A welcome turn

The Trudeau government is finally having its faced rubbed in an obvious but uncomfortable truth: you can’t sell weapons to a major human rights violator without getting your fine principles mussed up.

Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland has asked her department to get to the bottom of reports that Saudi Arabia has used Canadian-made armoured vehicles in operations against its own civilians. If true, that would be a violation of the terms of Canada’s arms deals with the Saudis.

Certainly, the Canadian public deserves to know the truth. Photos and video have come to light that apparently show Gurkha armoured cars, manufactured in Newmarket, Ont., being used against civilians in Saudi Arabia’s Eastern Province.

The eventual answer may well not be as clear-cut as the government — or Canadians generally — would like. The Saudi regime is engaged in increasingly violent actions against its Shia Muslim minority in the eastern part of the country. But while groups such as Amnesty International describe it as a crackdown on Shiite civilians, the Saudi government calls it an operation against “terrorists.”

Freeland says she is “deeply concerned” and promises to “take action” if it becomes clear the Saudis have violated their contract with Canada. It’s not clear, however, what action that could be. A sharp talking-to by Canadian officials isn’t going to make much of an impression on a regime that sees Shiite activists essentially as domestic agents of its hated rival, Iran.

The minister’s tougher language is nonetheless a welcome change of tone from the early months of the Trudeau government, when Freeland’s predecessor, Stéphane Dion, bent over backward to justify another, bigger arms deal with the Saudis.

That’s the sale of light armoured vehicles (LAV), a deal worth $15 billion that directly supports 2,100 manufacturing jobs in London, Ont. Dion stressed that he had no choice but to sign off on the deal, negotiated by the Harper Conservatives in 2014. It was vital, he said, to show Canada can be relied on to carry through with its international commitments, regardless of which party is in power.

At the time, Freeland was Trudeau’s minister of international trade and publicly supported Dion in endorsing the LAV sale to Saudi Arabia, despite human rights concerns. “It is important that the government of Canada is a trusted negotiating partner for international counterparts,” she said — even if the “counterpart” in this case violates human rights on a routine basis.

Now, as foreign minister, she is striking a different note. She is sending a clear signal that human rights concerns are playing a more important role in the government’s calculations.

This is all to the good, and if it turns out the Saudis have indeed violated their agreements with Canada then the government may have no choice but to pull the plug on arms deals with Riyadh.

That would come at a stiff cost, both in jobs and in Canada’s relationship with Saudi Arabia. But not acting in the face of clear evidence that the Saudis cannot be trusted would carry its own costs in terms of Canada’s international reputation, as well as its selfrespect.