Canada has no Place on the U.N.S.C.

Central Executive Committee, June 2020

The YCL-LJC condemns the Canadian States bid for a seat on the United Nations Security Council. As a Pan-Canadian and working class internationalist organisation we will always remain committed to building the movement for peace and solidarity. Since our 27th Central Convention unmasking the Canadian States growing role in NATO Imperialism and helping build Solidarity movements have been prioritized. 

The simple fact that Canada is an active member of NATO, committed to reach the Organisation’s expectancies by increasing the military budget by 73% is enough to discredit Canada’s bid to the Security Council. NATO is a criminal cartel in the eyes of International Law and constantly violates the UN Charter’s most fundamental principle: the inalienable right to self-determination and sovereignty of the countries. 

The increasing hostility of the Trudeau-Freeland government and their lockstep march with Donald Trump’s NATO agenda have pushed the world closer to the brink. Competition among imperialist states to seize resources and markets, and appropriate the wealth of other people have led the Canadian state to interfere in the affairs of other sovereign states notably Bolivia, Haiti, Haudenosaunee, Honduras, Mali, Syria, Ukraine, Wet’suwet’en, and Venezuela. We reject  military interference, illegal blockades and the mobilization of economic sanctions that harms the people and intensifies international tension.

Canada remains one of the largest exporters of armaments globally. Canada refused to join 122 countries represented at the 2017 UN Conference to negotiate a legally binding covenant for Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons. Canada continues to oppose the Basel Ban Amendment on the export of waste from rich to poor countries, which became binding in late 2019. Trudeau failed to ratify the United Nations’ Convention against Torture. Ottawa has refused to ratify more than 50 International Labour Organization conventions. In November 2019, Canada once again refused to back a widely supported UN resolution on “Combating glorification of Nazism, neo-Nazism and other practices that contribute to fuelling contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance. Canada is also currently imposing sanctions on 20 countries, asphyxiating them in a particularly difficult period of global pandemic, a time when international collaboration and cooperation should be the main goal.

 The Trudeau government has continued the shameful Harper era policy of unconditional support for the zionist project. Canada has voted against more than fifty UN resolutions upholding Palestinian rights backed by the overwhelming majority of member states since 2015. The Canadian government has refused to abide by 2016 UN Security Council Resolution 2334, calling on member states to “distinguish, in their relevant dealings, between the territory of the State of Israel and the territories occupied in 1967.”

Canada, under Trudeau and Freeland has also taken part in regime change operations in Latin America, especially in Venezuela. Their government has not only been an active partner in the coup d’État attempts against the Maduro government: it has been at the vanguard of all imperialist attacks against Venezuela through its leadership role within the Group of Lima, and by being one of the first countries of the world to recognise the putschist and fascist Juan Guaidó as President. Even in Cuba, where Canada has a track record of respecting the country’s sovereignty, Canada has started to follow the US’ lead by closing the Visa application centre at Havana’s Embassy, by buying into the US’ crafted conspiracy theory around sonic attacks and by refusing to denounce the extension of the Chapter 3 of the Helms-Burton Law. 

More recently, Trudeau’s refusal to denounce Trump’s murderous response to the current anti-racist demonstrations shows once more that allowing Canada to have a seat at the UN’s Security Council would be to reinforce the voice of US and NATO imperialism, which is the biggest threat to peace and to the sovereignty of the peoples over the world. 

Therefore, we strongly endorse the Canadian Foreign Policy Institutes petition ‘CANADA DOES NOT DESERVE A SEAT ON THE UN SECURITY COUNCIL’. 

As young communists, we need to bring binding action resolutions to student and trade unions. We will continue our work of bringing internationalist perspectives to the struggle of the youth and building the Peace and Solidarity Movements.