Video of Saudi armed vehicles will help court challenge of arms deal, lawyer says

[Foreign Minister Stéphane Dion got a warm welcome from Saudi Arabia’s ambassador at a March 24 event. GLOBAL NEWS]

The Globe and Mail’s video evidence of Saudi Arabia using armoured vehicles to violently quell dissidents will advance the court challenge of the Trudeau government’s arms deal with the Middle Eastern country, said the law professor who is leading the lawsuit.

Last week, the newspaper released video showing Saudi Arabia using armoured vehicles to quell minority Shia Muslims in its Eastern Province. The video added to mounting evidence that Ottawa’s $15-billion arms deal with Saudi Arabia could supply weapons that may be used against the country’s civilian population.

The lawsuit argues the Liberal government is obliged to uphold Canadian export rules and the Geneva Conventions Act that bar Canada from exporting military equipment to countries whose governments persistently violate the human rights of their citizens — unless Canada can demonstrate there is no risk the equipment may be used against the population.

“You just need to prove before a court that there’s a risk, that some equipment may be used to breach human rights,” said Daniel Turp, the professor of international and constitutional law at Université de Montréal who is leading the court challenge with a group of law students and a Montreal law firm.

“Things have evolved in a positive way for us and our lawsuit,” he said of the new video. “That’s really good and convincing evidence, in my opinion, for a court of law.”

The light armoured vehicles (LAVs), furnished with machine guns and anti-tank cannons, are to be built in London, Ont., by General Dynamics Land Systems Canada, a subsidiary of the similarly named U.S. defence company. As part of the former Conservative government’s efforts to build an exporting defence and shipbuilding industry in Canada, the deal will support 3,000 Canadian jobs over 14 years.

The government of Stephen Harper had lobbied Riyadh for the contract, brokered by federal agency, the Canadian Commercial Corp. In April the Liberal government approved export permits to ship $11 billion worth of the $15-billion agreement.

“I have said from the very beginning that the Canadian government, led by me, will not cancel a contract signed by a previous government,” Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in the House of Commons on May 11. “We need to be able to project upon the world that when Canada agrees to something, it sticks to its word.”

The Liberals appear to be taking into consideration broader, longer-term diplomatic issues while weathering criticism for providing arms to a country that violates human rights.

A Global Affairs Canada memo to Foreign Minister Stéphane Dion, obtained by Turp, showed that the department had recommended approving the Saudi export permits because the vehicles could help Saudi Arabia counter “instability in Yemen” and fight the Islamic State.

Saudi Arabia and Canada are both members of the U.S.-led coalition against ISIS, and Ottawa sees Saudi Arabia, despite its human rights record, as an important ally that collaborates on refugees, counter-terrorism and regional peace and stability.

“If this government had to make this decision from scratch, they wouldn’t (do it), but they’re stuck with it,” said Steve Saideman, the Paterson chair in international affairs at Carleton University. “If you cancel it, it would hurt relations with the Saudis, and it might send signals to everybody else that Canada is unreliable because its policies flip quite dramatically after every election.”

Saideman said jobs are also a consideration for the Liberals who would be criticized for killing employment if they reneged on the contract.

Dion has said he would block export permits for equipment built in Canada that is “wrongly used regarding human rights.”

Former Conservative senator Hugh Segal, author of the new book “Two Freedoms: Canada’s Global Future,” said cancelling the contract would set back relations with Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf states, and send a poor signal to other countries that have contracts with Canada.

“The intellectual and economic influence they exert has been broadly positive. That’s why over the last 40 years the United States, Great Britain, France, Germany and Canada have sold them arms, on a continuing basis,” Segal said of Saudi Arabia. “I would argue the Liberals have done the responsible thing.”

Turp, who’s hoping to find out by the end of the month when the case will be heard, said countries such as the Netherlands have banned arms exports to the Saudis.

“What lacks here is courage,” he said. “There might be diplomatic consequences, but when it comes to human rights, you have to make those choices.”