Government urged to rein in Canadian Commercial Corporation on arms deals
OTTAWA — The Crown corporation that arranges Canadian arms sales abroad has to be stopped from making deals with human-rights violators that become practically impossible for the government to cancel, say two international arms-trade watchdogs.
Project Ploughshares and Amnesty International say the upcoming ratification of the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty gives the governing Liberals a chance to prevent a repeat of the controversial deal the Canadian Commercial Corporation signed with Saudi Arabia in 2014 to sell $15 billion worth of Ontario-made light armoured vehicles.
The unassumingly named Canadian Commercial Corporation is a federal agency that helps Canadian companies sell all sorts of goods, including weapons, to foreign governments. The Trudeau Liberals say they are bound by a contract it arranged to sell the armoured vehicles under the previous Conservative government and have cited undisclosed penalties that would cost Canada billions of dollars if the federal cabinet blocks the deal.
The government is reviewing all future export permits for sales to Saudi Arabia in response to the October murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey. Saudi Arabia is also one of the countries fighting in a civil war in Yemen, which has ground to a stalemate with rebel forces in control of much of the country.