ‘home’ for the parents is not home for the children. This means that when the adults are excited about home leave, the children may not have the same enthusiasm for a home they don’t know. Just as your childhood was different from your child’s, so too is your concept of home.

I have talked with many parents who get themselves all twisted up in knots trying to provide a home for their children like the one they had, even though they are living overseas. There’s a contradiction at work here. Parents can’t have it both ways. But with a little insight and a lot of communicating, not all is lost.

For TCKs, home is where they feel at home, according to Dr. Pollock of Interaction Inc., a retreat in upstate New York where families go for briefings before and after their experiences abroad. Other experts agree. Home is less a geographical location and more an emotional one based on important relationships. For that reason, home is more often than not where the parents are posted, even if the child has never lived there herself because TCKs tend to be a lot closer to their mother and father. Home can also be a grandmother’s house enjoyed every summer during home leave; still others have claimed Holiday Inns as homes because during extended home leaves that’s where they stayed.

Home vs. Nationality

From personal experience, I have come up with a workable solution which I can share. For my children, I have separated the notion of ‘home’ from the idea of ‘nationality’. In other words, to my daughter and son, home is where we are living together as a family at the moment; our nationality is Canadian.

We have taken important steps to ensure a strong sense of nationality by buying a Canadian home for our children. When the time came to buy a house near the Canadian capital of Ottawa, where we live between foreign assignments, my husband and I chose to select a house not on the basis of future market value, but for our children. We bought a home that could be rented out while we were away and to which we can return after each assignment. It is our permanent Canadian home. The children — while away for years at a time — return to the same peer group who live near this home.

As our home is in the countryside, during home leave we are able to rent a cottage less than a kilometer from our own house, so that during the summers the children can rejoin that peer group. Friendships can be renewed over the summers as well as some sense of permanence established. We can also enjoy the fullest potential of a Canadian summer in the country. It was the smartest thing we ever did. That, and renting our dog along with the house so that he too could be there for the children’s return to Canada. If there is one thing all TCKs I’ve interviewed are agreed on, it’s the absence of real pets overseas that makes them long for ‘home’.

What Are the Characteristics of a TCK?

TCKs share a number of common character traits which distinguish them from what Dr. Pollock facetiously calls the OKs (one-culture kids). These characteristics spring from their unique childhood experiences and the many cultural influences at work.

1. Used to Change

With a move to a different country every few years, an ever-changing landscape cannot help but become ingrained into the TCKs’ subconscious. They don’t necessarily like all the change, but they become used to it because it is their way of life and possibly the only way they know. Uprootedness is the norm.

As a result of all the moving around, these children and young adults become extraordinarily flexible and adaptable, which can be seen as positive. In fact, the experts believe that TCKs are a lot more flexible than their parents, whose ideas and ways of doing things are much more ingrained.

A mobile child develops coping mechanisms to handle the constant moving so that when he arrives at a new location, an unconscious process of coping takes place. It is not unlike an adult who travels a lot on business and in each hotel room puts a framed picture on the bedside table to make himself feel more at home and the unfamiliar surroundings more comfortable. Strangely enough, to the TCK, the unfamiliar is entirely predictable, for change is part of his identity. But he too will develop certain routines or rituals to ‘familiarize’ a new place. I have watched my own daughter set up her bedroom — and especially her desk — in exactly the same style wherever we go.

Some of these rituals will be emotional rather than physical, for even a young child will set up barriers to protect himself from being hurt too early on in the game. That may be one reason why, contrary to what one might believe, TCKs are not overly friendly to new children at school from day one. Everyone plays a bit of a waiting game before taking any plunges into new friendships.

Some researchers have also made the distinction between the adult who ‘adjusts to’ his new environment and the child who ‘adopts’ his new environment. The term ‘adjusts’ implies that you are still an outsider. Adults, with their strong sense of national identity, prefer to remain outsiders even if they finally cope with a new environment. TCKs, on the other hand, ‘adopt’ — yet remain both ‘part of’ and ‘apart from’ — their new environment. TCKs, raised in other cultures, feel ‘ownership in none.’

As a group, they complain less than their parents about their environment and ‘bad’ living conditions, like traffic, lack of hot water, or dirty streets. They can deal with the bad, because it may have been bad before.

2. Highly Motivated and High Academic Achievers

As a group, TCKs spring from a sub-culture. Their parents are high academic achievers — typically from the same higher socio-economic strata of society. As a result, TCKs collectively score well on any testing of general knowledge and intelligence. All the travel doesn’t hurt their scores either. They are more articulate and well-read than their counterparts at home. They usually speak or have a working knowledge of several languages.

TCKs will probably not do well at games like Trivial Pursuit, for according to the experts, they don’t accumulate much trivial knowledge, especially information that might relate to popular culture like television or movies, which tend to be limited in overseas communities. So while they gather up special knowledge as a result of their international lives, their store of useless knowledge will be small.

TCKs are more self-sufficient and independent. Researchers have found them to have a high degree of self-awareness — they know exactly who they are and where they are going. While their parents challenge their own values later in life, TCKs challenge them at a much earlier age.

Along with self-motivation comes a higher degree of discipline and better control of themselves. That’s one reason why international school teachers seldom complain about discipline problems.

3. Greater View and Understanding of the World

Having seen large chunks of it, TCKs have a much broader worldview, with a much sharper perspective on international issues, which are likely discussed more in their international classrooms than they might be back home. With classmates from the four corners of the globe, TCKs also often have more racial tolerance and cultural awareness than their parents. They are certainly less judgmental than their elders.

Experts like Dr. Pollock also believe that TCKs have a three-dimensional view of the world, along with good cross-cultural skills. For that reason, he believes they hold great potential for building ‘cultural bridges’ in a society that is becoming increasingly international.

TCKs easily become world-weary. Upon re-entry to their own cultures, their vast view of the world can alienate them from the ‘kids next door’ whom they are now trying to befriend. Those new friends have not been out in the world, and many could care less about it since it is not part of their experience. Researchers studying the re-entry process of TCKs say the ethnocentricity of ‘home’ cultures bothers even a child of 10 or 11 who has a global view not shared at home.

Unfortunately, this can lead to a feeling of detachment from their peer group. Being multicultural can be lonely, and feelings of alienation are not uncommon among TCKs, especially teenagers.

4. Little Ambassadors

TCKs are generally better-behaved and certainly far more comfortable around adults with whom they spend proportionately more time than their counterparts back home. They also get along better with their siblings, whom they may rely on in the early days of a new assignment before friends have been found.

Also fueling their best behaviour are the limits which most TCKs know are out there: they will be shipped home or shipped out of a school if their behaviour does not measure up, especially if they do something illegal or questionable in a country whose government won’t stand for it.

5. Extensive Relationship Bank

Depending on how much their parents move around and how good they are about keeping in touch, TCKs may end up having friends in every world capital. Friendships are numerous and briefly intense for TCKs. There will be some loneliness until a new network of friends and companions has been established.

Along with this loneliness will come the sense of rootlessness and of belonging everywhere yet nowhere. There has been no stable peer group for the TCK because it has changed every few years. Peer groups — and measuring yourself against them — are very important for children, especially teenagers. When that measuring stick keeps moving, the child’s emotions may be equally unstable. Some of these issues will be particularly exaggerated when the time comes for re-entry into their own home culture. The many issues of re-entry — and how parents can help their children through that often difficult process — will be examined in Chapter Ten.

6. Delayed Adolescence and Rebellion

Work opportunities for teenagers overseas may be limited, if not impossible, to find. The lack of jobs, plus the narrow social network (which may be limited to a small international school) means there is a sharp reduction in the number of chances a teenager has to break away from his family. In fact, in some overseas settings, there is an over-dependence on family from the beginning to the end of the posting cycle.

The lack of work drastically curtails the chance for teenagers to start that process of becoming responsible, independent adults, handling responsibilities or a bank account. It also delays — and often prolongs — their adolescence.

Likewise, with parents around too much of the time, there are no opportunities to get into trouble during the teen years. But when these same TCKs go to college, there suddenly appears the chance of a lifetime to finally rebel and get into trouble.

7. Migratory Instinct

It has been said that children raised on Sesame Street and then MTV have short attention spans. Magnify that one step further for the TCK, who likely moved every two to three years during childhood, and you have created a child with a distinct migratory instinct which carries over into adulthood.

This instinct is usually felt first in college. According to the experts, TCKs are apt to go to at least two colleges to obtain their degree. Later, they may change jobs a lot. TCKs turned adult tend to feel — because of their experiences — that things will change anyway, so why deal with problems if you can simply leave them behind? It takes them a while to settle down. Once supposedly settled, they then feel the urge to get up and move again.

8. TCKs Are Told They Are Special

When re-entering their home culture, TCKs tend to feel they are weird since they can’t relate to their own culture. Parents must work hard at convincing their children that they are not necessarily weird, perhaps just different.

A problem can arise when these children are continually being told they are ‘special’. Problems arise when they re-enter, feeling they are special, and discover that perhaps they are not. One grown-up TCK, the daughter of a Canadian ambassador, told me the greatest disillusionment she had as an adult was the discovery that she was not special, after a lifetime of hearing from her mother that she was.

Other Important TCK Issues

1. Unresolved Grief

Of all the issues related to the study of TCKs, the subject of their unresolved grief is always highlighted by experts on the subject. It stands out as a major issue because it is a level of grief which, in quantity and quality, is higher than that which others may ever experience, even in a lifetime.

There is so much grief for the TCK because someone is always leaving his life. Such leave-takings may be multiple and simultaneous. There is even grief which is experienced after leaving a place a child may have hated because he is nonetheless leaving a place or people that had become comfortable and familiar.

In most cases, the grief is denied or delayed. TCKs and their parents can be very cavalier about leaving yet another posting and, in the process, deny themselves the right to grieve because that doesn’t measure up to the image of courage everyone is supposed to put forward. There is great pressure for everyone to ‘adjust’ and the sooner the better. Worse still for the child or teenager is the feeling that nobody else really understands what they are going through. They feel isolated, alone. This unresolved grief, says Dr. Pollock, can be particularly destructive for the younger child because it can have life-long results.

In the olden days, when families would move around by ship rather than by 747, the long sea voyage provided a suitable grief period between one post and another. Now, too short a time elapses before a grandmother or sibling waits at an airport terminal on the other side of the world, representing the new life that lies ahead.

When that grief stays inside long enough — enough postings go by without expressing grief — resentment and anger can grow, especially a child’s resentment and anger towards the parents who have created the situation. There will be a delayed expression when the dam eventually bursts, as it must.

2. Friendships and Relationships

Deep, long-lasting friendships can be problematic for TCKs given their time restraints and the traditional waiting period of evaluating potential friends at the start of a new school year. It may be a few months before a newly arrived TCK feels confident enough to even start making friends, and then the school year is ending — and possibly the person they have targeted for friendship is leaving for another post. In some cases, knowing their time is short, some children prefer not to make any friends at all, if it means leaving them too soon. Parents need to help out with their TCK’s efforts at friendships by facilitating visits, sleepovers, picnics, play dates, or whatever works.

With the moving cycle associated with life as a TCK, some children also never learn some of the life skills necessary for satisfying interpersonal relationships. In so many instances, they can leave a post without dealing with or settling a problem they may have had with a friend. They can just leave, which is hardly a good method of dealing with a bad situation. Once again, parents need to help out and force their children to deal with problems in friendship head-on rather than just fleeing the scene.

Long-term relationships will also be problematic for TCKs, especially if they cross over into what Dr. Pollock calls a ‘mixed marriage’, that is, a TCK marries an OK (one-culture kid) who plans to never move around. The partner can’t understand many of the ingrained instincts and feelings of the TCK, and this can cause problems in the marriage.

TCKs, say the experts, tend to seek out one another, especially on university campuses where they may also befriend the local population of foreign students, with whom they feel a lot more comfortable. It has been said, in fact, that TCKs are really foreign students in disguise.

3. Career Issues and Role Models

I have already noted that TCKs tend to delay decisions about careers and likely switch jobs a lot. It should be plain how some of these feelings arise; after viewing the world, the career choices for the TCK may seem unlimited. Also, with a closer attachment to parents, who may still be living somewhere overseas, the TCK may further delay career decisions and choose to stay for a while with their parents in still another foreign country.

Another important issue which influences career decisions, indeed influences the road to adult career issues, is the absence of role models from their own culture in the TCKs’ life. Educators and medical people alike have noted this unique situation which exists for TCKs. Growing up in international communities, TCKs are exposed to very few types of people outside of middle-class professionals who are likely above average in both education and intelligence.

It Can’t Be Too Bad a Life

The experts say that 10 percent of TCKs, when adults, look for some small town and choose to hug a tree — in other words, put down roots. The other 90 percent of TCKs choose to return to international life.

So parents of TCKs agonizing over the childhood they are providing should stop to consider: international life must be a great life if so many children choose it for themselves when they grow up.

Une première affectation à l’étranger - Quelques réflexions et leçons tirées

par Grégoire-François Legault

Les premières sont bien souvent des événements marquants. Pour un jeune diplomate enthousiaste à l’idée de partir en poste à l’étranger, la première affectation est à la fois redoutée et attendue. C’est un moment qui symbolise simultanément le fil d’arrivée et la ligne de départ, le point culminant de tant d’années de préparation sur les bancs d’école et à la centrale ainsi que le début d’une carrière hors du commun qui mènera littéralement aux quatre coins du monde. Bref, il est parfois difficile d’imaginer ce qui nous attend. Le texte qui suit rassemble quelques-unes des leçons que j’ai tirées après un an de formation linguistique et trois années passées en Thaïlande, dont près de 18 mois en temps de pandémie. Certaines viennent de mentors que j’ai côtoyés au fil des années. D’autres sont plutôt l’aboutissement de mes propres réflexions.

Premièrement : apprendre à embrasser l’imprévu sous toutes ses formes

Ceux qui aiment la routine ou encore veulent que tout se déroule sans encombre ont définitivement choisi le mauvais métier. Une bonne planification demeure la meilleure façon de pallier aux imprévus, mais il est impossible de toujours les anticiper. Ici, la capacité d’adaptation et d’improvisation sont clefs. Tout comme apprendre à gérer le stress et apprendre à rigoler suite aux changements de dernière minute. En faisant le point sur les quatre dernières années, je pense que la seule constante dans mon travail fut le changement qui se manifeste de façon imprévisible sans crier gare.

Deuxièmement : prendre les rênes de son propre parcours de carrière

Malgré la hiérarchie propre à la diplomatie, le manque relatif d’encadrement pour ce qui touche à notre développement professionnel me laisse encore bouche bée. Sur une carrière de 35 ans, un agent du service extérieur peut normalement espérer compléter cinq ou six affectations à l’étranger entrecoupées par des retours au pays de durée variable. Il y a bien sûr des exceptions; je pense ici aux agents consulaires et à nos collègues de la filière immigration qui suivent une formation à la fois poussée et hautement structurée, et qui peuvent plus souvent faire des affectations croisées. Je crois donc qu’il est important de mettre sur papier ses objectifs à long terme. Cela inclut à mon avis le développement d’une ou deux spécialisations géographiques ou encore thématiques. Recruté pour travailler sur la Chine, j’ai toujours pensé que j’y passerais ma première affectation. Ce fut toute une surprise de recevoir mon message d’affectation avec comme entête « BNGKK », même si en fin de compte je suis content d’avoir pu élargir mes horizons en travaillant en Asie du Sud-est et d’avoir développé une perspective régionale qui me servira plus tard.

Troisièmement : ne jamais négliger l’administration, à la fois personnelle et reliée au travail

Il est facile de reporter une tâche qui peut nous sembler anodine. Avec le brouhaha associé au départ à l’étranger, je saurai à l’avenir qu’une affectation se prépare dès la réception du message des ressources humaines. En poste, que ce soit le remboursement des demandes d’hospitalité ou encore le renouvellement des documents importants comme le permis de conduire, la paperasse s’accumule rapidement. Et une fois que cette dernière atteint une certaine hauteur sur le coin de notre bureau, il devient presque insurmontable de s’en débarrasser. J’aurai appris cela à mes dépens.

Quatrièmement : protéger une plage horaire hebdomadaire pour persister dans son apprentissage de la langue locale et dans son propre développement professionnel

Peu de corps diplomatiques offrent la chance de passer jusqu’à deux années en formation linguistique. Cette opportunité d’apprendre une langue étrangère se révélera bien souvent un atout dans la plupart des postes où nos contreparties n’ont pas toujours cette chance. Si jamais il est possible de tirer avantage de ce privilège incroyable, je crois néanmoins qu’il faut aussi continuer de le faire une fois arrivé en poste. Le train-train quotidien reprend rapidement le dessus, mais cela n’est pas une excuse pour mettre l’apprentissage continu de la langue locale de côté. Il en va de même pour le développement professionnel, tels que les cours en ligne, les certificats, ou encore l’obtention d’un diplôme de cycle supérieur. Parfaire ses connaissances, c’est investir dans son avenir en élargissant ses horizons et en devenant plus efficace.

Cinquièmement : investir dans ses employés locaux

Ils représentent notre mémoire institutionnelle et assurent la pérennité des opérations. Malheureusement, peu d’opportunités de développement professionnel leur sont offertes, et à moins de gagner un concours à l’interne, les promotions sont rares. Je ne regrette pas du tout le temps passé à essayer de comprendre leurs besoins et attentes, à leur trouver de nouveaux défis et à les supporter dans leurs développements professionnels respectifs. À mon avis, il faut les habiliter eux aussi dans leurs carrières pour que finalement ils décident de rester.

Sixièmement : s’imposer des limites

En Asie du moins, l’empreinte diplomatique du Canada n’a pas la profondeur des grandes puissances et de certaines autres puissances moyennes. En Thaïlande, la section politique compte trois employés canadiens, comparativement à huit pour l’Australie et une vingtaine pour les États-Unis (avec 87 employés au total, la section politique américaine est plus grande que l’Ambassade du Canada au complet). Étant donné la concentration des responsabilités au sein d’un petit nombre d’individus, le travail s’empile à un rythme effréné. Il est probablement impossible de tout finir. Bien qu’il soit impossible de toujours éviter les heures supplémentaires, il est sain de s’imposer des limites en termes de nombre d’heures travaillées. Suivant les conseils d’un mentor, j’ai cessé une fois en poste de chercher la perfection, un luxe, et appris à simplement viser le travail bien fait. Ma santé mentale s’en porte d’ailleurs beaucoup mieux.

Septièmement : apprendre à jongler avec plusieurs « balles » sans en laisser tomber une seule

Ce point est relié au tout dernier. La petitesse relative de nos équipes fait en sorte que tout le monde doit mettre ses mains à la pâte (je me rappelle par exemple d’avoir eu à assembler 40 poutines juste avant la tenue d’une réception). Gérer les priorités ainsi que les dates butoirs sont des aspects importants de notre travail. À ce sujet, chaque personne aura un système qui fonctionne mieux; il n’y a pas de recette magique!

Huitièmement : garder contact

Cela peut vouloir dire différentes choses. Pour moi, garder contact signifie : (1) correspondre et discuter avec sa famille, ses proches et ses amis; (2) se tenir au courant de l’actualité au Canada; (3) téléphoner à ses collègues de travail à la centrale régulièrement pour faire le point au lieu de toujours s’envoyer des courriels. Cette leçon est d’autant plus vraie en période de pandémie où il devient facile de broyer du noir. S’inventer des traditions est une option. Par exemple, j’envoie des cartes postales lorsque je visite de nouvelles villes.

Neuvièmement : se souvenir de l’appel du métier et surtout ne pas oublier de s’amuser

Notre travail est aussi une vocation. Nous travaillons parfois sur des dossiers qui prendront des années à faire avancer. Nos contributions, petit à petit, s’inscrivent dans la globalité de la diplomatie canadienne. Chaque affectation vient avec des moments de frustration et d’impuissance. Toutefois, il faut savoir garder le cap et remettre les choses en perspective. Vivre à l’étranger pour une période prolongée est une chance relativement rare. Se faire de nouveaux amis, idéalement en dehors des cercles diplomatiques, et se lancer dans de nouveaux passe-temps aident à mieux s’ancrer dans notre nouveau milieu et à garder la tête froide durant les moments plus difficiles qui se pointeront un jour ou l’autre.

Cette liste n’est pas exhaustive et est limitée en termes de longueur. J’aimerais bien connaître vos propres leçons tirées lors de vos affectations précédentes, alors n’hésitez pas à y rajouter vos suggestions!

GRÉGOIRE-FRANÇOIS LEGAULT était deuxième secrétaire (Affaires politiques, économiques et publiques) à l’ambassade du Canada en Thaïlande et devait bientôt compléter sa première affectation.

Witness to a Collapsing Empire: Echoes from the former Soviet Union

by Anne Collins and Chris Shapardanov

As diplomats, perhaps one last pilgrimage to the Kremlin or the Ministry of Foreign Affairs would have been more appropriate. But we chose to say good-bye to Russia in St. Petersburg at the Piscariovskaya Memorial to the victims of the 900-day siege and the “Great Patriotic War”. The glorious Soviet fatherland is no more; war veterans accept humanitarian assistance from a benevolent Germany and the city’s Lenin Museum now houses the American Commercial Office.

Our Russian friends reminded us as we stood at the foot of the monument that some things remain sacred. The heroism of those Leningraders who survived the blockade, and those who did not, is one of them. The hardship endured in those years entitled the survivors to a privileged status in Soviet society and defined their identity as well as that of their children and their grandchildren. If you have come to know us, we were told on the eve of our departure, you will understand these things.

We arrived in Russia in August 1990 eager to get to know these people whom we had discussed and pondered for ten months in our Russian language class. At the time it was not Russia, but the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic, one of the fifteen republics which made up the Soviet Union. It was five years into Gorbachev’s glasnost, and we felt fortunate to be posted to Moscow at a time when the Soviet peoples were rediscovering their voices. We would spend the next three years listening and trying to understand those voices as we witnessed such events as the crackdown in the Baltics, the August 1991 failed coup, Ukraine’s referendum on independence, the dissolution of the USSR, and the wars in the Caucasus.

We could not see these historic developments on the horizon in the fall of 1990 as we settled into our work at the Embassy. What we could see was the rain. For three weeks in September, it rained every single day. Moscow, with its overabundance of grey Stalinist buildings, poorly lit streets and sparse greenery, can be onerous under the best conditions. The unrelenting cloud cover threatened very early in the posting to deplete our reserves of enthusiasm, which we had brought with us from Canada along with the ninety boxes of food products and toiletries. Three years later, veteran expatriates were still dredging up memories of the 1990 downpour as they chided newcomers who dared to complain about the difficult living conditions in today’s Moscow.

The city was very different then; safer, but also less colourful and vibrant. Whereas today’s foreign community has access to a wide variety of food stores, shops and Western-style restaurants and hotels, the choices in 1990 were very limited. It required you to be imaginative and enterprising while in Moscow, and well organized on your trips outside the USSR. Forget sightseeing in Helsinki, or a leisurely stroll down the Champs-Élysées; every “out” (four-month intervals were recommended) became a power shopping trip planned like a ministerial visit. Laden with suitcases of dry cleaning, and armed with your wish list and those of several colleagues, we would drop our bags at the hotel and dash to the nearest well-stocked department store. When finally confronted with the best of what capitalism had to offer, we were surprised to find the whole experience a little overwhelming. The contrast with Moscow’s empty shops and the poor quality of Soviet consumer goods was unavoidable. This was an early indication that boarding a flight to the West did not mean that we were leaving Moscow behind.

Our first trip home to Canada for Christmas provided a further taste of the Soviet Union’s magnetism which had developed in us after only four months. As we left our suburban Moscow apartment in the early morning darkness for the airport, we felt we were abandoning Russia in its hour of need. Perhaps it was the talk, oft repeated in the coming years, of possible famine, or the thickening air of political uncertainty.

Once in Canada, we found ourselves riveted to the TV and devouring newspaper accounts of events in the USSR. Shevardnadze resigned the day after we got home, warning that conservative forces were threatening President Gorbachev’s policies of glasnost and perestroika.

The Baltic Events

We returned in January 1991 to news of the crackdown in the Baltics. Little did we know that this would be a harbinger of the tumultuous events which would follow that year, shaking the Soviet Union to its core.

Thirteen people were killed by Soviet troops outside the television tower and the parliament buildings in Vilnius, Lithuania. Merv Meadows, our colleague at the Embassy, was in Vilnius that night and for several days was the Lithuanian Government’s only link to the outside world. He was honoured with the Lithuanian Medal of Honour #86. The Lithuanians recognized Boris Yeltsin with Medal #87 for his public support of the Lithuanian Government during the storming of the parliament by Soviet troops.

Minister Clark instructed the Embassy in Moscow to maintain a presence in the Baltic states for an indefinite period. These were still the days when solo travel by NATO country representatives was prohibited. Throughout the next three months, we worked together with other diplomatic colleagues to create a solid network of contacts in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

We were impressed by the determination and resolve of the many young Canadians of Baltic descent who were working as advisors to these fledgling governments. A Latvian-Canadian woman who had been in the park across from the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Riga on the worst night of violence showed us the tree which had saved her from a stray bullet. Flowers and poems lay at the foot of other trees in honour of those less fortunate than her.

A special bond was formed between diplomats, journalists and other foreigners who witnessed first hand the events leading up to the breakup of the Soviet Union. On February 7, 1991, Lithuania was where the story was. Or at least that’s how the late Jeannette Matthey would have put it. Jeannette, CBC Radio’s Moscow correspondent, was in Vilnius along with other members of the Canadian press corps to cover the non-binding “poll” on Lithuanian independence. Chris and Roman Waschuk, an Embassy colleague, were there to monitor the referendum as informal observers. Their presence almost became the story.

For the Lithuanians, the international observers offered reassurance that the world would not forget them again in their hour of darkness. But the Soviet Foreign Ministry took a dim view of international interest, and took particular exception to the “interference in the domestic affairs of a state” allegedly perpetrated by Norwegian, Australian and Canadian diplomats while observing the Lithuanian vote. This struck us as particularly odd given the presence of diplomats from several other Western countries.

The vote was conducted in an almost festive atmosphere with children accompanying their parents to the polling booths. The ballot boxes, more often than not, were covered in the Lithuanian tricolour, which was still banned under Soviet law. Chris and Roman dragged themselves to the 2 a.m. press conference to hear the preliminary results. They were met by an ebullient Jeannette. Having gone for her usual 10k run a few hours earlier, she was, as always, in eager pursuit of the latest chapter in the unfolding Soviet saga.

This was but one of the many stories which we diplomats would “file” alongside Jeannette. We reported through our telexes to External Affairs in Ottawa, and she through her unforgettable voice to Canadians across the country. Prior to leaving Canada, we had listened for Jeannette’s reports each day as we travelled to and from Russian class. Those of us who worked and played alongside Jeannette during her time in the Soviet Union were greatly saddened by the news of her death from breast cancer in October of last year. She knew what a privilege it was to be in Moscow at that point in history. And she didn’t let any of us forget.

The August Coup and its Aftermath

It was mid-summer, and while Gorbachev was making his first appearance on the G-7 stage in London, negotiations on the Union Treaty were reaching a successful conclusion in Moscow. The proposed treaty spelled the end of the USSR as it was known; it would be replaced by a Union of Sovereign States. These and other changes were too much for conservatives in the Ministry of Defence, the KGB, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and elsewhere.

At that time we were living on Kutuzovsky Prospekt just up the street from the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR, commonly known as the Russian White House. On Monday morning, August 19, several army and KGB divisions moved into Moscow. We heard rumblings outside but dismissed it as heavy trucks. Wrong.

For the next four days, those Embassy personnel who were not assisting the consular section in contacting Canadians across the USSR were out in the streets assessing the military presence and speaking to the Russians on the barricades. We had never seen tanks other than in static displays. The first T-72 and T-80 tanks seen protecting the bridge over the Moscow River on Dorogomilovskaya Street were an unforgettable sight. Some of us tried to get a better look at the tank crews. Were they Central Asians as had been the case during some of the worst bloodshed in the Baltics? They were not. Peter Bates, a colleague at the Embassy, suggested that such close observation in a Volkswagen Jetta (even with diplomatic plates) was not likely to win the approval of any T-80 tank crew.

It became quickly apparent that this was a coup against Gorbachev, but one that lacked the decisive will or momentum to achieve its goal. When asked why they had parked themselves on the bridge near the White House, the soldiers replied they were told to move their armoured vehicles to Moscow and await further orders on arrival. The soldiers were calm, relaxed and open to the pleas of passers-by, including mothers and grandmothers, who begged them not to use their weapons in anger against the Russian people. Soon we saw flowers sticking out of tank turrets and soldiers posing for pictures with civilians on armoured vehicles. It would not always be this friendly.

On Tuesday, August 20, around 5:00 p.m., a telephone call to the Embassy from an official in the Russian government warned that the White House would come under attack within the hour. Several Embassy staff raced over to the White House, video cameras at the ready. The attack never came. Efforts to get into the Parliament that night proved unsuccessful; the White House was sealed off, in case of attack. It was later revealed that KGB helicopter gunships were to attack the building but General Shaposhnikov, Commander of the Soviet Air Force, threatened to use air force interceptors to shoot down the helicopters, sealing the fate of the coup plotters.

In anticipation of the attack, we settled in for a vigil. The rain began in the evening, and it continued into the early hours of the next day. The Muscovites, who were busy fortifying the barricades around the White House in scenes which came to resemble those from Les Misérables, were defenceless against the incessant downpour. But their spirit and determination to take a stand against the coup was undiminished. News broadcasts from underground radio Mayak crackled at the centre of huddled groups. Word that some of the plotters were found in a drunken stupor electrified the defenders of the White House. The news spread through the crowd, followed by waves of cheers which echoed around the building. “How long are you prepared to stay here?”, we asked them. “Until our President is returned to Moscow.” This would be the night of greatest uncertainty, when three young men were killed as the tanks made one final attempt to reach the White House. We went to bed with the feeling that, one way or another, it would be over by morning.

Had the plotters found their heretofore lack of nerve to take decisive action? Would they order a full-scale attack on the White House? These were the questions being asked by journalists and diplomats inside the White House on Wednesday. However, by late morning, the coup had fizzled. Gorbachev returned to Moscow in the early hours of Thursday morning. Politics in the Soviet Union would never be the same.

Soon the Baltic States would achieve independence, and Ukraine would embark on the same path. We travelled to Kyiv in early December for the Ukrainian referendum on independence. Gorbachev’s entreaties to salvage the Union were increasingly falling on deaf ears. Seeing the polling stations decorated with Ukrainian national symbols, we were reminded of the scenes in Lithuania earlier that year. Canada was the first Western country to recognize an independent Ukraine. In the streets of the capital we saw people waving both the Canadian and Ukrainian flags. It was a good day to be a Canadian in Kyiv.

We ushered in the New Year in Red Square. This marked not only the end of the Soviet Union, which had officially ceased to exist on Christmas Day, but the midway point in our posting. As we watched the spectacular fireworks display, and the Russian flag flying atop the Kremlin, it struck us that we were among the last diplomats accredited to the Soviet Union.

Newly Independent States

For us, the breakup of the Soviet Union translated into more travel to establish contacts with the governments, commercial organizations and people of the newly independent states. Canada opened offices in Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan and Yerevan, Armenia, and these were staffed out of Moscow. Working out of hotel rooms equipped with a laptop computer and a satellite communications unit brought with it the feeling of being on the front lines of Canadian diplomacy.

We learned through trial and error. It took only one sojourn at the Hotel Kazakhstan to know that on all subsequent trips, the small suitcase would be for clothes, and the large one of food. Diplomats and journalists traded packages of instant noodles along with their theories about the future course for Kazakhstan. The metal cover of the satellite fax unit, when leaned against the hotel room door, doubled as an early warning device when the 3 a.m. shouting in the hallway became all too disconcerting.

With the changed political landscape came the possibility of travel to areas previously off limits to foreigners. Nizhny Novgorod (formerly Gorky), the site chosen for Sakharov’s internal exile, was known to us as a symbol of Soviet repression. Now in the forefront of Russia’s privatization campaign, the city was actively promoting itself to potential foreign investors. Following a tour of a local factory, we could now raise vodka glasses (yet again) and toast the fact that former enemies could now sit at the same table and drink to good health and mutual prosperity.

But the erosion of Soviet totalitarianism also took the lid off centuries-old ethnic strife. Increased travel took Embassy personnel into the war zones of the Caucasus.

On arrival in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi, Chris and an Embassy colleague noticed that almost everyone was carrying a Kalashnikov or packing a sidearm. There was no welcoming party, as promised; a bad sign. Phone calls to the Ministry from the airport barber shop, the only place with a working phone, went unanswered. As obvious foreigners, the gauntlet of persistent cab drivers determined to test out their broken English or Russian on us was unavoidable. The haggling was the usual routine and even somewhat informative: the high price of gas, difficulties with getting spare parts, poor road conditions, etc.

We checked into the Metechi Palace, an oasis of first-world comfort in a city which was suffering more and more deprivation. The sign at the door asked guests to check their weapons. If this was not enough to persuade someone to part with their gun, all guests had to pass through a metal detector before entering. Our Georgian military hosts were quite relieved to find us at the hotel but spoke sternly about taking an unknown cab in Tbilisi.

Wearing black berets and combat fatigues, our two military escorts picked us up at 11:00 a.m the next day. They looked in their thirties but were actually quite younger. After some delay due to fuel shortages, we boarded an Aeroflot Tupolev-134 (DC-9 equivalent) for our 40-minute flight to Sukhumi. As foreigners, we were allowed to board the aircraft first. What followed was a descent into chaos.

When it became known that fuel was found for our aircraft, a crowd of soldiers and civilians gathered around the stairs to the aircraft, appropriately called the “trap” in Russian. There were 120 seats on the plane and perhaps 300 who wanted to go to Sukhumi.

Pandemonium erupted when an attempt was made to end the boarding process. One soldier drew a knife on those who suggested that he consider taking the next plane. He was forcibly dragged down the aircraft aisle to the doorway when we heard him click off the safety on his rifle. The aircraft had just been refuelled. Another round of shouting and gesticulation. Finally, a woman dressed in black and wearing a small portrait of a fallen son was able to calm this weary soldier. And the flight proceeded well as we flew over the verdant forests and fields of Georgia, a major food exporter during the Soviet years.

As the plane approached the war zone, a wide turn was made over the Black Sea to avoid possible Abkhazian heat-seeking missiles. The aircraft was decelerating and coming around to its final approach when the pilot started yelling in Russian, “Na zad! Na zad!” or “to the rear!” All of a sudden, the forward compartments usually occupied by attendants were quickly vacated. The battle for Sukhumi intensified. In the weeks that followed, two Georgian aircraft were shot out of the sky, killing all onboard.

Stifling heat and the distant rumble of shelling welcomed us to Sukhumi, a former idyllic city on the Georgian Black Sea coast. The Abkhazians were now shelling the Soviet-era equivalent of the Riviera in retaliation for Georgian attacks earlier that day. The next morning, we were given a tour of the damaged city. Georgian forces were firing shells back at Abkhazian positions visible just across the Gumista river.

One Georgian family, a middle-aged couple living with the husband’s parents, showed us the damage to their two-storey house caused by an Abkhazian shell. Despite the damage and rebel advances on their city, they refused to leave their home. We were led past their still, which remained in operation, up to the second storey. The shell pierced the upper wall and destroyed the contents of the bedroom. Fortunately, the family learned when to expect Abkhazian shelling and escaped injury by gathering in the safety of their basement.

We wanted to continue our tour, but our new friends had other ideas. The women disappeared, and the men proceeded to speak of their plight. The elderly man thought he had seen enough violence for one lifetime during the “Great Patriotic War”. He joined the Soviet army of the Caucasus, and chased the fascists across Ukraine and Eastern Europe to Berlin. And then he walked back to his home in Sukhumi.

In a matter of minutes, the women had prepared a tasty dish of eggs, shallots and chopped meat and served it with cucumbers on the side. The vodka, distilled a few feet away, began to flow. Vodka toasts well before noon could be considered above and beyond the call of duty, but refusal would have been misinterpreted. In the Caucasus, a guest could be feted for days before being asked the purpose of the visit. We left it to our Georgian military escorts to extricate our group. Just as we were leaving, the elderly man brought us over to the front of the house to show us something which he revered. It was a bust of Josef Stalin, a Georgian by birth. “He was a great man. We could use a leader like him today,” he said.

Epilogue

Knowing what the history books had taught us about the pain and suffering which Stalin wrought on his own people, statements like these were difficult to comprehend even after three years in what was the Soviet Union. Maybe we had not come to know these people after all.

We continue to watch the story unfold with interest from Canada. It was difficult to sit through the televised reports of the October raid on the Russian White House, the building which we had passed every day on our way to work. Since returning to Canada, we can’t help but wonder what has become of the children in Lithuania, the younger defenders of the White House, the factory director, the family in Sukhumi. They are many miles away, but their voices still resonate.

Anne Collins had been posted to Moscow. At the time of writing, she was with the Policy Staff, Economic Summit Coordination.

Chris Shapardanov had served in Washington and Moscow. At the time of writing, he was with the Central and Eastern Europe Relations Division.

Women In The Foreign Service - Do They Have Legitimate Career Complaints?

by Margaret Ford

The view still prevails in many corners of the Department that while women were once discriminated against, the tables have now turned and women are now at least treated equally, or even given special treatment in the Department. I would like to provide my perspective.

The blatant discrimination of bygone years is, of course, largely gone. But the problem of discrimination has not disappeared. What concerns many women officers is the much more subtle discrimination, or “hidden discrimination,” that continues to persist in a very sophisticated Department. Much of what I believe needs to be put aright is what the Canadian Human Rights Commission has called systemic discrimination; that is, “practices that may not be obviously discriminatory in their formulation or nature, but that, in the results, have an adverse impact...” In short, what I am concerned about is the results, not just the perceived equality of the rules.

Being prepared to get at this kind of discrimination is not easy. It requires a clear understanding of employment equity issues by management; a firm commitment and clear signals by them to the Department that changes will be made and inaction will not be tolerated; aggressive staffing, remedial and other measures by all levels of management to bring about more acceptable results; and a sense of commitment by women themselves and by their male colleagues to bring about essential change.

In the American Foreign Service, it took 13 years and $1.7 million for a class action suit by women in the State Department to succeed in obtaining remedial action in such key areas as recruitment, appraisal systems and job assignments. The class action suit brought by women officers against the State Department was able to show, for example, that the excruciatingly small number of appointments of women to deputy chief of mission positions over an eleven year period could only have arisen in a random throw of the dice once in 2500 times, given the number of women eligible for such positions. Similarly, the large number of assignments of women to less substantive jobs in the State Department could only have occurred randomly once in a million times. And the general background section of the Foreign Service Entrance Examination, on which women have tended to have significantly lower scores, was considered to be discriminatory. An examination of our Foreign Service would, I believe, reveal similar problems.

One need only look as far as the charts drawn up by the Public Service Commission comparing the representation of women in the management category across a wide range of Departments. It shows that in December 1988, the Department of External Affairs, with the single largest number of EX officers anywhere in the Government, rated 32nd in a survey of the 33 government departments that have more than 25 employees in the management category. Why does Department of External Affairs score a meagre 5.4% representation of women in the management category when the Privy Council Office and the Department of the Secretary of State can attain more than 30% women managers? And why is it that that reputed male bastion, the Department of National Defence, is able to achieve a higher representation of women managers than External? These figures would suggest that there is a prima facie case of discrimination in the Department. It would also appear to be an opinion shared by the Canadian Human Rights Commission which has selected this Department, along with DND and Revenue Canada, the three bottom rankers in the PSC survey, for a review of their equity data and employment systems.

The Department’s ranking in the PSC survey is particularly ironic, given the government’s international objectives for women. How can Canada be the most outspoken of all countries in the world in our insistence that professional women should comprise at least 30% of international secretariats when women rotational officers comprise only 15% of the Foreign Service Officer complement (EX(FS) and FS)? In our development assistance programme, we insist that each and every project be examined for its impact on women, including the benefits that women should derive from the project, and their participation in the development process. And, we insist on results in relatively short time frames. Why is it that we have more rigorous standards to ensure the equality of women in developing countries and in international secretariats than we do in the Canadian Foreign Service where management can directly influence the outcome?

Rotational women Foreign Service Officers for three consecutive years produced for management a paper on the profile of rotational women officers. They have used statistics prepared by the Personnel Branch, but also have taken a hard look at the management and other responsibilities of women at headquarters and at posts abroad. Some of the findings are as follows:

At the end of 1988, there were 1172 Foreign Service (FS) Officers in all four streams. Overall, women comprised 19% of the FS group and 15% of the Foreign Service (FS and EX(FS)) groups. But they were mostly situated at the lower end of the FS and EX scales. 37% of the FS1Ds were women; 28% of the FS1s were women; and 13% of the FS2s were women. In the EX(FS) management category, the statistics were worse. Of 404 EX(FS) employees, 16 were women. None had made it near the top ranks. There were no women EX(FS) 4s or 5s. 5.7% of the EX(FS)1s were women; 4.7% of the EX(FS)2s were women and 2% of the EX(FS)3s were women.

A closer inspection of the situation revealed that there had been relatively little progress in staffing women in the management ranks at headquarters by the end of 1988. For example:

There were no women Deputy Ministers, only two women Assistant Deputy Ministers (only one of whom was rotational) and no women Director Generals.

There were no women in the Social Affairs Stream in any management position (Deputy Director and above). This is particularly discouraging as women are disproportionately represented in this stream (50% of the new recruits in 1988 in Social Affairs were women, while women comprised 37% of new recruits overall).

In the Development Assistance Stream, only 3 of 99 management-level positions at Headquarters were held by rotational women from that stream.

Women did not get a fair share of Deputy Director positions. While FS2 women within the area of competition for promotion to the EX(FS)1 level represent approximately 10% of the total FS2 group in the area of competition, only 2.6% of women FS2s in 1987 and 6.8% in 1988 were Deputy Directors.

At the FS1 and 2 level and even EX(FS) levels, disproportionately few women got the benefit of any special measures, such as stretch assignments. For example, no woman FS2 officer in the Political/Economic Stream has ever been made a Director in the Department, while some 15 FS2 male officers in the Political/Economic Stream in the last few years have benefitted from this type of stretch assignment and most have, not surprisingly, been promoted to the EX(FS) category. No EX(FS)2 woman has been staffed into a Director-General job. Last year, half the EX(FS)2 men promoted to the EX(FS)3 level occupied Director-General positions.

Abroad, the Department’s still fairly limited use of rotational women in head of post (HOP) positions has been highly visible and has on the whole worked reasonably well. (8 positions were filled by rotational women out of 13 HOP positions filled by women). This is the statistic, of course, that most people think of when they assume that discrimination does not occur in the Department. Regrettably, it has not been complemented and backed up by the effective development of women at all the other critical stages of the career path in order for these HOP assignments not to become isolated cases of tokenism. A profile of posts abroad at the end of 1988 still showed a dearth of women in management positions below the Head of Post level. Thus, in the Political/Economic Stream, only 2 of 81 programme managers abroad (Counsellor to Minister-level) are women. In Washington, our largest and most important Embassy, the most senior woman ranked twenty-eighth on the diplomatic list.

The problem, and its solution, lies hidden in Departmental attitudes and its culture and in the way the job assignment and appraisal system work.

I have asked myself why the Department has so far been largely unable to develop its own female senior management. I have no definite answers, but I do have some plausible explanations about why this problem has persisted. The problem, and its solution, lies hidden in Departmental attitudes and its culture and in the way the job assignment and appraisal system work.

Virtually all women would testify that paternalistic and even chauvinistic attitudes still exist in the Department to some degree. A good number of male officers still seem to have difficulty, at least to some extent, in accepting women as peers or superiors and in relying on them in the same way as their male colleagues. Women have found most male supervisors to be less comfortable with women and, consequently, less at ease as their superiors, often treating them somewhat differently from their male colleagues. For instance, I know of at least two cases where the participant/Head of Post took each of his male officers with him on official tours, but never the women FS at the post. In my own experience at headquarters, none of my supervisors ever had lunch with me on a one-to-one basis, although we often lunched in somewhat larger groups. In other cases, I and other woman have rarely been asked to accompany our supervisors to appointments with senior-level officials. Many useful learning experiences were thus missed. Why did these experiences and other similar ones occur? I can only assume that there was some problem with the optics and comfort level for the male officers concerned, particularly in cases where the woman was young and single.

The personnel assignments process regrettably seems to be oblivious to this type of problem and unable to cope with the dual priority of assigning personnel to jobs and ensuring adequate career development. Personnel Divisions tend to put virtually all their energies into simply filling vacancies — admittedly an important priority in a rotational system. Personnel managers are rewarded by the system for ensuring that vacancies are filled promptly by officers capable of doing the job. But they are unfortunately not given any particular reward for ensuring the career development of officers — whether male or female.

The system tends in particular to be conservative and risk adverse in staffing women, because they have generally less access to the “old boys’ network” and are consequently less well-known and have less credibility in comparison with their male peers. The end result is that women often do not get the same type of challenging assignments as many of their male colleagues. It is frankly easier to assign a woman to a job for which she is over-qualified than to persuade a supervisor to accept her in an assignment where she has the qualifications but is unknown or untested. By contrast, a good number of my male colleagues have been given active boosts to their careers by being staffed by Personnel into high profile jobs, often as stretch assignments for high profile supervisors. Not surprisingly, they have done considerably better in terms of appraisals and promotions, not just because they are able officers, but because they acquired the on-the-job experience needed to make them even more effective. The Personnel system can, if it chooses, be an inordinately powerful tool in determining who gets what job, and consequently, who has a better opportunity to learn the Department’s work and to demonstrate his or her potential for promotion.

When I talk about the personnel system, I am not just referring to the Personnel Branch. The other critical players are Assistant Deputy Ministers, Director-Generals, and Heads of major Posts, who can make careers by requesting particular individuals for key job.

Other problems relate more specifically to the appraisal system. They also may be intertwined with our cultural values and the place and role of women in our society. Women, for instance, through their upbringing and culture, tend on the whole to be more modest than many of their male colleagues about their achievements. This means, I believe, that when requested to make their input to their appraisals, they tend to be overly modest in reporting their accomplishments, or at least, less prone to exaggerate. More seriously, in the cases where officers write part or all of their own appraisals, (an all too frequent occurrence), women tend to under-rate themselves. In other cases, supervisors may under-evaluate a woman’s potential or mark her down in certain areas because he is less comfortable with her style of getting things done. He may be less willing or comfortable in coaching a woman officer about how to deal with a new or difficult situation or less willing to back up her decision or approach to a decision. Supervisors may also be less willing or less comfortable in making the “strategic decision” that a woman officer is ready for promotion and may be less prepared to write her appraisal accordingly.

Finally, there is the problem that any promotional system has a tendency to promote the type of individual that has proved successful in the past — in the Foreign Service, traditionally a male officer who has functioned well in a predominantly male culture. The written appraisal system used by the Foreign Service has an even deeper bias because it provides a second-hand view of the individual with inevitably some of the biases of the rater contained implicitly in the description of the individual’s performance.

How can we remedy the problems? There are two challenges to be addressed. The first challenge entails putting in place measures to ensure that women genuinely receive equal treatment and a fair share of career opportunities — for example, an equitable share of the deputy directorships. The second challenge entails the development of catch-up and remedial measures to overcome the disadvantages that women have historically faced and continue to face — for example, the use of the assignment process to enhance women’s career development opportunities. Government policy stipulates that employment equity entails “practices designed to eliminate and prevent disadvantages in employment for designated groups through such mechanisms as special measures which redress these disadvantages and (provide), in a meaningful way, equitable opportunities in employment”. The Department needs to work urgently on both these tasks. Some recommended approaches to rectifying past imbalances are:

Very clear signals by senior managers to all levels of the Department that they are determined to make significant and rapid progress to increase the number of rotational women entering the management category.

At our major posts abroad there should be a conscious policy of staffing a woman into one of the top three or four positions. There is already an informal policy whereby a francophone occupies the number one or two position in these posts: This type of affirmative action should be extended to women.

More generally, senior management should review the measures that were successfully used in the 1970s to increase the representation of francophones at senior levels in the Foreign Service and, where appropriate, similar measures should be used for women. It should also look at other measures “to grow” women.

For women at more junior levels, the Personnel Operations Bureau, with Senior Management, should be “pro-active” in assigning rotational women to positions which will maximize their abilities and effectiveness and enable them to compete for management positions and promotions on an equal basis with their male counterparts. Women should be encouraged to apply for assignments and senior managers should be encouraged to ask for and obtain good women for stretch assignments. Particular attention should be given to staffing women in traditionally male-dominated bureaus and very visible positions such as executive assistants to deputy ministers.

It is also important to provide women with informal “mentors” early on in their careers and to assign them into jobs where they work for some of the more successful (and sympathetic) officers in the Department.

There is no better way “to learn the ropes” than by working with officers who “have succeeded” in the Department and who are willing to share the lessons of their success. It also helps to provide women with key entry points into “the old boys’ network”.

The biases in the appraisal system need to be tackled. Special appraisal review committees could review appraisals to ensure women are fairly rated and that their ratings reflect their effectiveness and potential. Promotion boards might interview the top 20 or 25% of candidates so they can evaluate women candidates first-hand.

Finally, better statistics are essential in measuring progress towards employment equity.

Not all of these ideas may be feasible and a good many more might be equally or more effective in redressing discrimination in the department. What they do illustrate is that there is room for major change that will remedy the lot of women in the Foreign Service while retaining the excellence of the Foreign Service and career opportunities for both men and women.

Margaret Ford served as a political economic officer in Dar-es-Salaam and the Permanent Mission to the UN, New York. She left External Affairs in August 1989 to take an EX1 position at the National Transportation Agency.

Letter to the Editor of bout de papier

Colin Robertson's memorial to Charles Ritchie (Volume 12, number 3) prompted a rush of personal recollections.

I remember Charles's last words to me on the telephone: "When you get back, come in for drinks. We'll have an orgy!". This was an injunction that he issued to many. The Bacchanalian reference simply reflected his feelings about one of the great pleasures of his life - convivial company gathered together over drinks, gossiping, telling stories, and talking about books, films and the issues of the day.

He had the singular knack of drawing all sorts of people to him. They loved to be in his company because around him life quickened. This was certainly true for foreign service officers. They angled for the chance to serve with him. His reputation as a head of mission of wit and distinction went well ahead of him. I was fortunate to serve with him twice, in Bonn in my first posting, and, much later, in London on his last. Long before he attained celebrity status and literary success with the publication of his diaries, he was a well-known and professionally respected figure in the upper echelons of the public service in Ottawa and in the wider reaches of international diplomacy. It was in this world that he made his first reputation as a diplomat and obtained the materials with which he achieved his second as a diarist.

He was not an originator of foreign policy ideas on the scale of, say, his peer Escott Reid. His talent ran in a different but equally important direction. His forte was the diagnostic and the reportorial. With clarity and precision, he could describe the mood and atmosphere of an international meeting, expose the interplay of personalities, shrewdly estimate their importance in relation to the probable outcome, and sum up and assess the often concealed issues of any diplomatic confrontation. He was an astute observer and judge of people and problems. He also had an acute sense of where the Canadian interest lay in any situation. It was gifts of this order that made him the superb diarist that he was.

He presided over rather than managed a diplomatic mission. He belonged to a foreign service in which the house style and the standards of performance had been set by a small group of elite practitioners who were not by nature didactic. The new entrant was expected to absorb the essentials of his or her craft from the atmosphere and the daily routines of the Department and from the example of his or her Betters. The closest that the Department ever came to anything as obvious as training was the informal academy called "The University of the East Block". Given this conditioning, it is not surprising that Charles simply assumed a level of performance from his officers that conformed to Departmental standards without recourse to much explicit direction on his part. Yet one was always conscious of the need to keep up to the mark even though it was set with a seemingly light hand. As for the mechanics of administration, he mercifully left that to others temperamentally better equipped to cope. Certainly, the mantras of the management gurus never entered Charles's professional vocabulary.

Among foreign service officers of my generation, the talk at any gathering would, at some point, turn to the latest of Charles Ritchie's stories. These were hilarious accounts, of which he was often the butt, told by the man himself, of his bizarre collisions with the mundane conditions of every-day living. He was famously non-mechanical and many of his stories attest to that fact. He wisely never learned to drive a car but even this self-denial was not sufficient to shield him from the vituperation that is visited upon the driver who is in the wrong. One day in Paris, the driver of the Embassy car in which Charles was riding was working his way through heavy traffic and in doing so was edging a workman on his bicycle closer and closer to the curb. Finally, the workman was forced over the curb and off his bicycle. At that moment, Charles, reclining in the back seat, looked out to see the workman shaking his fist at him and shouting "cochon de luxe!"

In London, his range of contacts from Buckingham Palace to Whitehall was formidable. A Foreign Office colleague, seconded to the Cabinet Office, once told me that the staff had standing instructions from Burke Trend, the Secretary to Cabinet, that any call from the Canadian High Commissioner was to be put through to him straight away. His connections with the Palace were close and members of the High Commission were often the beneficiaries. In my own case, my wife and I received privileged seats at Trooping the Colour and had the rare experience of attending an installation ceremony of the Order of the Garter in the royal chapel at Windsor Castle. These contacts, however stellar, were never paraded for the greater glory of their possessor. One learned of them, as I did, as the recipient of a favour or a piece of information from a third party.

He loved big cities, cosmopolitan capitals with their ceaseless buzz of professional and social activity, and their rich and varied cultural scenes. He once told a colleague that he yearned for the concrete of New York, faced as he was at the time with what was, for him, the sylvan scene of Washington. He was especially fond of London and hated the thought of leaving when retirement approached. I can see him now, his spectral figure clad in dark, pin-striped English suiting, sauntering along a London street on his way to a bookshop, a cinema, or a picture gallery or perhaps lunch at The Travellers' with friends.

Although his professional life was centred on distant cities, he never lost touch with his roots in Nova Scotia. He and Sylvia summered in their beloved Chester as often as they could, and in their final days they strove mightily to continue doing so despite the ever-increasing odds of physical frailty. Summers in Chester fortified them against the rigours of winters in Ottawa.

The last paragraph of his last book, My Grandfather's House reads: "One sunny day last summer I was standing on the wharf in Chester, Nova Scotia, gazing out to sea, thinking about the dead people of whom I had been writing and of the changing scenes of my own life. I was shaken out of these Proustian musings by a hand grabbing my arm. It was an old fisherman whom I had often encountered on the wharf. Today he seemed slightly the worse for drink.

"How are you doing, old stick?" he inquired.

"Fine", I replied.

I went on my way in a more cheerful mood. The encounter had brought me down to earth, the earth of my native Nova Scotia, where it had all begun."

Charles Stewart Almon Ritchie was an ornament to his profession and a joy to all who knew him.

A. Douglas Small