Pursuant to notice of September 30, 2020, moved:

That the Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade be authorized to examine and report on the situation in Hong Kong, when and if the committee is formed; and

That the committee submit its final report no later than February 28, 2021.

He said: Honourable senators, what we are witnessing in Hong Kong is part of a larger series of events, events that the Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has said represent “the most challenging times we have known since the 1930s.” Senators will be familiar with the history of Hong Kong, which was a British Crown colony until 1997, when it was transferred to Chinese control pursuant to an agreement between the United Kingdom and the People’s Republic of China.

I recall that at the time of that transfer, there was both trepidation and hope. There was trepidation because China was a communist state where human rights had not only been shockingly abused but where mass murder on an unimaginable scale had taken place during the Cultural Revolution. But, despite that history, there was also hope; hope that China had changed internally.

China had, after all, liberalized its own economic system. And while the memory of the Tiananmen Square massacre was still fresh, there was hope that China would now respect its agreement with the United Kingdom to maintain Hong Kong’s capitalist system and its way of life for a period of at least 50 years.

For some time after 1997, there appeared to be optimism that this initial hope would be vindicated. Hong Kong was mostly left alone and the freedoms that existed there continued. However, underneath the surface, a fundamental conflict festered. There has been a conflict between the people of Hong Kong, who want to see the territory evolve into a true democracy, and the Chinese Communist Party, which clearly is not prepared to permit that to happen. Indeed, over the past decade, the regime has sought to assert greater and greater control over Hong Kong. These steps culminated in an open conflict in 2019, starting with the measures that would have allowed the extradition of individuals to mainland China.

The result has been what we have all witnessed with tens of thousands of Hong Kong citizens marching in the streets and an increasingly brutal response on the part of both Hong Kong authorities and the Chinese government. Yet, through it all, the resilience of the people of Hong Kong has only increased. It has persisted in the face of increasingly brutal state tactics involving the arrests of thousands of protesters and the enactment, this past June, of a national security law.

Amnesty International regards the law as one that could result in a life sentence in detention for the accused for even the slightest criticism of the Chinese Communist regime. Definitions in the law of terms like “subversion” or “support for secession” are so vague that virtually any opposition to the government can trigger its provisions. People can be arrested for possessing flags, stickers or banners. They might be arrested for wearing the wrong T-shirts or for singing certain songs.

Gloria Fung, president of Canada-Hong Kong Link, recently told the House of Commons Special Committee on Canada-China Relations that the law’s extraterritorial provisions are so broad that:

Anyone anywhere in the world who criticizes the Chinese or Hong Kong governments could be considered a criminal under its vaguely worded provisions . . . .

Also incorporated in the national security law is a provision permitting suspects to be removed to mainland China, a provision which Amnesty International warns could be a precursor to secret detention and torture.

Simultaneously, both the Hong Kong government and the Chinese authorities have increasingly restricted democratic and political freedoms in Hong Kong. Pro-democracy advocates have been barred from standing as candidates in elections. Legislative elections that were to take place this fall have been postponed.

That move prompted a joint statement from the foreign affairs ministers of the Five Eyes countries condemning the “unjust disqualification of candidates and disproportionate postponement of Legislative Council elections.”

As frightening as all of these developments are, they are part of a much broader pattern of coercion and intimidation by the Government of China. For instance, when the British Foreign Secretary, Dominic Raab, recently protested the measures, arguing that they violated China’s 1997 commitments, China warned that it might cease to recognize British-issued Hong Kong passports, thereby threatening hundreds of thousands of persons holding such passports in Hong Kong.

Similarly, last month, the Chinese ambassador to Canada warned that if Canada were to grant asylum to Hong Kong protesters, the “health and safety” of 300,000 Canadian passport holders in Hong Kong might be placed at risk. It is hard to imagine more coercive behaviour.

Honourable colleagues, I’m also concerned about the implications of what we are witnessing in Hong Kong with respect to Chinese state actions elsewhere. We should recognize by now that the Chinese state does not pay much attention to international law or norms. It has, for instance, ignored a ruling by a Hague tribunal in 2016 that its territorial seizures and island-building campaign in the South China Sea are illegal under international law.

At the time, the Chinese Communist Party’s official organ, the People’s Daily, mocked that decision saying that the international law tribunal was “a lackey of some outside forces” that would be remembered “as a laughing stock in human history.” What I worry about most is that China’s approach on both domestic and international human rights issues no longer pays any regard to either human rights or our international laws. This is an orientation that we must start to come to terms with, and it is something that I believe our Foreign Affairs Committee should examine closely, bringing in both international and national scholars for their analysis.

I am most concerned that the Government of Canada still does not have a full appreciation of what we are dealing with in relation to Chinese state policy. The Prime Minister has proclaimed:

We will stand up loudly and clearly for human rights all around the world, whether it’s talking about the situation faced by the Uighurs, whether it’s talking about the very concerning situation in Hong Kong, whether it’s calling out China for its coercive diplomacy.

In July, Foreign Affairs Minister Champagne said, “We are considering all the options when it comes to standing up for human rights.”

But if we are to be honest, the government has been saying this for some two years now, long after China grabbed Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig off the streets and took them hostage without due process.

Colleagues, I believe that the government’s lack of any concrete action is due to the fact that it believes it can return to business as usual with China.

Indeed, just last month our government issued a statement on the fiftieth anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Canada and Communist China. In that statement, Minister Champagne made reference to the arbitrary detention of Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor, but his statement also said:

The common future of Canada and China depends on the rule of law, respect for rights and freedoms and for people in all their diversity. At the same time, we will continue to seek dialogue and cooperation where it makes sense to do so.

I do not understand where in recent Chinese state actions there is a foundation for believing that this will happen.

I understand maybe the goodwill of our government to try to find a resolution to this conflict of values, but clearly their dialogue and our compromise is not working. I see absolutely no indication that the Chinese state is interested in the rule of law. It is delusional to believe that it is interested in rights and freedoms for people “in all their diversity.” And I see no interest in dialogue and cooperation unless that takes place entirely on terms set by the Chinese Communist Party.

That, it seems to me, is how the Chinese state behaves internally. That’s how it’s behaving in relation to its own minorities and in relation to the people of Hong Kong.

It’s also how it is behaving internationally in the South China Sea, in the East China Sea vis-à-vis Japan, in relation to India, in relation to Taiwan, where President Xi Jinping has several times in recent months threatened war unless Taiwan yields to Chinese demands for reunification under the Communist Party. What we are witnessing is a fundamental clash of interests and values that cannot simply be wished away.

In the face of this, Canada requires a new policy approach that must be premised on effectively standing up for the rule of law and for respect of international law. We need to become firm. We need to become solid in defending these values.

Michael Levitt, the former Liberal chair of the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee, recently wrote in the Toronto Star:

. . . the idea that a nation’s borders create a shield of impunity against being held accountable for its human rights abuses is categorically false and contrary to the important lessons we draw from the Holocaust and other tragic moments in our history. Human rights are universal and it is the obligation of Canada, and all countries, to defend these rights and seek accountability for abuses, wherever and whenever they occur.

Now is the time for much more than a change in tone. It is a time for action. As the chair of the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee during the last Parliament, I was a strong proponent of the use of Canada’s Magnitsky Sanctions to hold gross human rights abusers to account.

That’s Mr. Michael Levitt’s perspective, and I completely agree with Mr. Levitt. I believe that we as parliamentarians can assist in moving Canadian policy in a more realistic and more effective direction.

Witnesses appearing before the House of Commons Special Committee have said there are several actions that Canada might look to take, such as implementing Magnitsky sanctions as per our motion right here in this chamber, endorsing the appointment of a United Nations special rapporteur on Hong Kong and offering an expedited path to permanent residency for Hong Kongers seeking asylum.

We have a motion right here on the Senate floor calling for Magnitsky sanctions. Let’s take advantage of that opportunity, colleagues, and let’s make a firm statement and do it expeditiously. We have a government that prides itself on welcoming asylum seekers to Canada with open arms. Why aren’t we putting in place an expedited path for asylum seekers from Hong Kong, even those already here in Canada?

Whatever actions we take, I believe that we have to take them multilaterally, and we should start creating the basis for a unified and effective approach in the face of human rights violations we are witnessing in Hong Kong and other places in the world. Threats and intimidation from the Chinese Communist Party and its representatives can no longer deter us from taking action.

I believe that the Senate of Canada must engage itself on this issue, and therefore I ask senators to support this motion, send it to our Foreign Affairs Committee and start pushing our government to stand up for the values that Canadians expect us to stand up for. Thank you very much.