Trudeau’s Liberals clueless on foreign policy
NOT ONLY ... NAÏVE AND UNDIPLOMATIC, BUT ... INEFFECTIVE — TASHA KHEIRIDDIN
“Iwant to take this opportunity to speak with our brothers, the Taliban. We call on you to ensure the safe and secure passage of any individual in Afghanistan out of the country. We call on you to immediately stop the violence, the genocide, the femicide, the destruction of infrastructure, including heritage buildings.”
Those words were spoken Wednesday by Maryam Monsef, Canada’s minister for women and gender equality. Unsurprisingly, her use of the term “brothers” generated a firestorm. “The language used by the Trudeau government is completely unacceptable,” Conservative leader Erin O’toole riposted. “I think of the women and girls in Afghanistan who are at risk with the Taliban regime once again coming into place. Canadians deserve a government that will always stand up for our values.”
Monsef, who was born in Iran to Afghan refugee parents, defended her remarks as a “cultural reference,” but was called out on social media, including by Muslim journalist Fatima Syed who tweeted “FACT: ‘brothers’ is a term of respect FALSE: Muslims call the Taliban ‘brothers’ OPINION: this was dumb SOLUTION: Move on; there’s lives on the line.”
But the opposition has not moved on. That’s because, while foreign policy is traditionally not a ballot question, when a gaffe like this feeds a larger narrative, it can shift the course of a campaign.
That’s what happened almost exactly six years ago. A photograph of three-year-old Syrian refugee Alan Kurdi, lying drowned on a Turkish beach, went viral one month into the 2015 federal election campaign. Alan, his mother and brother died trying to reach Europe in a rubber raft; their father claimed the family had applied for asylum in Canada but their application had been rejected as incomplete. NDP MP Fin Donnelly then reported that he had hand-delivered the family’s file to Citizenship and Immigration Minister Chris Alexander, already on the hot seat for the slow pace of refugee approvals from Syria, who rejected it for the same reason.
This incident had a profound impact on the election, because it fed into a larger political narrative: that the Conservatives were uncaring, anti-refugee, and racist. Further announcements by the Tories compounded the problem: less than a month later, the Tories pledged to appeal a Supreme Court ruling in favour of Zunera Ishaq, a woman who had refused to remove her veil to take the citizenship oath; a week after that, Alexander and fellow Tory candidate Kellie Leitch announced the Tories would set up a “tip line” to report “barbaric cultural practices” such as female circumcision and forced marriage. In Alexander’s view, that was the nail in the coffin; after nearly 10 years in government, the Tories were turfed, and Liberal leader Justin Trudeau promised to usher in a new era of “compassionate” foreign policy.
In 2021, the roles are reversed. It is the Liberals who are in government, asking for a third mandate, defending a foreign policy record that can only be described as a series of fails. These include the PM’S disastrous trip to India in 2018, Canada’s “dilettante” attempt at obtaining a seat on the UN security council in 2020, and China detaining two Canadian citizens for the past two years while openly mocking Trudeau as a “boy” who has turned Canada “into a running dog of the U.S.” Add to that Trudeau’s incredulous statement this week, that he is “concerned” about revelations that his government contracted to build a $100-million Canadian ferry in China (the Tories immediately pledged to terminate the deal), and it is clear that when it comes to international relations, the emperor not only has no clothes, he has no clue.
Monsef’s comments shone the spotlight on a larger narrative: competency. Not only is this government naïve and undiplomatic, but it is ineffective: Canada’s efforts to evacuate Afghans who assisted Canada’s war efforts have been described as a “catastrophe.” The subtext is: if the Liberals can’t manage the foreign affairs file, how can we trust them to manage anything? And if that’s the story that sticks, they are in serious trouble.