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THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS AND INTERNATIONAL TRADE

EVIDENCE

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OTTAWA, Wednesday, November 1, 2023

The Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade met with videoconference this day at 4:15 p.m. [ET] to study foreign affairs and international trade in general.

Senator Peter M. Boehm (Chair) in the chair.

[Translation]

The Chair: Hello, senators. My name is Peter Boehm. I am a senator from Ontario and the Chair of the Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade.

[English]

Before we begin, I want to note that Sébastien Payet will be with us for the next two weeks as our clerk. I now wish to invite committee members participating in today’s meeting to introduce themselves.

[Translation]

Senator Gerba: Amina Gerba from Quebec.

[English]

Senator Hartling: Nancy Hartling, New Brunswick.

Senator Ravalia: Mohamed-Iqbal Ravalia, Newfoundland and Labrador.

Senator MacAdam: Jane MacAdam, Prince Edward Island.

Senator MacDonald: Michael MacDonald, Nova Scotia.

Senator R. Patterson: Rebecca Patterson, Ontario.

Senator Lankin: Frances Lankin, Ontario. I’m subbing in for Senator Coyle who sends her regrets; she’s attending a family funeral today.

Senator M. Deacon: Marty Deacon from Ontario. Welcome.

The Chair: Thank you, senators. I want to welcome you, as well as those who may be watching us across the country on SenVu.

Colleagues, we’re meeting today under our general order of reference to discuss the important file of Women, Peace and Security. This will also be our topic of discussion at tomorrow’s meeting.

To discuss the matter, we are pleased to welcome, for our first panel, Bénédicte Santoire, Doctoral Student, Political Studies, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ottawa; and Stéfanie von Hlatky, Full Professor and Canada Research Chair on Gender, Security, and the Armed Forces at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. Welcome and thank you both for being with us.

Before we hear your opening remarks and proceed to questions and answers, I wish to ask members and witnesses in the room to please refrain from leaning in too closely to your microphone, or remove your earpiece when doing so. This will avoid any sound feedback that could negatively impact the committee staff and others in the room who might be wearing an earpiece for interpretation purposes.

We are now ready to hear your opening remarks, which will be followed by questions from senators. We’ll begin with Professor von Hlatky — you have the floor.

Stéfanie von Hlatky, Full Professor and Canada Research Chair on Gender, Security, and the Armed Forces, Queen’s University, as an individual: Thank you so much for the invitation.

My research primarily focuses on NATO’s Women, Peace and Security agenda in that alliance context. I recently published a book entitled Deploying Feminism which looks at the implementation of the Women, Peace and Security agenda across missions and operations. That research will inform my opening remarks today.

The timing is ripe for a discussion on Women, Peace and Security — not only because Canada has an important voice in those international discussions, but also because at the latest NATO summit in Vilnius, it was announced that there would be an update to the NATO policy on Women, Peace and Security.

At the same time, it’s clear that the Women, Peace and Security agenda is also being contested not only by member states in the NATO context, but also more broadly in the global context. I think we want to acknowledge that as well in our discussions, and to really focus on how gender equality and security intersect yet, at the same time, are being contested in many different contexts.

Moreover, I think it’s important to acknowledge that the Russian war in Ukraine has also led to a re-evaluation of the NATO policy on Women, Peace and Security. A refocusing on collective defence and deterrence is having some implications for how member states are approaching the Women, Peace and Security policy.

At the UN, Women, Peace and Security has focused on the four pillars of participation, protection, prevention, as well as relief and recovery, while NATO’s policy has been articulated around the principles of integration, inclusiveness and integrity. While these two policy frameworks at the UN and NATO are very compatible, as I mentioned before, NATO’s return to the deterrence mindset has created some challenges in terms of providing clear articulation of Women, Peace and Security goals when the priority is to stand up brigades on the eastern flank.

The existing policy does not provide much guidance, so that will be one of the key areas of focus in the consultations that will lead up to the unveiling of a renewed policy for Women, Peace and Security in the NATO context, which is expected to be released in 2024 at the Washington Summit.

By contrast, the Women, Peace and Security policy is a lot more specific in how it relates to NATO’s other core pillars of crisis management and cooperative security, and it has been implemented in the context of NATO missions in Afghanistan, Iraq and Kosovo.

Findings from my research — based on interviews and fieldwork data — highlight that Women, Peace and Security considerations are integrated into the operational planning and execution of missions when there is full participation of NATO gender advisers and gender focal points, consistent with NATO’s gender structure; when there is civilian representation in the leadership structure of the mission; and when there is representation and participation of women on the NATO side to model the importance of the Women, Peace and Security agenda in host countries, with some credibility and legitimacy.

From a NATO perspective, the Women, Peace and Security agenda was shaped by the operational experiences of two long-standing missions: the International Security Assistance Force and the Resolute Support Mission in Afghanistan, as well as the Kosovo Force, or KFOR.

As part of these NATO-led missions, there have been tangible efforts to increase the representation of women in local security forces and to conduct local engagement with women in host communities, as well as to diversify the targets of civil-military cooperation activities and public affairs initiatives.

To some extent, it’s fair to say that Women, Peace and Security policies were implemented into practice. They were institutionalized to a large extent because there was a commitment of resources and personnel, and some guidance that was issued — both on the civilian and military sides of the house — to support these efforts, but there are important shortcomings to note as well and to learn from as we consider the topic of Women, Peace and Security.

First, I want to identify the marginalization of gender advisers and gender focal points within and across missions, as these roles were poorly socialized within national militaries. I want to also highlight the lack of responsiveness by NATO member states when it comes to increasing the representation of women in missions and operations, despite stated policy objectives.

I also want to highlight the unintended consequences of engagement activities with women, which undoubtedly improved intelligence and situational awareness for the mission, but did not necessarily improve the security conditions for women in the short or long term. More significant achievements were met through investments in health and education.

In short, the implementation of Women, Peace and Security in NATO and other militarized contexts has prioritized the focus on women’s participation as a means of improving operational effectiveness rather than improving gender equality as a pathway to achieving more just and peaceful societies.

For example, in NATO directives on Women, Peace and Security, a close link is made between gender and the use of force in that “Integrating a gender perspective contributes to the understanding and application of fighting power . . . .” It talks about gender as leverage, as a capability and as a force multiplier.

This is in tension with the original intent of the Women, Peace and Security agenda, which is to respond to conflict in a way that is sensitive to the differentiated impacts on some groups and populations, understanding that women’s roles, in particular, have been marginalized in the design of national and international conflict responses.

Men, for their part, tend to be overrepresented when we look at combat deaths — that’s what we mean by “differentiated impacts” in the context of conflict.

On paper, NATO’s policy acknowledges this fact, as it states there’s a strong correlation between gender equality and a country’s stability. In practice, the operational effectiveness argument tends to dominate the articulation of official policy, as well as military training and practices.

I’ll end my opening remarks there, and I look forward to questions and discussions.

The Chair: Thank you very much, Professor von Hlatky.

Bénédicte Santoire, Doctoral Student, Political Studies, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ottawa, as an individual: Thank you. Dear senators, I am deeply honoured to stand before you today to address the critical issue of Women, Peace and Security.

Last week, I had the privilege to be in New York City with the Canadian delegation to the UN as a civil society representative of the Women, Peace and Security Network – Canada. People from all over the world gathered during Women, Peace and Security, or WPS, Week to celebrate and reflect on the landmark UN Security Council Resolution 1325 that was adopted in 2000.

Today — 23 years later — what constitutes the Women, Peace and Security agenda is the most comprehensive normative framework that we have to address the differentiated and disproportionate impacts of armed conflicts on women and girls, but also the necessity for their meaningful participation in every step of international peace and security decision making.

However, this agenda is not a magical solution to the world’s deepest crises that we are currently facing. One clear take-away message from WPS Week is that 23 years after the passing of this resolution, not only is there still so much to be done to achieve its full implementation, but we are also observing alarming drawbacks on women’s rights worldwide. Armed conflicts, nuclear threats, increased military spending, arms proliferation, irreversible climate change, the rise of authoritarianism and far-right movements are all phenomena that seem to be gender-neutral in appearance, but, in reality, they have very distinct and specific impacts on women, their loved ones, their livelihood, their freedom of movement and even their rights over their own body.

Today, my heart is grieving for women in Haiti, Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo who are victims of atrocious sexual violence committed by different armed groups; for women in Afghanistan whose fundamental human rights are denied by the Taliban regime; and for women in Palestine who — in addition to suffering occupation for the last decades — have to try, once again, to survive under the brutal, genocidal Israeli violence in an open-air prison. This includes pregnant women who must give birth under the bombs, without electricity or access to clean water.

I want to shed light on two cases that I know best from my fieldwork in Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus: Ukraine and Armenia. The war in Ukraine, as you know, did not start in 2022, but the full-scale invasion made everything worse. Since 2014, while mostly men are dying on the front lines, vulnerable populations across Ukraine — such as women, children, internally displaced persons, elderly people, the Roma communities, the LGBTQ+ communities and people with disabilities — have also paid the high price of war. Ukrainians who live in illegally Russian-occupied territories, or near heavily affected conflict areas, face many challenges, including poverty, destroyed infrastructure and land mine incidents, as well as the lack of social services, essential goods, transportation and primary health care.

In the last year, mass graves have been found, pointing to the existence of unspeakable atrocities committed by Russian soldiers against civilians, including rape as a weapon of war and other forms of sexual torture.

The vast majority of Ukrainians who have fled the country are women and children, and research has shown that they are at an extremely high risk of human trafficking, survival sex work and gender-based violence.

Unfortunately, Armenians do not receive the same amount of global attention. In the past month, following the total dissolution of the Republic of Artsakh, also known as Nagorno-Karabakh — an ethnically Armenian-populated enclave in what is internationally recognized as Azerbaijan — the entire population has been forcibly displaced and pushed out of their ancestral lands, refusing to live under Azerbaijan’s brutal regime. According to several legal experts, this amounts to ethnic cleansing.

Before this mass exodus, the population of Nagorno-Karabakh was under a nine-month blockade without access to essential necessities like food, fuel, transportation and medicine, leading to a humanitarian catastrophe.

As we know all too well, based on other conflicts around the world, Karabakh Armenian women fleeing their homes are subjected to significantly increased levels of gender-based violence with few means of protection. While displaced, women have to care for themselves and their relatives. They have limited access to hygiene kits, menstrual products, contraceptive options and emergency supplies for pregnant women. This massive influx of refugees has a high impact on Armenia, which is a geopolitically isolated country with limited resources and infrastructure. Armenia was still recovering from the massive losses, collective trauma and consequences of the Second Karabakh War in 2020.

There are several documented instances of violence committed against women soldiers as well — with, unfortunately, the most famous case being Anush Apetyan who was tortured, raped and dismembered by the Azerbaijani forces in 2022. This is a grim picture of the world that I am sharing with you today, but women, in all their diversity — despite bearing a disproportionate burden of the conflicts — are not only victims. Their voices, experiences and expertise must be heard and acknowledged.

Unfortunately, women remain excluded from the vast majority of peace processes worldwide. Canada must support initiatives that ensure their safety, dignity and economic empowerment through sustained advocacy in multilateral spaces and resource mobilization. We must not forget, however, that what is happening inside Canada is not disconnected from all of this. I have in mind, especially, the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls, which is still waiting to be fully implemented. I think Canada can play a major role, both globally and at home, in promoting the Women, Peace and Security agenda.

I thank you, senators.

The Chair: Thank you, Ms. Santoire, for your commentaries.

Colleagues, as per usual, we’ll go to a round of questions and answers. I encourage you to indicate your interest. I think we only have three senators thus far, so don’t be shy.

I want to inform members of the committee that, as per usual, you will have a maximum of four minutes for the first round of each panel, and this includes the questions and answers. My suggestion to you, as always, is to keep your questions concise, and that also encourages our witnesses to be concise in their responses — at least that is my hope.

Senator M. Deacon: Thank you for being here. I appreciated listening to both of your introductions today, with the background of today.

I will start off by asking a question for Ms. Santoire, and it’s regarding a research article that you published discussing the post-Soviet space: It’s entitled “Neither the Global North nor the Global South: locating the post-Soviet space in/out of the Women, Peace and Security agenda.”

I do hope to do your thesis justice, but in it you suggest that these regions fall into a gap in our thinking, as they are neither the Global North nor the Global South. I’m hoping you can elaborate on that, and maybe comment specifically on how it affects our thinking on Women, Peace and Security in places like Ukraine and Nagorno-Karabakh.

Ms. Santoire: Thank you so much for your question and your interest in my research. This is an extremely difficult question because it’s ongoing research. Indeed, it’s the subject of my thesis, and it’s actually kind of the empirical and theoretical starting point, I would say.

After travelling and working extensively in this region, I did notice a gap in the literature in the Women, Peace and Security framework — not only the resolution, but also the discursive politics around it — where research and advocacy are really structured around the Global North and the Global South.

Usually the Global North is seen as, let’s say, the norm teacher or the provider of Women, Peace and Security expertise to the Global South, which is the norm recipient, let’s say, of Women, Peace and Security policies and funding resources.

You can see that very easily in the national action plans of Global North countries. A national action plan is the main way to implement this Women, Peace and Security agenda. Usually national action plans in the Global North are concentrated on the country’s foreign policy; whereas, national action plans in the Global South are concentrated on their own domestic policy.

The major consequence that it has on how we understand, how we study and how we implement Women, Peace and Security is that there are so many gaps in this region. Let me give an example:

Women, Peace and Security was elaborated mostly for conflict and post-conflict settings. What we don’t understand, and what remains unexplored — and what I wish to do in my thesis — is that we know very little about Women, Peace and Security, as well as how it’s understood and how it’s implemented in the context of long-term protracted conflicts, and also in the context of Russian imperialism and colonialism.

I don’t know if that answers your question, but I would say this is the major gap in terms of knowledge production, but also in terms of the fact that we don’t know how this framework works in those settings.

Senator M. Deacon: Thank you. Good luck in your continued research.

Senator Ravalia: Thank you very much for your very powerful testimony. My question is for Professor von Hlatky.

In your extensive research, have you witnessed any emerging trends or challenges in the field of Women, Peace and Security that NATO could address in the future, and that could possibly act as a catalyst for a more positive global change?

Ms. von Hlatky: Thank you, Senator Ravalia; that’s an excellent question.

I think one area of challenge — and you were talking about trends, and I think this challenge is manifested in almost every institutional setting, whether it’s national or international, such as NATO, the UN, the EU, the African Union or other regional contexts — is the under-representation of women, whether it’s on the civilian side or the military side. And that is a challenge for organizations that have as an explicit goal the increased participation of women within their structures and their activities.

For NATO specifically — and for the goals that it has set out for itself with the support of its member states — I think that one area where it can be improved is specifically on this question of diversity and increased participation of women because there’s an obvious credibility gap when NATO is talking about the Women, Peace and Security agenda through its public diplomacy efforts and also with interlocutors in countries where it has missions, but then is entertaining questions about Women, Peace and Security with an almost all-male presence in those countries.

In order to have legitimacy and credibility, I think it’s important for an organization like NATO to think about the mechanisms through which it can really fulfill its commitments to increasing the participation of women. And I think it’s fair to acknowledge that in the NATO context, when it comes to the international staff, which is NATO’s civilian bureaucracy, NATO will have more levers of control in terms of its own hires.

However, when it comes to deployed personnel, whether civilian or military in the context of missions, it really defers to individual member states to make contributions. On that, NATO could demonstrate increased leadership in setting some goals that are essential to the successful execution of the missions so that there is a greater representation of women, as well as a greater representation of civilian personnel, in the context of NATO missions and activities.

That has been a weakness in the NATO context and beyond. NATO — through its fourth-generation conferences and through its own mechanisms and integrated command structure — can perhaps offer some more forceful guidance to member states on increasing the representation and participation of women.

The Chair: Senator Patterson, I note that you have two questions. Is that because you have to leave for a bit?

Senator R. Patterson: I can go during the second round for the second question.

My first question is for Dr. von Hlatky.

To follow up on where you were going, the one thing that we know about Women, Peace and Security is that we have to look at our own home first. If Canada were to try to project Canadian values abroad in other countries without getting our own house in order, it would be pretty hypocritical to tell other countries what to do — that tends to be a Western approach, though.

Given that, looking at the women who serve in all the defence and security forces — because we deploy police as well — what can we actually do better in order to prepare them? How do you think we’re doing?

Second, I’m going to focus on NATO specifically. Having worked on both the military and civilian side of NATO, my observation — on the civilian side — is that the two do not meet; there is a delta. I look for Women, Peace and Security as we are on the civilian side looking at the policy, but it is not permeating through.

What can Canada do at NATO to help cross-pollinate so that legislators are also looking at the concepts of Women, Peace and Security? Thank you.

Ms. von Hlatky: Thank you so much, Senator Patterson. Let’s start with what we can do better at home.

My answer is twofold: First, while I understand that we want to do better at home — and that might create some reluctance to project activities abroad — I also don’t think it’s wise to wait until we have figured out everything perfectly in Canada before taking action internationally to help support NATO activities in operations. That being said, the ongoing process of culture change that has been initiated can serve as important lessons for member states. This is a crucial learning moment, and NATO, as an institution, is a bit of a teaching machine for its 31 member states. In full transparency, for some of the challenges that the Canadian Armed Forces is facing, it can perhaps help by sharing some of those challenges from a military-to-military perspective — if we’re staying focused on the Canadian Armed Forces for now — in the hopes of breaking down some barriers in order to have very difficult conversations about military culture.

By its very process of going through this journey of culture change, Canada can have some influence in broader multinational conversations. The approach that the Canadian Armed Forces has taken, which is really an approach informed by the Arbour report, encourages a very comprehensive look at culture from recruitment to training, as well as from the way people are rewarded and promoted to the way they are trained for missions and operations.

That updated and improved approach can serve more broadly in ensuring best practices with other member states.

I will push back a little bit on the idea of the Western construct being extended in other countries because when I think, for instance, about the NATO mission in Iraq, and when we look at the lines of effort that were developed in support of the Women, Peace and Security agenda, they were in response to and to support the Iraqi national action plan, working with Iraqi interlocutors. There was a fairly intentional design of this line of effort to provide support to the national action plan as opposed to, let’s say, projecting the NATO Women, Peace and Security agenda as a bundled package.

These exchanges and conversations between NATO and Iraqi interlocutors are very important, and serve as an example for how this can be done iteratively as opposed to a NATO model being exported to another setting.

The Chair: I’m afraid I have to interrupt because you’ve gone over time on the segment.

Ms. von Hlatky: I’m sorry.

The Chair: That’s fine. We can pick up on this.

[Translation]

Senator Gerba: My question is for Ms. Santoire. You painted a fairly grim picture of the situation and of the serious consequences for women and girls in conflict zones. As you often said, gender-based violence is used as a weapon of war, especially in countries in the south, specifically African countries, as you said. On the whole, do you think Canada’s framework to combat this problem is relevant? Can this framework effectively combat the problem?

Ms. Santoire: I’m not sure I understand what you mean by “framework.” Are you referring to Canada’s National Action Plan for Women, Peace and Security?

Senator Gerba: How can Canada’s action plan help counter this problem?

Ms. Santoire: That is a very broad question. I am not a specialist on rape as a weapon of war.

Canada is doing a lot in this regard. It is very engaged in multilateral spaces such as the UN, for instance, and in forums. In particular, Canada heads up the Group of Friends of Women, Peace and Security. That is why I mentioned this in my remarks: One of the things Canada can do — and that it must also continue doing and has done for 23 years, since the adoption of Resolution 1325 — is to be a real advocate in multilateral spaces such as the Security Council.

In recent years, we have seen very hostile and anti-feminist reactions and a deeply alarming regression in the language used in those spaces. There have been several instances of this in recent years: Russia, for example, proposed resolutions to the Security Council which, if they had been accepted, would have seriously diluted the language of resolutions relating to women, peace and security. I am thinking in particular of resolutions pertaining to rights and access to reproductive and sexual health services, and the very mention of gender. A number of countries oppose the very use of the word “gender” and consider it an import from the West.

I am somewhat skeptical of that, unfortunately. I think we need to work on the full implementation of the Women, Peace and Security program and, in light of where we are now, we must also work to protect what we already have because what is happening around the world is truly alarming considering the anti-feminist alliances in these multilateral spaces. I think Canada can be a force in this regard.

The Chair: Thank you very much. Your speaking time is up. Now for the second round of questions.

[English]

Senator Lankin: I appreciate the opportunity to ask a couple of questions.

I’ll begin with Ms. Santoire. You’ve referenced Israel and Gaza — a current, ongoing, tragic situation. I want to stay away from the politics and history of those communities. I want to talk about what’s happening today, and Canada’s role with respect to the Women, Peace and Security resolution and our commitment to that.

The first thing I would like to ask is whether you have seen any evidence in any of Canada’s statements that the Women, Peace and Security resolution principles have been used to inform our country’s analysis of what is going on there. I specifically think that in a domestic situation, in a legislative situation, of Gender-based Analysis Plus — which we often don’t get until much later when we’re studying a bill — I wonder what influence these tools have because we’ve called for them for years. Could you comment on that and anything you’ve seen with respect to Israel and Hamas right now?

Ms. Santoire: Again, this is a really big question, but thank you for your interest, Senator Lankin.

Unfortunately, I think that how the Women, Peace and Security framework has been institutionalized across the years is insufficient to address such structural problems and atrocities. Again, I’m very skeptical — I’m sorry — but just being in the Security Council last week really shows how we lack teeth, and how we are unable to name the aggressor.

I’m afraid I cannot comment much more on that because I’m not an expert on the Israel-Palestine situation, or what Canada is doing in regard to the situation.

Senator Lankin: I appreciate you trying. I asked specifically because you referenced that in a negative way around this.

Am I right that Canada’s policy commitment to this has expired at this point in time? Do you know what’s happening there? Do you know when it’s expected to be renewed?

Ms. Santoire: Yes, of course. Canada is working on its third National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security. We are still waiting for it. There is a lot of work and advocacy being done on our part. The Women, Peace and Security Network – Canada is the network of civil society organizations across Canada. We monitor Canada’s implementation of Women, Peace and Security, and we work in concert with them. We find ownership in different ministries — for example, we establish partnerships mostly with Global Affairs Canada and also the cabinet of our ambassador for Women, Peace and Security, Jacqueline O’Neill. We do a lot of advocacy and back and forth with them.

We just released a report on how to apply the Women, Peace and Security framework inside Canada with a domestic lens — addressing questions such as military culture, violence against Muslim women, violence against LGBTQ+ communities and armed gang violence — and we make sure that Canada also applies a domestic lens to its next national action plan.

The Chair: Thank you very much.

Senator MacDonald: Ms. Santoire, I’m reading your statement, and you said your heart was grieving for women in Haiti, Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Afghanistan and Palestine. I think we all share those sentiments. However, I can’t help but notice that you mention nothing about the Hamas attack on October 7 of Israel where hundreds of girls and young women were raped and murdered.

I’m just curious why you didn’t mention that. Why wasn’t that part of your presentation?

Ms. Santoire: Of course, I’m aware that gender-based violence is committed by Hamas toward Israeli citizens — mostly women and girls — such as rape and other forms of sexual violence and sexual torture. I chose to focus on Israeli violence because I think that we should not look at this violence devoid of its context. We need to understand that this is a consequence of ongoing occupation — decades of occupation.

Senator MacDonald: That’s a very strong political statement.

I didn’t ask you about why you did it. I’m asking you why you wrote what you wrote. I’m asking why you showed no empathy for those young women and innocent people who were raped and murdered and slaughtered by the Hamas attack on October 7. Why did you avoid that? Why did you specifically ignore that?

Ms. Santoire: Thank you, Senator MacDonald. Of course, I have empathy. Violence against civilians is condemnable on all sides. No civilian should suffer such violence — whoever it is committed by.

However, I chose to focus on Israeli violence because I think this balance of power is totally unequal, and all this violence that we see committed toward Israeli citizens is not happening in a void. We should understand it as part of Israeli’s ongoing occupation of Palestine.

Senator MacDonald: You are trying to rationalize it.

Ms. Santoire: No, I’m not.

Senator MacDonald: You seem to be.

Ms. Santoire: Well, I don’t know what to say.

Senator MacDonald: Well, I think our universities are full of anti-Semitism, and I think you’re another example of it.

Ms. Santoire: I don’t agree with that.

Senator MacDonald: [Technical difficulties]

The Chair: Okay.

Senator Lankin: Mr. Chair, I don’t want to be a troublemaker — it’s my first time here — particularly with my friend Senator MacDonald.

I find that kind of beratement and assumption of a witness’s perspective to be inappropriate, particularly as we’re talking about gender issues here — to be issued by a man to a young woman student who is doing her doctoral research on this. I might agree with you that I missed that statement, but I don’t agree with that conduct at the table.

The Chair: Senator MacDonald, you still have about 40 seconds if you want.

Senator MacDonald: I have nothing to say.

The Chair: Okay. Thank you very much — so noted.

We will go to the second round, but I’m going to ask a question first of Professor von Hlatky.

Canada has had an ambassador for Women, Peace and Security for several years now. We will hear from her at tomorrow’s meeting. I’ll ask our ambassador this as well: For Canada staking out its position, and with the work that you have done — and I’m sure you have your international network as well — are there best practices that Canada can learn from other countries and other governments? I mean, the usual Europeans and Nordics come to mind, but are there others? Are there things that can be put into an inventory of best practices as you look ahead?

Ms. von Hlatky: Thank you very much for the question, Mr. Chair. I would point to the experience, for instance, of the EU as a good model for civil society engagement. I think that’s been a challenge across the board for Women, Peace and Security. That’s been one of the lessons learned from the last Canadian national action plan that can be applied to the one that’s currently being finalized: Create more space for civil society engagement, understanding that a whole-of-government process is essential to the successful implementation of Women, Peace and Security commitments, but also that there are still gaps when it comes to taking a whole-of-society approach. Finding the right mechanism for meaningful civil society engagement is challenging, but, in terms of policy development in a multinational context, I think the EU has some interesting lessons to share.

I think that NATO, by contrast, has had more challenges on that front. Perhaps that’s where we need Canada’s voice, along with other Nordic member states who have led on this question, including those who have, in the past, adopted formal feminist foreign policies. NATO currently has a civil society advisory panel, but I understand that there have been some interruptions in the consultations with that body.

Deepening that type of engagement with civil society interlocutors — both at the headquarters level and also across activities, whether it’s in Canada or in the NATO context — is where major improvements deserve to be made. On that front, we can look to other member states of NATO and other international organizations and regional organizations for guidance.

The Chair: Do your professional colleagues in these countries share your views?

Ms. von Hlatky: Across the board, there’s a fairly strong scholarly consensus, at least in the feminist literatures, that civil society engagement has been wanting — and that is a definite pathway for improvement of the agenda so that it is more responsive to the needs of different subgroups of the populations that Canada chooses to engage with in its international programming efforts.

The Chair: Thank you very much.

Senator M. Deacon: I’m going to ask this question to Dr. von Hlatky. Again, it’s going to look at expanding on something that you said in your opening comments.

I got the sense — and you’ll have to help me if I have misread it — you suggested that if NATO responds to Russian aggression with boots on the ground and a focus on defence spending, topics like Women, Peace and Security may, will or are falling by the wayside, as attention turns to the more traditionally recognized security threats. Is that a fair assumption? If so, what steps should Canada take within the alliance to ensure that the gains we have made are not lost?

We’ve touched a bit upon this in some other questions, but I just want to make sure that I’m clear.

Ms. von Hlatky: I’ll dive right in. My comment is informed by the fact that NATO has implemented Women, Peace and Security predominantly through the prism of crisis management and cooperative security — two of its pillars. It has experience in that realm, but less experience when it comes to the articulation of Women, Peace and Security for deterrence and collective defence.

It is definitely a challenge because the policy guidance is fairly vague and unclear in its official policy documents. Hopefully, the next iteration will provide some precision.

There’s an opportunity here to really think about deterrence and collective defence not only in terms of the number of personnel and tanks on the eastern flank, but also in terms of societal resilience. That’s key to the equation of deterrence. You need to have your societies on board, especially with the full spectrum of threats that NATO is exposed to. You cannot have societal resilience by excluding 50% of the population.

Senator Ravalia: This is a follow-up question for Professor von Hlatky.

Are you able to address how gender-based analysis can help improve military operational effectiveness and potentially lead to improved security based on your research and your collegiality with other members of the NATO community? Do we have examples in this regard that we can learn from?

Ms. von Hlatky: Thank you very much. The narrow focus on operational effectiveness in the NATO context has led to a few blind spots. It was an essential narrative to introduce Women, Peace and Security to military audiences, connecting it to the mission and mission success right away. But, at the same time, by having a narrow focus on military effectiveness, we’re losing an opportunity to think about security with a longer-term lens.

Of course, there’s always going to be this push of thinking through six-month increments in the military because that’s the length of a deployment, of a rotation. If we don’t design operations with the long game in mind, and how gender equality and improvements in gender equality can lead to long-term security and stability, we will keep facing — which we’ve been facing, unfortunately, with the latest missions — mission failure and withdrawal after very costly losses.

I would challenge Canada, NATO and the military stakeholders — who are often the first to respond in very volatile environments — to think through that longer-term lens with GBA Plus. That’s what GBA Plus and a focus on gender equality can deliver.

Senator Ravalia: Just to dig deeper, when you are doing this analysis, do we look at the changing demographic in Europe? Are we seeing a representation from minorities, individuals from the LGBTQ2S+ communities and Indigenous involvement, in terms of the women from these respective communities? Are they rising in the ranks within the military?

Ms. von Hlatky: In NATO member states?

Senator Ravalia: Yes.

Ms. von Hlatky: You definitely see some evolution in the representation of women and other under-represented populations in NATO member states. Certainly, you have seen it in Canada — probably too slow when looking at the ambitious nature of those targets. Of course, we collect that kind of data differently from one member state to the next, including for deployed personnel on operations.

That being said, it is important to raise these questions in the NATO context, and for Canada to be bold in raising this question to its member states because while NATO has adopted a diversity strategy, for instance, and tracks these numbers and pays attention to its LGBTQ staff and personnel, it isn’t the case for all member states — and Canada can be bold here in raising this.

Senator R. Patterson: Thank you for that response. I agree with you. I’m going to shift gears a little bit, and start focusing on the UN and Canada’s role in there.

To follow up, we have Women, Peace and Security, but just for clarification, there are other resolutions connected to it, and one of them is about gender-based violence, child soldiers, et cetera.

Now, on the Canadian front, we are participating in the Elsie Initiative for Women in Peace Operations, which I know you’re tracking. It’s quite a unique look at trying to help build Women, Peace and Security into voluntary nations that wish to be part of this.

Could you talk a little bit about the Elsie Initiative specifically, as well as Canada’s role, and do you think it’s a model that we should continue to pursue?

Ms. von Hlatky: Thank you. I’m very interested in the Elsie Initiative because this is one area where Canada made a bold move by launching a pilot initiative — and launching initiatives where it didn’t already have all of the answers.

In regard to the Elsie Initiative, this model of introducing a big, bold idea, and then inviting a lot of different players to the table to shape the contours of that initiative, is a good model to follow.

I have some reservations about providing financial incentives for meeting certain targets on the representation of women in the UN context, but, putting that aside, the Elsie Initiative has been successful in signalling Canadian leadership, and signalling — through diplomatic channels — the importance of the participation of women. It keeps this high in terms of visibility. It’s an opportunity to raise the topic in various diplomatic circles, and to gain buy-in from other member states.

Seeking some voices that have been traditionally under-represented in those conversations — from day one — is the model to replicate. I’ve written about the Elsie Initiative elsewhere, so I will park my caveats and my reservations for now, and I’ll say that the consultative model that emerged alongside the Elsie Initiative is definitely something to replicate. We don’t need, again, the perfect solution before launching a well-funded initiative to promote women’s participation in the UN and elsewhere.

The Chair: Thank you very much.

[Translation]

Senator Gerba: I will be very quick. I want to go back to the issue of representation. The UN secretary general stated recently that the participation of women contributes to establishing lasting peace. Yet there are few women mediators, even though it has been demonstrated that peace accords facilitated or negotiated by women are more long-lasting.

I have two quick questions. Why do we see such a paradox? My second question for you both is the following: What can be done to promote the participation of women in peace negotiations?

Ms. Santoire: You’re right. The paradox you mentioned is very frustrating and persistent. The research is very clear. It has been found that when women are signatories, mediators or negotiators, when women are at the negotiation table, the peace accords are more likely to last.

Your question is very broad, but I have some ideas as to why this paradox persists. First, diplomatic spaces are traditionally dominated by men. Further, in some cases, the number of women present is diverse; they are present but their voice is not given equal weight to that of men. There is also something called “corridor diplomacy” whereby informal decisions are made away from the negotiating table and to which women do not have access.

There has indeed been some progress, but it is extremely slow. Just last week, the secretary general noted that, among the peace accords signed in 2023, only one of them included a woman signatory. Diplomatic spaces are still strongly dominated by men. This is unfortunate because women’s expertise on the ground is truly essential in concluding and signing a peace accord.

[English]

Senator Lankin: I offer this question to either or both of you to answer.

I’m not sure of the year, but four or five years ago, the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians conducted a report and issued it on the progress of gender-based plus diversity across the community of national security and intelligence organizations. While I would say the review looked at the efforts that were made, the results were not what anybody would want.

Given that we can’t even recruit numbers to many of these organizations — defence, RCMP and others — have you seen a backsliding of the representation of women, both civilian and in combat, as well as in uniform in terms of the RCMP? Is it more at the senior levels, or is it right through the organizations? Do you have any comments on where we’re headed? Are the numbers looking better or worse?

Ms. von Hlatky: I’m sorry; I can’t comment on the RCMP numbers. I can maybe comment on the Canadian Armed Forces, which is more in my realm of expertise, by acknowledging that there are major personnel shortages right now that the Canadian Armed Forces is facing, both in the reserves and the regular Armed Forces.

The tailored marketing campaign efforts of the military have borne fruit when it comes to increasing the visibility of a career in the Canadian Armed Forces with women in the targeted demographic. There are hopeful signs.

If we’re talking about diversity writ large as well, the policy to open the door for permanent residents to join the Canadian Armed Forces has also been incredibly successful. There have been, of course, some challenges with processing some of the documentation, and doing security background checks in particular, but I think there are some encouraging signs on that front.

By no means do I mean to suggest that this is an effort that has come to its culmination, but I think that there are some encouraging trends, even if the overall personnel picture remains worrying from a trained effective strength perspective.

The Chair: Thank you, senators. On behalf of the committee, I’d like to thank our witnesses, Professor von Hlatky and Ms. Santoire, for being with us today. We appreciate your commentary.

For our second panel, we are pleased to welcome Yolande Bouka, Assistant Professor, Department of Political Studies, Queen’s University.

[Translation]

Finally, we welcome by video conference Marie-Joëlle Zahar, professor and director of the Research Network on Peace Operations at the Université de Montréal.

Welcome and thank you for accepting our invitation.

[English]

We’re ready to hear your opening statements. We’ll start with Professor Bouka — the floor is yours.

Yolande Bouka, Assistant Professor, Department of Political Studies, Queen’s University, as an individual: Good afternoon, everyone. It’s a pleasure to be among you today. I’m coming to you from here, even though I teach at Queen’s University. In addition to my position, I’m also the co-director of the Research Network on Women, Peace and Security, which is a network that is funded by the Department of National Defence. My work focuses on Women, Peace and Security in Africa.

In less than two years, we will be celebrating the twenty-fifth anniversary of the UN Security Council Resolution 1325 — one of the founding documents of the Women, Peace and Security agenda.

I would be remiss if I did not highlight the fact that while the agenda emerged after years of global exchanges across women’s movements, it is the leadership of Namibia who held the presidency of the Security Council that tipped the balance in our favour.

Prior to the adoption of Resolution 1325, there was some serious resistance against elevating and centralizing women’s issues, and the need for a stand-alone mandate to promote the equal representation of women in security practices. Selma Ashipala-Musavyi, who was Namibia’s deputy permanent representative to the UN at that time, along with a number of civil society organizations and other countries, pushed and shoved to allow a debate and a motion to pass Resolution 1325.

When Women, Peace and Security scholars share this story, they talk broadly and they often forget to contextualize the ways in which the Cold War — and its end — shaped many of the contributing women’s realities and experiences with insecurity, conflict and war.

In the case of southern Africa, the South West Africa People’s Organisation — today the leading party of the Government of Namibia — and the African National Congress — today the leading party in the Government of South Africa — fought a long war against the apartheid South Africa regime. Namibians and South African women contributed to the liberation of independent struggles as teachers, doctors, fighters and negotiators. They knew well before Resolution 1325 the role they had to play to ensure their community’s safety.

During these decades of conflict, Namibian and South African women also experienced first-hand how war impacted women uniquely and disproportionately. A UN delegation that visited the Cassinga camp in Angola reported the devastating impact and toll of the South African defence forces bombing and the massacre in the camp. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa only recorded a small fraction of the ways in which Black women were sexually tortured under the apartheid government. At the time, foreign policy imperatives aligned the U.S. government with the apartheid government, and linked them through various ways of provision of military training through various states. These alliances forged through the Western world order not only prolonged the war, but also shaped the experiences of some of the women who would move forward to contribute to the development of the Women, Peace and Security agenda. The end of the Cold War upended patronage links between undemocratic governments in Western countries, and brought about other forms of conflict and gendered violence around the world.

Today, thanks to the courage of Rwandan women and institutions like the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, we have a legal precedent for the prosecution of genocidal rape. It is on the suffering of countless women — who have experienced devastating violence — that we build our entire practice and discipline of Women, Peace and Security.

Before I conclude, I would like to cite a short section of the UN Beijing Platform for Action, which came five years before Resolution 1325. Paragraph 131 reads:

Violations of the human rights of women in situations of armed conflict are violations of the fundamental principles of international human rights and humanitarian law. Massive violations of human rights, especially in the form of genocide, ethnic cleansing as a strategy of war and its consequences, and rape, including systematic rape of women in war situations, creating a mass exodus of refugees and displaced persons, are abhorrent practices that are strongly condemned and must be stopped immediately, while perpetrators of such crimes must be punished. Some of these situations of armed conflict have their origin in the conquest or colonialization of a country by another State and the perpetuation of that colonization through state and military repression.

It has been over 30 years since Beijing and, as a country and international community, we still do not have the clarity or determination to develop foreign policies as if Black and Brown lives mattered. We struggle to take action informed by the Women, Peace and Security agenda as robustly in Palestine as we do in Ukraine, and sadly, we fail to see the dangers of our complicity in our allies’ imperial ambitions in places like Haiti. In the 23 years since the adoption of Resolution 1325, we’ve done a lot, but there is still a long way to go. Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you very much, Professor Bouka, for your comments.

[Translation]

Ms. Zahar, please go ahead.

[English]

Marie-Joëlle Zahar, Professor and Director of the Research Network on Peace Operations, Université de Montréal, as an individual: Thank you. I’m extremely sorry not to be with you in person.

As my colleague has already stated, it’s been almost 25 years since the Women, Peace and Security agenda was established. In those almost 25 years, it has become a normative framework that informs the ways in which — or ought to inform the ways in which — we think about international peace and security. However, nowadays, we are experiencing a global backlash against the agenda — a backlash in the form of populism and in the form of the rise of extreme-right movements, including in our own countries.

In this context, I would like to take the case of Afghanistan to highlight some of the things that we do well and, unfortunately, some of the things that we do less well. Currently, in Afghanistan, the situation of women is dire. When we and our allies decided to withdraw, we left behind women who had courageously come forward to become our partners in attempting to change the situation on the ground — not just for themselves, but for the majority of Afghan people.

The latest UN report on the situation of women in Afghanistan indicates that over 80% cannot any longer engage in income-generating activities, and that includes women who are the heads of households. And 48% speak of a serious deterioration of relations with male family members. Worryingly, 69% indicate that they have mental health issues due to isolation and despair.

What are we doing in this regard? Instead of securing the gains we made in the Women, Peace and Security space, we have actually failed our women partners in this country and, as my colleague has also highlighted, elsewhere around the world. When we started evacuating partners and resettling them upon the Taliban’s seizure of power in Kabul, the women peacebuilders — the same women that we, in Canada, and our partners had funded and supported — ended up falling to the bottom of our lists.

I have the honour of serving on the board of the International Civil Society Action Network, or ICAN — one of the non-governmental organizations, or NGOs, funded by Canada that has been a driver of this agenda since the very beginning. For the past three years, we have been fighting to convince both our government and our allies to actually accept more women peacebuilders and resettle them.

We have also failed these women by adopting a normatively understandable yet, unfortunately, empirically devastating policy of blank sanctions. The women in Afghanistan — the ones who were left behind — absolutely need our support in the same way that the women in Gaza today also need and deserve our support. Women’s organizations were at the forefront of efforts to respond to the earthquake that happened in Afghanistan about a year ago. The reason they were at the forefront was that they realized that female-headed households could not receive male assistance and, therefore, would be left alone.

ICAN, the organization of which I spoke, was able to deliver funding to help with this assistance, but it’s not easy to reroute funds that have been earmarked for something else to respond to urgent crises. However, that is the price and the cost to maintain our former partners in a situation where they can still operate and try to do good, and secure some of the gains they have made in the Women, Peace and Security space.

I would be remiss not to also talk about our efforts to include women in mediation and peace processes. These efforts — which were one of the important parts of the Women, Peace and Security agenda — have recently stalled. Not only are we unable to include more women in peace processes, but there are also fewer processes today than there ever were. In fact, we are increasingly supporting military and security responses to problems that cannot be resolved in ways other than through diplomacy and development.

The Women, Peace and Security agenda is an agenda that puts peace and negotiated outcomes at the forefront of efforts to resolve today’s conflicts in the world. Whether the women peacebuilders are in Ukraine, the Philippines, Iraq, Gaza or Afghanistan, they have all worried about the trend toward militarization — not only amongst those countries that we identify as threatening the liberal international order, but also amongst countries that defend, or claim to defend, the liberal international order.

Only two days ago, all the women’s organizations associated with ICAN, which are regrouped in an alliance for security and leadership, issued a call for us — our countries’ democratic leaders — to take stock of the fact that by supporting military solutions to conflicts, we are contributing to undoing the progress that was made in the Women, Peace and Security space. That call, I think, needs to be heeded.

It does take courage to deal with crises. It takes even more courage to actually sit at the table and deal with them peacefully.

Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you very much for your commentary, Professor Zahar.

We will go to questions. As before, senators, you have four minutes, and we’ll work toward a second round as well.

Senator Ravalia: Thank you to both of our witnesses for your testimony.

My question is for you, Professor Bouka. Are you using any specific metrics or evaluation methods that can be used to assess the impact of gender equality policies — and ensure they remain focused on the intended goals — rather than potentially using gender politics as an instrument for political optics?

I ask that question given the fact that there is some criticism that meaningful empowerment and influence may not necessarily accompany numerical representation.

Thank you.

Ms. Bouka: Thank you for the question.

It’s one of the challenges, whether we’re talking about politics, the military or mediating spaces. I teach my students that it’s the difference between substantive representation and descriptive representation. It’s whether you have the number of under-represented groups — whether they be women, sexual minorities or racial minorities — in the space that you want to diversify, and the actual type of representation, and their capacity to impact policy in the spaces in which they operate.

Theoretically, we have this kind of conceptual difference between substantive and descriptive. We often look at descriptive representation simply by looking at the percentage of women in armed forces and the percentage of women in parliaments. What we struggle more to do is assess the type of decision-making power they actually have.

In countries like ours — but also other countries around the world — we’ll try to ensure that we add and recruit very intensely. When we use a metric or a justification for inclusion that seeks to improve the quality of institutions, we do two things: The first thing is that we set the burden of changing of institutions on the individuals that we’re trying to put into those spaces. Then, the other challenge is the reality that the people who will be in these spaces — in order to be deemed efficient, or in order to look as if they are performing — will often adopt the very culture of the spaces we’re trying to change.

There is definitely a conceptual difference between substantive and descriptive representation, but depending on which institution we engage with, the emphasis will be different.

The Secretary-General of the United Nations recently made a statement — I think it was a month ago — about the ways in which they have tried to put women in decision-making power positions at the upper echelons of the United Nations. That, in and of itself, allows for more power and influence on policy. At the same time, we have to be very wary about expecting all women — who are in positions of decision-making — to make decisions that will be beneficial for women to begin with. That’s quite a challenge.

Senator Ravalia: Just very quickly, you alluded to the situation in Namibia and the South West Africa People’s Organisation, as well as the critical role that women played in the liberation. Has that transposed into an equality of power for women in Namibia today?

Ms. Bouka: That’s an excellent question.

Across countries where we’ve seen war, particularly in southern Africa, we’ve seen an increased number of women in politics, in parliament and in some decision-making positions. Initially in Namibia, after the liberation, women were not allowed to join the military. After, they were reintegrated. At the same time, in countries where you have seen war, while you have women in positions of power, you also have the legacy of war that leads to increased gender-based violence in women’s everyday lives. So it’s a little bit of a conundrum.

Senator Ravalia: Thank you.

Senator M. Deacon: Earlier, the comment was made about it having been 30 years — a generation — since this, and 25 years since that, so we are looking at a couple of generations. Learning a little bit more, my question concerns the generational trauma that would arise from rape in conflict — quite candidly.

I have to believe this trauma echoes into not only the generation that was affected, but perhaps also into the individuals who arose from such horrible actions. I wonder how the psychological scars will present themselves in 5, 10, 15 or 20 years down the road, and what we can do about it.

Ms. Bouka: It’s an excellent question.

The reality is that with war, broadly speaking, conflict-affected societies take quite a long time to recover from instances and episodes of violence. We have the case of Rwanda as a perfect example. Children — in Rwanda or Uganda — born out of rape, for example, have challenges in being accepted in their communities. The mothers who have given birth to those children struggle to reclaim their space in life as parents and as members of their families.

Dr. Erin Baines from the University of British Columbia has amazing research on children born out of sexual violence.

And sexual violence as a weapon of war is used by different institutions, but particularly by non-state armed groups. We are having a conversation here about the Women, Peace and Security agenda, and I’m focusing the majority of my remarks on state institutions and foreign policy, and countries who have been signatory or have accepted Women, Peace and Security.

The challenge is non-state armed groups around the world — whether they are in Latin America, the Middle East or Africa — are not actually abiding by these rules. We are facing situations where we have a framework that is focused on how states should behave, but we have less control over non-state armed groups.

Across generations, we know that traumatic experiences with violence, whether sexual or not, are felt not only in the body but also psychologically. There’s quite a bit of research on the ways in which chronic diseases that emerge from trauma can also be passed down from one generation to the next.

The Chair: Thank you. I see that Professor Zahar would like to jump in as well. We’ll let her jump in, please.

Ms. Zahar: I was nodding in approval of all that my colleague said.

I will maybe add one consideration. Although the trauma is often intergenerational, our funding and support do not follow. The structure of foreign aid to the recovery of societies is such that there is little space to think of programs in the long term, such as the programs needed to really assist in helping generations, both women and their children, recover from the trauma.

Part of the problem is also the inability to really think systemically about how to approach these things. Although the Government of Canada, for example, has made the funding of the Peace and Stabilization Operations Program, or PSOPs, and Global Affairs Canada be multi-year, that still is relatively medium term compared to the kind of challenges raised by trauma and intergenerational transmission.

[Translation]

Senator Gerba: I want to stick to our current topic and get back to my question. I think you were already here when I asked about gender-based violence. We seem to have lost a lot of ground in this regard. What could Canada do to reduce violence? What could be done to improve the situation of women and better protect them in conflict zones?

Ms. Bouka: That is quite a complex matter. First of all, we are facing what is called the patriarchal backlash, in various contexts politically and in security matters. I think there is also a problem in society. The UN recently conducted a survey of men’s gender roles in general. It found that young men of a certain generation have much more traditional views than the previous generation. It is not a big difference, just a few percentage points.

As a result, despite our efforts to promote gender equality and reduce gender-based violence, we find that, in a context of economic and political inequality, there is a hardening of certain forms of masculinity that encourage or increase violence against women in security contexts, as we might call them here depending on one’s perspective, and in conflict zones. Even in countries that should be promoting the security of women, there is an increase in violence against women in general, globally, in fact. So that is a risk we are facing in the context of rapidly increasing inequality. This is a systemic, economic and social issue, in our countries and elsewhere. What can be done? A much more systemic analysis of inequalities beyond gender is needed, including economic and racial inequalities, and so forth.

Senator Gerba: Thank you.

Ms. Zahar: Yes, once again, I completely agree with what Yolande said. I would add that the enormity of the task can sometimes cause us to feel paralyzed and give up.

What can Canada do, strategically speaking? As of right now, wherever we are working around the world, we can think seriously about how we can ensure the safety of the women we are working with.

I mentioned Afghanistan earlier. We have worked with extraordinary Afghan women on the issue of women, peace and security. Those women chose to work publicly on a subject that they knew was not widely agreed upon in their country. They knew they were taking risks.

Nonetheless, as a donor country that has supported them, we should have put those women at the top of our list when we started getting our partners out of Afghanistan. They were actually at the bottom of our lists. We gave priority to police officers and all kinds of people, but the women who were working for NGOs on women, peace and security issues ended up making desperate calls to their partner, saying that people were trying to kill them, that they were moving from house to house every night to try to survive. They were pleading for help. By the time we got to the bottom of the list, it was too late. The Taliban had closed the borders and it had become too difficult.

We need to make a commitment when we establish programs: Those programs must include physical protection for the women we work with. Perhaps that cannot be extended to the entire population at this time.

Yolande is right: All of this requires thought about the inequalities and how international systemic conditions contribute to these backlashes and the increase in violence. At least, though, we can protect the people we work with and ensure they are not made vulnerable as a result of their association with us.

The Chair: Thank you, Ms. Zahar.

[English]

Senator Lankin: Professor Zahar, you spoke, I believe, about the hope that this kind of framework being brought to life more and more every day would move us to a situation where women play a role in an alternative dispute resolution — I’m going to call it that — as opposed to the violence of war. Where is the discussion, the mediation and the coming together of common values and ideas where they exist? I think Professor Bouka spoke about that in Namibia.

I have argued for many years and have been active in trying to get more women of all political parties, and non-partisan women, involved in the political process to bring those voices because I believed when there is a critical mass, it would change the dialogue. I’m not sure that the critical mass of women changes the dialogue in today’s world. I’d like to know how you view implementing such a situation. How do we bring women to a table where the men who are waging war don’t want to set a table?

Ms. Zahar: That’s an important and difficult question.

To your point about critical mass, I honestly think that if I look back at the last 15 or 20 years, I can seldom identify a situation in which we had a critical mass of women included — we’ve had women included. My colleague highlighted earlier that the inclusion of women does not necessarily mean that it is going to shift the balance because we have to ask the following: Who are the women who are included? Whom do they represent? What is the real effective decision power?

Having said that, there was more that we could do. The last two years, and the resurgence of war as a way of settling problems, have put a bit of a dent in my optimism, if I may. I have to admit, though, that we have not done as much as we could have.

I have been involved with the United Nations as an expert on mediation — for part of my tenure there actually lent by the Canadian government to support the Syrian peace process. The Syrian peace process was often hailed as an example of the way in which we should include women, except that the women whom we included were not necessarily seen as representative by their counterparts in Syria, and they were not really given the space to express their political opinions. They were framed as “peacebuilders,” and, as peacebuilders, they were required to have consensus among themselves. As we know, when people have different ideas, even if they have the same objective, it means you are going to agree on some sort of lowest common denominator.

There were better ways in which we could have thought about inclusion. It’s ways that would allow women — the same as men — to express differences among themselves, yet work toward the objective of peace.

I would dare say that, even today, with the situation developing in Israel-Palestine, the women peacebuilders — who, until October 7, were actually working hand in hand across lines to try to build peace — are still there, but they are not the ones we privilege when we’re talking about the situations. They are not the ones we showcase, and, unfortunately, when the time comes to talk across sides, they will not be the ones invited.

There is definitely space to do much better in this realm than we have collectively done. This is not just about Canada, but, in general, the actions that we have done in this realm have been more symbolic than really strategic.

The Chair: Thank you very much. We’re out of time there, Senator Lankin. Did you want to go to the second round? Okay. Thank you.

I’m going in hot pursuit of Senator Lankin’s question because I found the answers very interesting.

In some parts of the world, you have what is called Track 2 initiatives. They are all about building confidences — not necessarily a mediation exercise, but it’s about getting there. Some countries have sponsored some of them. Some have been successful, but with others, you really have to have a lot of patience and see what happens.

Usually, the people who are involved tend to be older and might have had a previous career, and they are almost invariably all male.

As we look at Track 2 situations in any part of the world, I’m wondering whether there might be a push — or maybe I’m being a little naive on that — where we could get more women — former practitioners, and people who are outstanding in their communities, with knowledge of the culture and languages — involved at the table.

This is a question for both of our witnesses. Professor Bouka, I will go to you first.

Ms. Bouka: Thank you so much for the question.

One of the great examples of this particular type of thinking is the African Union — where I’m conducting some research on Women, Peace and Security — where they have understood, in theory, the need for women practitioners and mediators. At the moment, they have an organization attached to the African Union called FemWise-Africa. They conduct a lot of training for women mediators.

What is interesting, however, is the assumption that women need training in order to engage in mediation. The President of Togo, for example, was called to mediate a crisis in the Sahel during a coup. He has limited training in mediation, but he’s a head of state.

There’s this perception about the obstacles to women entering these spaces of mediation, as my colleague mentioned a little bit earlier in the previous session, as well as the reality of homosocial capital, which is the capital shared between people of the same gender. The capital that men are able to exchange in terms of knowledge and networking ends up predicating more who will be in mediation spaces than the availability of women or the types of training that women get.

There’s definitely a need to break down barriers more than trying to identify women because the women are there.

There is a quick example that I will give before I let my colleague speak. During the coup in Mali, the Economic Community of West African States, or ECOWAS, decided they wanted to put an embargo on Mali. Mali is landlocked, and that would have prevented trade. It was the women of a civil society organization — I don’t think you can call it Track 2; it’s Track 3 diplomacy — who, on the margins of the margins, went and negotiated against the embargo in order to ensure that the population would not be punished by the decision of the military junta. All we saw in the news media was the men having conversations, but the protection of women, children and unprivileged civilians was actually done by women who have a variety of experiences in those spaces.

There’s a challenge between the assumption of what women need and the reality of the changes of the culture and practices in the world of mediation.

The Chair: Thank you very much. Professor Zahar, I see that you’re nodding. You would probably like to make a comment as well, so please go ahead.

Ms. Zahar: It will be very brief because part of what we can do is ensure that if the men do not want to bring the women along, those of us who are in those spaces can bring the women as experts and advisers. That is, unfortunately, the kind of political capital that our countries do not expend enough.

Women from Afghanistan have, time and again, lobbied Canada, the U.S. and other countries to make sure that they were going to be at the discussions in the Gulf when there were still discussions between the Taliban and the U.S. No one brought them along.

There’s more we can do, but I totally agree; I was nodding and laughing because I happen to be part of a so-called pipeline of senior women of talent at the UN, and all we are offered is training that I could have provided to my undergraduate students because it is so basic.

There is a failure to recognize that women actually know stuff, and that they not only have experience but also knowledge bases that can be applicable, including the knowledge that people don’t necessarily identify as relevant.

Professor Bouka talked about women in Mali. I have had the privilege to work with women in the Sahel. The way in which they engage within their communities with radical actors is actually something that we can get inspiration from in terms of our own policies, except it’s not visible because no one is interested in finding out what it is that they do and how they do it, and to learn from them — because we think we know better.

The Chair: Thank you very much. I’m so glad that I asked the question. Those were two very good responses.

Senator Hartling: Thank you for your wonderful presentations. I’m substituting tonight for my good friend Senator Boniface. In one way, I’m glad I came. In another way, it’s disturbing to hear about this. I want to thank you for your presentations and good work.

I was interested when Professor Zahar was talking about Beijing. I was involved with the World March of Women in 2000, and we were so hopeful of change. Now we’re seeing this backlash, and it’s very disturbing because we want to go forward. Frankly, I think women are tired of struggling with the day-to-day domestic violence in Canada and around the world. We do need some men to be our allies.

What do you think our committee here in the Senate can do to support you in some of the things you’re talking about? Do you have any suggestions? It’s nice to hear all of this, but it sort of leaves me thinking this: What can I do as an individual, or what can we do, to support some of these issues?

Ms. Bouka: The Women, Peace and Security agenda is based on four main pillars: participation, protection, prevention, as well as relief and recovery. I’ve said somewhere else that I think our country prides itself on engaging in participation and protection and, many times, in relief and recovery.

The pillar that is missing, in all honesty — and it goes back to what Professor Zahar was saying a bit earlier — is prevention in terms of rethinking how we respond to crises in a way that is not always militarized.

I also agree with her that when we turn to military options, we actually undermine the very ways that we can protect women from violence and conflict. For me, I’m also a critical scholar of world systems, and I’m part of those scholars who are looking at long-term trends of colonization, imperialism and capitalism, and the impact that it has on issues such as inequality, as well as issues of racial hierarchies in the world system.

One of the key things that this committee, and also our government, should be involved in — or, at least, try to take very seriously — is a type of foreign policy that we put forward in order to prevent conflict or encourage mediation as opposed to the militarization of solutions.

I want to make a distinction between — what we’ve called for the past few years — feminist foreign policy and simply the type of foreign policy in which we understand the reality that the militarization of solutions to crises only leads to more violence. We have to think about the cost of intervention not only in terms of tanks or deployment of troops, but also, as we were talking earlier, the long-term impacts of violence and entrenched violence in the long term.

It’s about rethinking foreign policy in a way that will lead to ensuring that violence is not what we resort to first, or even second, in order to prevent the escalation of militarized conflict. Systemically, this is where we should spend a lot more time. We do the participation. We want to include women. We want to protect women and children, and we deploy peacekeepers, police and relief services. Where we fail is in the prevention.

The Chair: We’re slightly over time, but I do want to give Professor Zahar a chance to respond, if she wishes.

Ms. Zahar: This is going to sound like a broken record because I agree, again, with everything that Professor Bouka has said. I would add only one thing.

Part of the way in which we need to think and craft our foreign policy is not just about pursuing our own interests. We claim to be a normative country — to have a foreign policy based on norms. These norms, particularly feminist norms, involve collaborating with our partners on the ground in various countries. A more systematic consultation with allies and partners in countries where we are trying to develop prevention measures is essential to make sure that the way in which we do things does not end up worsening situations — particularly for women, but also through the women — for the entire society.

It’s about prevention with consultations and partnering with the women on the ground to understand what the priorities are, and to think through different options in terms of how we formulate our foreign policy and how we implement it in practice.

The Chair: Thank you very much. Thank you, Senator Hartling, for the question. You should join us more often on this committee.

[Translation]

Senator Gerba: I think she answered my question.

I want to return to the situation in Africa. You mentioned Mali. It seems there are in fact a lot of women involved in peacekeeping in Africa, but they are confined to informal roles. You touched on that. I would like to know whether Canada’s foreign policy — Canada’s feminist policy — could be helpful. What more could it do locally to prevent violence against women?

Ms. Bouka: Ms. Zahar, you worked in that region for a long time.

Ms. Zahar: That is an excellent question, senator. For the time being, much of our support in the region relating to conflict resolution is focused on the Elsie Initiative, that is, the inclusion of women in peacekeeping forces as blue berets. As Ms. Bouka suggested earlier in her answers, a tremendous burden is being placed on those women because their inclusion is expected to change the way things are done in military institutions, given that it is indeed military members who are deployed from the various countries participating in those missions. There is also the expectation that their presence will create strong ties with the societies where those troops are deployed. They are being asked to do the impossible. Those women are doomed to fail.

The number of women deployed has indeed increased slightly under the Elsie Initiative. Many women who were questioned by researchers expressed reservations about this approach: Upon their return, they believe that their deployment created problems, including domestic issues in families that are not considered and for which no assistance is provided.

Further, we often provide support to women working for NGOs. I have already touched on the limitations of that support, since it essentially depends on a positive evaluation of the context. As soon as the context deteriorates, such as in Mali, our presence shrinks and we leave the women we put forward to face the storm alone. In short, a stronger commitment to providing support is needed, including when the situation is deteriorating.

Of course, I think Ms. Bouka could say a lot more about this. More serious thought must be given to the areas in which we must invest in order to support change in various countries. Right now, the focus is on the military. Consideration is also given to civil society and NGOs, but the structural economic inequalities that contribute to the persistent instability of those countries are overlooked.

The Chair: Thank you.

[English]

Senator Lankin: Thank you very much to both of you. This question follows up on our chair’s question to you.

Professor Zahar, you talked about those places where you are trying to put in place the prevention model that Professor Bouka spoke about. You gave some examples about the Elsie Initiative.

Are there other examples that you could set out for us? Is it all on the shoulders of women in the not-for-profit, UN-supported and state-supported networks? Are there states involved conscientiously in trying to bring about places of prevention where there are roles for women to play in mediation, et cetera?

Ms. Zahar: I don’t know whether I can say there are states that are seriously involved. There are states that have made nods to the agenda and have adopted — including some with the support of Canada — national action plans on Women, Peace and Security. However, as I think both my colleague and I have highlighted, this is the kind of change that is structural and long term, and that needs sustained accompaniment.

As you have probably gathered, I straddle academia and the world of policy. In my own engagement, I’ve found that one thing we haven’t done as well — but which is quite important — is strength in numbers. Connecting and networking women from the various NGOs — not only within countries, but also across countries — is something that I think is quite important for them to exchange best practices, knowledge and information, and also to support one another.

I was very lucky back in 2018 to have support from the PSOPs to launch what I thought was quite a unique experiment — selecting 25 women from the five countries of the Sahel region to, in part, train them. I say “in part” because they taught us more than we taught them. The idea was to present a framework for training that would be adapted and owned by them so that, therefore, they would identify the things they wanted support on. That connected the women across the region.

One thing that I found very interesting — because I’m still on WhatsApp with most of these women — is how they have all mobilized across borders to help each other in times of need. The women in Niger and Burkina Faso were supporting their colleagues in Mali during the coup. The women of Mali, Niger, Mauritania and Chad were supporting the Burkinabé women when things got tough in that country. Finally, most recently, all of them helped the Niger women draft a statement to call for non-violent dialogue so that Niger doesn’t go the way that Burkina and Mali have gone — which is increased violence that has been wreaking havoc in communities, particularly in rural and already vulnerable areas.

The Chair: Thank you, professors. We have only one minute left, and I want to see if Professor Bouka wants to respond to Senator Lankin’s question.

Ms. Bouka: Absolutely. Some of the initiatives also take place in regions. Professor Zahar talked about the Sahel, and one of these organizations is the West Africa Network for Peacebuilding, or WANEP. They’re not country-specific, but a network of organizations that work with regional, like ECOWAS, which is for the West African community, and then the East African community. They have their regional frameworks and instruments that try to implement the Women, Peace and Security agenda in their region, and some of this work is supported by various partners.

Ultimately, like the women’s movement of the 1990s, the synergies across women’s participation are required — across countries, but also across regions. I think that WANEP in West Africa is a perfect example of what is possible when women have the capacity not only to work in their own countries, but also to participate, to exchange ideas and strategies and to support one another. The creation of transnational networks ultimately yields amazing dividends.

The Chair: Thank you very much. On behalf of the committee, I’d like to thank Professor Bouka and Professor Zahar for being witnesses today. It was a very rich discussion. I think we had some good take-aways from it.

Tomorrow, we will hear from the ambassador for Women, Peace and Security when we meet at 11:30 a.m. tomorrow morning.

(The committee adjourned.)