The Arctic: The Final Frontier
February 5, 2010 § 1 Comment
This weekend, the G7’s finance ministers are gathering in Iqaluit, in the Canadian Eastern Arctic, to discuss the fallout from last year’s global economic meltdown, as well as how best to prevent the same from happening again. The meeting comes amidst questions about the on-going relevancy fo the G7 in the face of the creation of the G20 to handle the global economy.
That the meeting is being held in the Arctic is both interesting and significant, as Canada is currently attempting to bolster its claim to various lands and waters in the Arctic, as are the US, Russia, Norway, and Denmark. That the G7 is meeting in the Canadian Arctic is surely no coincidence.
Canada is also caught up in a sort of new Cold War with Russia, its neighbour across the North Pole, in the Arctic. Russia has just announced it is going to spend another $50 million USD on hydrographic and geophysics research along the Arctic Ocean bed. This comes as Canada, Russia, and the other Arctic nations face a UN-mandated deadline to register their claims to the Arctic according to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. Norway did so over a year ago, whilst the other 3 Arctic nations. The 5 Arctic nations face staggered deadlines, Norway’s was last year, Russia’s this year, Canada’s in 2013. Denmark has a claim to the Arctic through its possession of Greenland.
Under UNCLOS, panels of scientists will assess the validity of uncontested claims in the Arctic, but the 5 nations themselves will sort out their own disagreements when it comes to disputed claims.
For example, Canada’s mapping effort is focussed on proving that 2 massive under-water mountain chains, the Alpha and Lomonosov, are geologically connected to North America. If this is indeed the case, not only will Canada benefit, but so, too, would Denmark and the US. Hence, whilst Canada is carrying out the majority of the mapping work, it periodically co-operates with the Danes and Americans. Meanwhile, both Canada and the US will come to loggerheads over the Beaufort Sea and its oil & gas reserves, whilst Canada, Denmark, and Russia are expected to have competing claims to the territory around the North Pole. And then there is the battle over the Northwest Passage. Canada hopes to prove the waters within the Arctic Archipelago belong to it, meaning the Passage would be Canadian. This would limit access to the Passage as a shipping chanel as global warming causes the ice in the passage to melt.
Cross-posted at Current Intelligence.
Off the Deep End…
January 26, 2010 § Leave a comment
Yesterday, Canada’s Fisheries Minister, Gail Shea, was hit in the face with a tofu cream pie, due to her support of the seal hunt in Canada. PETA quickly claimed responsibility for the act. OK, big deal. A nice publicity stunt, got the topic back on the national radar here in the Great White North. But today, Liberal MP Gerry Byrne, who represents a Newfoundland riding that has an interest in the seal hunt, suggests that this makes PETA a terrorist organisation:
When someone actually coaches or conducts criminal behaviour to impose a political agenda on each and every other citizen of Canada, that does seem to me to meet the test of a terrorist organization…I am calling on the Government of Canada to actually investigate whether or not this organization, PETA, is acting as a terrorist organization under the test that exists under Canadian law.
Moreover, says Byrne, the pie-in-the-face (which occurred in Burlington, Ontario, some 3,200km west of Newfoundland) is a threatening act which puts hunters and sealers at risk.
Oh boy.
Cross-posted at Current Intelligence.
UPDATED: It seems that PETA got a taste of its own medicine in St. John’s, Newfoundland. On Friday, a PETA member dressed in a seal costume outside of a speech by Canadian PM Stephen Harper was pied in the face by an unidentified man. No one is wondering if he’s a terrorist, however.
In slightly-related news, I saw a bumper sticker in rural Western Massachusetts that read: “PETA: People Eating Tasty Animals.” Said bumper sticker was on a pickup truck with a gun rack, containing 3 rifles, and carrying 2 hillbillies in hunting gear. I had to laugh.
Canada and Its Inferiority Complex
October 6, 2009 § 8 Comments
Last week, I published a review of Canadian journalist John Lorinc’s new book, Cities: A Groundwork Guide, over at the Complex Terrain Laboratory. As much as I liked and enjoyed this book, I found myself wondering, though, as I read this book, was what is with Canadians’, or maybe just Torontonians’, obsession with Toronto?
Toronto is mentioned more than any other city in the world in Lorinc’s book. More than London, Hong Kong, Sao Paolo; more than Nairobi, and New York. Toronto is mentioned more than twice as often as Canada’s other 2 major cities: Montréal and Vancouver. Moreover, Montréal is usually, though not exclusively, mentioned in a negative light. Not Toronto.
We are a nation with an inferiority complex, that I can accept. Toronto’s wiki page, though, is kind of sad, as it has to point out that: “As Canada’s economic capital, Toronto is considered a global city and is one of the top financial centres in the world.” It is indeed a top financial centre in the world, somewhere around 20th. Great. Who cares, really.
Why can’t we just stand on our own merits and not have to defensively point out that we can play with the big boys? I liked Canada more when we were an unassuming nation, proud to be what we are, but not a neighbourhood bully or the whiny little brother of the USA. This inferiority complex is getting out of hand.
And whilst Lorinc, on the one hand, is showcasing Toronto for the domestic audience, it is kind of sad that it has to come at the expense of Montréal and Vancouver, and that Toronto is mentioned more often than any other city in the entire world. Years ago, the Vancouver band, Spirit of the West, wrote a song about this, called “Far Too Canadian;” times have changed, though, we are no longer content to be the unassuming, quiet Canadians. Now we’re becoming a bunch of loudmouths. I like the old way better.
we’re #4!!!
October 5, 2009 § Leave a comment
the un released its human development index rankings today. canada ranks as the 4th best place in the world to live. not so bad, i suppose, to be ranked #4. it ranks after norway, australia, and iceland. but i find this kind of disturbing, really. norway, fine. i’ve got nothing against norway, nor really australia, either. but iceland? iceland is practically bankrupt, one of the hardest hit nations in the world during the current economic meltdown that we may or may not be recovering from. how that can be translated into a #3 rating is beyond me. but i guess the economy is only part of the hdi, but i do wonder what will happen to iceland next year. and to be fair, iceland did fall from 1st to 3rd this year.
meanwhile, canada. canada spent a long time atop the annual hdi. in 1992, and from 1994 right through to 2000, this was the best place in the world to live, at least as measured by the compilation of statistics by the un. but, hey, that’s not a bad thing. canada was the first dynasty of the hdi, which the un only began publishing in 1990. norway is the current dynasty, having been first from 2001-2006 and now this year, its reign only punctuated by iceland’s two chart toppers in 2007 and 2008.
and whilst canada is by no means a poor place to live, its measurement in the hdi has consistently ranked it in the top 10, most often in the top 5. but this slippage does get me worried in some ways. canada tends to fall down these rankings due to its poor record vis-à-vis the aboriginal population and the vast amount of poverty on reserves around the country, as well as the incredibly difficult circumstances aboriginals in urban areas tend to face. and yet, and yet…every government in the past decade has sworn to do better by the aboriginal population. and every government does nothing. last week, the globe & mail visited what it called “ground zero” of the h1n1 outbreak in canada, an indian reserve at wasagamack, manitoba. wasagamack is an incredibly isolated community, 600 km north of winnipeg, a trip made by air and water taxi.
wasagamack made headlines last month because health canada sent out 200 body bags instead of supplies to fight a possible outbreak of h1n1. this was a great insult, because death is taboo in aboriginal culture, death is not prepared for, death is dealt with when it arrives, but not beforehand.
at any rate, as the newspaper article shows, this nation lags on dealing with the very real threat against the human rights of canadian aboriginals. i have been on reserves in various parts of this country, and in some cases, conditions are appalling. and spare me the rightwing argument they only have themselves to blame. that is utter bullshit. reserves were created on marginal land the country over. traditional ways of life were discouraged by the government, languages were lost, and so on. when “modern” housing was promised, the results were disappointing. places like wasagamck have homes inundated with mould, improper sanitation, like no running water, broken windows, and sagging foundations.
this is a national embarrassment. i recall, back when i worked on aboriginal claims, canada 2000. i lived in ottawa, and i was working on a claim that involved the forced removal of several groups of inuit in northern manitoba and what is now nunavut to new locations. the government, in some cases, claimed it was due to the need for food. the caribou, which the southern inuit relied upon for food, had changed their migration patterns and were experiencing a dip in their population. but rather than let the inuit track their new routes south and west of their location, they were moved to churchill, manitoba, where they were put on the dole and disease stalked them. further north, the inuit were moved around the arctic like pawns on a chessboard for the government, as a means of shoring up canadian sovereignty in the arctic during the cold war (aboriginals and the arctic are two issues in canadian politics where politicians talk the talk but continually fail to walk the walk). and so here i was in ottawa in 2000, 40 years after these events up north. and all i could feel was revulsion at my country, that this was allowed to happen.
one civil servant at northern affairs canada argued, quite forcefully, that the government had done the right thing, that it knew better than the inuit as to how to survive. i was dumbfounded, i was astounded that this attitude still existed in the government.
and meanwhile, each successive government talks about improving the quality of life of aboriginals on and off reserves. and each government fails. even the current conservative government, with a minister of health, leona aglukkaq, who is an inuit from nunavut, has continued to fail. indeed, it was aglukkaq’s government which sent out the body bags to wasagamack.
Nationalism, Globalism & The Economy
February 27, 2009 § Leave a comment
A few weeks ago, French President Nicholas Sarkozy dismissed nationalism in Québec as tribalism, amongst other things, and suggesting that the world has moved on. This set off a frenzy amongst nationalists here, not surprisingly, who have been keenly and actively using the economic downturn to argue that Québec would be better off as an independent country.
Meanwhile, in the United States, President Barack Obama’s first stimulus package contained a “Buy American” clause for major items and industries, like steel. This set the United States’ trading partners, including the EU and Canada into a rage and was Obama’s first mis-step on the international stage, which he and his administration have spent a lot of time backing away from since.
Québec and the United States demonstrate, in many ways, the old way of doing things. During an economic crisis, to withdraw, to become protectionist, and tribal. Meanwhile, in the European Union, at least at a political level, the impetus has been quite the opposite: Europe has branded together to attack the economic downturn, to try to find solutions. Sarko’s rejection of québécois nationalism is something that plays out in his politics, and those of the rest of the Europe.
And whilst the actions of European politicians may be at odds with some aspects of the European population, what I find more interesting are these two competing notions of how to deal with the economy today. During the Depression of the 1930s, nations became protectionist and introverted, led by the United States, the country that, in many ways, had the most to lose with the Stock Market Crash in 1929. The Depression, I should also point out, lasted for most of the 1930s. So maybe protectionism is not the correct model for surviving this recession? Whatever we think of globalism, good or bad or ambivalent, it might be time to recognise its reality, that we do live in a globalised economy, with an emergent global culture, and respond to the recession in that spirit. The world’s response to the “Buy American” clause of the US stimulus package was telling. Canada and the EU told Obama and his administration that protectionism was not acceptable in this day and age (nor is it entirely legal according to the US’ trade pacts with Canada and the EU), and that rather than turn inwards, the world’s governments need to work together in order to solve the problems with the economy.
Of course, that then leads to the question of whether deep structural reforms are necessary, as the European Union seems to suggesting insofar as the banking and securities industries are concerned, or not, as Canada and the United States are suggesting. Will this bring conflict and argument about a New World Economic Order?
The Wild, Wild West
February 24, 2009 § Leave a comment
On 14 October 2007, Robert Dziekanski was trying to immigrate to Canada. His mother already lived in the interior of British Columbia, so Dziekanski flew from Gliwice, Poland, to Vancouver. But things went horribly awry at the Vancouver International Airport. After a long, drawn out immigration process at Customs at the airport, Dziekanski was frustrated. For one, he didn’t speak English, so he needed help with the immigration process. Meanwhile, his mother, Zofia Cisowski was waiting for him in the airport at arrivals. But she could get no information about her son’s arrival, and at one point was even told by Canadian customs officials that he was not in the airport at all. Around 10pm on the night of 13 October, she gave up and went home to Kamloops, several hours away from Vancouver. She though Dziekanski had missed his flight.
Meanwhile, Dziekanski was increasingly agitated, and violent. He threw a computer and a table across the customs area. Staff and other passengers could not calm him down. No one could speak Polish. But, at the same time, no one thought to call airport maintenance worker Karol Vrba, who could. Indeed, Vrba even offered his services, but was told to go back to work. Meanwhile, the RCMP were called to deal with Dziekanski. Officers were told that he was “extremely drunk.” Toxicology reports show he hadn’t been drinking.
As anyone who has followed this story, Dziekanski was killed that night by the RCMP, tasered to death.
What scares me is that the testimony of one of the officers in front of the inquiry into Dziekanski’s death, we have been told that the four officers who responded all came individually in their own cars, and did not discuss a game plan as to how to deal with the situation, neither over their radios nor in person upon arrival. Indeed, Cst. Gerry Rundel reports that he felt threatened, “to a certain degree” because Dziekanski was acting in a “to hell with you guys” manner towards the police. No kidding. 10 hoursof being caught in a Kafkaesque purgatory at the Vancouver International Airport, refused access to his mother, and refused any comprehensive translation services, who wouldn’t be upset?
This is from Cst. Rundel’s testimony at the Braidwood Inquiry, as summarised by The Globe and Mail yesterday:
“One bystander pointed Mr. Dziekanski out to the constable, and another told him that the man did not speak English.
Constable Rundel said he did not discuss these insights with the other officers.
He described Mr. Dziekanski as unkempt, sweaty, “perhaps disoriented,” and in a state consistent with intoxicated males he had seen in his policing experience.
“I recall Constable Bentley asked Mr. Dziekanski a question to the effect of ‘Hi. How are you doing?'”
Mr. Dziekanski said some words “in a language I did not understand,” and gestured to his luggage, prompting Cpl. Robinson to say “No” sharply and gesture to Mr. Dziekanski to stay away from the items, Constable Rundel said.
The officer said he assumed Mr. Dziekanski’s response suggested he understood basic gestures, adding he did not think Mr. Dziekanski’s lack of English was a barrier to communication.
Mr. Dziekanski stood up and moved away, but he had a “to hell with you guys manner,” Constable Rundel said.
He said Mr. Dziekanski flipped his hands up and moved away from the officers in what was deemed to be “non-compliant” way.
“I recall his combative behaviour. I recall fearing for my safety to a certain degree.”
He said this was a situation in which his training had taught him a taser could be used.”
It was not Cst. Rundel’s call to use the taster, he was not the ranking officer there. But Dziekanski was tasered a total of five times. The most frightening thing here for me is that the RCMP seems to think that this is acceptable. That using the taser gun is a viable means of law enforcement. Ignoring study after study after study that suggests that the taser is not entirely safe, the RCMP (and other police forces across Canada, do a google search) have continued to use tasers, resulting in 16 deaths in Canada between 2003 and 2007. In many of these cases, such as Dziekanski’s, I find it hard to believe that police officers, who are supposed to be trained in such things, could not convince the targetted person to calm down. In Dziekanski’s case, there was one of him and four police. Surely four trained police officers could subdue one disoriented, upset Polish construction worker without tasering and killing him.
Finally, in February 2009, some 16 months after Dziekanski’s death, the RCMP has revamped its rules of engagement for the taser gun. While this is a positive development, I am left wondering what in the hell took them so long?
Matthew Barlow 